Meet Some of AIChE’s Recently Elected Fellows

Azita Ahmadzadeh is a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) modeling specialist at UOP, a Honeywell Company. In addition to her leadership roles in AIChE’s Chicago Section, her activities on the Institute level are extensive. These include leadership positions in the Fuels and Petrochemicals Div. and service as a session chair at Spring and Annual meetings, as well as for the Process Development Symposium. She is also a member of the Career and Education Operating Council, the Particle Technology Forum, and the Women in Chemical Engineering Community. She earned her PhD in chemical engineering from Illinois Institute of Technology.

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Victor Breedveld is Professor and Associate Chair for Undergraduate Studies in Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology. His research focuses on the structure and rheology of complex fluids. In particular, he works with the development and use of novel experimental techniques to elucidate the microstructural dynamics of complex fluids, and also works with interactions between fluids and solid substrates, with a special interest in extreme non-wetting of porous materials and droplet manipulation. He is Vice Chair of AIChE’s Career and Education Operating Council and recently chaired AIChE’s Student Chapters Committee. He also serves as student chapter advisor at Georgia Tech.

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James Gilchrist is the Ruth H. and Sam Madrid Professor of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at Lehigh Univ., where he directs the Laboratory for Particle Mixing and Self-Organization. His research includes nanoparticle self-assembly, suspension rheology and transport, coatings, microfluidics, chaotic mixing, and granular dynamics, with applications in solar energy, optoelectronic and nanostructured materials, bioseparations, and technologies for pharmaceutical, automotive, architectural, and optically adaptive coatings. He has been a leader of AIChE’s Particle Technology Forum and served on the Executive Board of the Program Committee, and he has also been involved in meeting programming on fluid mechanics topics.

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Erdogan Kiran is the Alexander F. Giacco Chair Professor of Chemical Engineering at Virginia Tech, where he served as Department Head from 2000 to 2005. His research focus is on supercritical or compressed fluids and their applications in polymer modifications and processing, and his leadership includes organizing numerous international workshops devoted to supercritical fluids. In 1988, he established the Journal of Supercritical Fluids, for which he remains editor-in-chief. He is also the editor of the Elsevier book series Supercritical Fluid Science and Technology. He is a 50-year member of AIChE.

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Julia A. Kornfield is the Elizabeth W. Gilloon Professor of Chemical Engineering at the California Institute of Technology. She joined Caltech after performing doctoral work at Stanford Univ. and postdoctoral research at the Max Plank Institute for Polymer Research. Her research group designs and synthesizes new molecules guided by an understanding of their physics. Applications of this work include non-invasively optimizing a lens after it is implanted into a patient’s eye. She is co-founder of Fluid Efficiency, which uses “megasupramolecules” to improve hydrocarbon transport and safety. She was elected to the National Academy of Engineering and the National Academy of Inventors.

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Rachel A. Segalman is the Kramer Professor of Chemical Engineering and Materials, and the Schlinger Department Chair of Chemical Engineering at the Univ. of California, Santa Barbara, where she is also Associate Director of the Center for Materials for Water and Energy Systems. Her research group works on controlling the structure and thermodynamics of functional polymers for energy applications including polymeric ionic liquids and semiconducting and bioinspired polymers. She was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the National Academy of Engineering. Among numerous honors, in 2022, she received AIChE’s Andreas Acrivos Award for Professional Progress in Chemical Engineering.

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