WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Dr. Michael A. Bevan, assistant professor in the Artie McFerrin Department of Chemical Engineering at Texas A&M University, will receive a 2004 Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE) in a ceremony today (June 13) at the White House for his innovative research investigating colloidal and surface interactions.

Bevan and a second Texas A&M honoree, Dr. Luis R. Garcia (assistant professor of biology) will be among 58 of the nation's best and brightest young scientists and engineers honored today in a ceremony presided over by John H. Marburger III, science advisor to the president and director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. PECASE recipients will meet with President George W. Bush and have their photos taken prior to the ceremony in the Eisenhower Executive Office building in the White House complex.

The award, established by President Clinton in 1996, is the nation's highest honor for scientists and engineers at the outset of their independent research careers. Eight federal departments and agencies join together annually to nominate the top young scientists and engineers for the PECASE who broadly advance the frontiers of science and technology to benefit the agencies' missions.

Bevan was one of 20 chosen for the honor by the National Science Foundation (NSF). NSF selects its PECASE winners from the most meritorious of those scientists and engineers who receive the NSF CAREER Award, which Bevan received in 2004. Bevan was selected for the PECASE for his pioneering research on measuring and manipulating colloidal interactions involved in assembling nanoscale materials and devices on patterned surfaces.

"Dr. Bevan's groundbreaking work is exciting on its own merits, but especially so for the future of engineering," said Dr. G. Kemble Bennett, vice chancellor and dean of engineering. "We are extremely proud of the contributions Dr. Bevan is making to the theory and practice of engineering, and he is most deserving of this prestigious recognition. He, indeed, is a bright, young star on the rise."

Colloids are very small solid particles that can be dispersed in a liquid such as water. Latex paint, for example, is a colloidal mixture in which insoluble latex colloids remain dispersed as the result of particles repelling each other.

Bevan's research focuses on understanding how to assemble nanostructures on surfaces by measuring interactions between colloids, surfaces and external fields. The approaches being developed by Bevan are critical to realizing a variety of new materials with applications ranging from photonics to biomaterials to nanodevices.

When there are no attractive interactions between colloidal particles, they tend to wander away from each other -- the way a drop of food coloring diffuses throughout a glass of water. However, by controlling the interactions between particles and surfaces, they can "self-assemble" into larger structures with interesting behaviors and properties.

Measuring the weak colloidal interactions that control these assembly processes allows Bevan to know which kind of forces and how much to apply so that particles assemble properly.

"We measure the very weak interactions between particles that are necessary to manipulate these `bottom-up' assembly processes," Bevan said. "With the right types of interactions, particles can naturally assemble into interesting and useful structures."

Such colloidal structures include photonic crystals that can be used as chemical sensors or perhaps one day in computers that do with light what a semiconductor does with electrons in current microelectronic devices.

Bevan is currently extending such approaches to biological applications in measurements of protein interactions and protein self-assembly.

"No one's ever measured proteins in this way before. It's very important to medicine, and we are currently trying to perform these measurements more sensitively and directly than existing techniques," Bevan said.

Bevan's collaboration with several education experts at Texas A&M is leading to an innovative, interactive complex fluids and nanotechnology course. He is using information technology to integrate visuals and animations from his research program into classroom lectures. Plans also include using such approaches to communicate research to underrepresented groups, K-12 students, and local science teachers in outreach programs.

Bevan is the second Texas A&M Engineering faculty member to receive a PECASE Award. Dr. David Ford, associate professor in the chemical engineering department and holder of the Kenneth R. Hall Professorship in Chemical Engineering, received the award in 1999 for his work solving the problem of aging materials in the nation's enduring nuclear stockpile.

"PECASE Awards are exceedingly special and rare," said Dr. Ken Hall, head of the chemical engineering department and holder of the Jack E. and Frances Brown Chair in Engineering. "Moreover, it is much more likely that scientists receive them than engineers. We are excited and proud that Mike Bevan's excellent work has made our department one of very few that has multiple PECASE awardees."

Bevan joined the Texas A&M Engineering faculty in 2002. Prior to joining Texas A&M, he was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Melbourne, Australia, and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Bevan holds B.S. degrees in chemistry and chemical engineering from Lehigh University and a Ph.D. in chemical engineering from Carnegie Mellon University.


Presidential Early Career Awards for Scientists and Engineers
National Science Foundation
White House Office of Science and Technology Policy

For more information, contact

Source: Dr. Michael A. Bevan
979/847-8766
Faculty page
mabevan@che.tamu.edu

Reporter: Lesley Kriewald
lesleyk@tamu.edu
(979) 845-5524

News Story 1178, June 13, 2005

Direct page link:
http://engineeringnews.tamu.edu/news/1178

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