Beckham, Gong, Sneddon: First Winners of the ACS Sustainable

Editorial pubs.acs.org/journal/ascecg

Beckham, Gong, Sneddon: First Winners of the ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering Lectureship Award ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering and the ACS Industrial & Engineering Chemistry Division are pleased to announce the first winners of the ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering Lectureship Awards. The awards recognize early career (first 10 years or less) investigators' research contributions to green chemistry, green engineering and sustainability in the chemical enterprise from three regions: The Americas, Europe/Middle East/Africa, and Asia/Pacific. The three winners were selected from among many outstanding nominations. The inaugural winners of the ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering Lectureship Award are: • Dr. Gregg T. Beckham of the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory (Golden, Colorado, USA), honored for his research contributions in lignin valorization and cellulase enzyme structure−function relationships.1−5 He is a Group Leader and Senior Engineer in the National Bioenergy Center. • Professor Jinlong Gong of Tianjian University (Tianjin, China), honored for development of chemical technologies for sustainable hydrogen production and CO2 capture and conversion, and green approaches for selfassembly of multicomponent hybrid nanostructures.6−10 He is the Deputy Director for the Key Laboratory for Green Chemical Technology of Ministry of Education. • Dr. Helen F. Sneddon of GlaxoSmithKline (Stevenage, United Kingdom), honored for developing and implementing greener solvent and reagent guides, and developing greener approaches to drug discovery.11−15 She is GSK Head of Green Chemistry and an active member of the ACS Green Chemistry Institute Pharmaceutical Roundtable. The winners will be honored at an I&EC Division symposium at the 253rd ACS National Meeting in San Francisco, California, April 2−6, 2017. We thank the sustainable chemistry and engineering community for the enthusiastic response to our inaugural call for nominations. Details of the next award cycle will be available in Spring 2017 or by sending inquiries to [email protected].

(2) Vardon, D. R.; Franden, M. A.; Johnson, C. W.; Karp, E. M.; Guarnieri, M. T.; Linger, J. G.; Salm, M. A.; Strathmann, T. J.; Beckham, G. T. Adipic acid production from lignin. Energy Environ. Sci. 2015, 8, 617−628. (3) Linger, J. G.; Vardon, D. R.; Guarnieri, M. T.; Karp, E. M.; Hunsinger, G. B.; Franden, M. A.; Johnson, C. W.; Chupka, G.; Strathmann, T. J.; Pienkos, P. T.; Beckham, G. T. Lignin valorization through integrated biological funneling and chemical catalysis. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U. S. A. 2014, 111 (33), 12013−12018. (4) Payne, C. M.; Knott, B. C.; Mayes, H. B.; Hansson, H.; Himmel, M. E.; Sandgren, M.; Ståhlberg, J.; Beckham, G. T. Fungal cellulases. Chem. Rev. 2015, 115, 1308−1448. (5) Knott, B. C.; Haddad Momeni, M.; Crowley, M. F.; Mackenzie, L.; Götz, A. W.; Sandgren, M.; Withers, S. G.; Ståhlberg, J.; Beckham, G. T. The mechanism of cellulose hydrolysis by a two-step, retaining cellobiohydrolases elucidated by structural and transition path sampling studies. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2014, 136, 321−329. (6) Chang, X.; Wang, T.; Zhang, P.; Wei, Y.; Zhao, J.; Gong, J. Stable Aqueous Photoelectrochemical CO2 Reduction by Cu2O Dark Cathode with Improved Selectivity for Carbonaceous Products. Angew. Chem., Int. Ed. 2016, 55, 8840−8845. (7) Huang, Z.; Liu, Y.; Zhang, Q.; Chang, X.; Li, A.; Deng, L.; Yi, C.; Yang, Y.; Khashab, N. M.; Gong, J.; Nie, Z. Collapsed Polymerdirected Synthesis of Multicomponent Coaxial-like Nanostructures. Nat. Commun. 2016, 7, 12147. (8) Chang, X.; Wang, T.; Zhang, P.; Zhang, J.; Li, A.; Gong, J. Enhanced Surface Reaction Kinetics and Charge Separation of p−n Heterojunction Co3O4/BiVO4 Photoanodes. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2015, 137, 8356−8359. (9) Yue, H.; Zhao, Y.; Zhao, S.; Wang, B.; Ma, X.; Gong, J. A copperphyllosilicate core-sheath nanoreactor for carbon−oxygen hydrogenolysis reactions. Nat. Commun. 2013, 4, 2339. (10) Wu, G.; Zhang, C.; Li, S.; Huang, Z.; Yan, S.; Wang, S.; Ma, X.; Gong, J. Sorption enhanced steam reforming of ethanol on Ni−CaO− Al2O3 multifunctional catalysts derived from hydrotalcite-like compounds. Energy Environ. Sci. 2012, 5, 8942−8949. (11) Alder, C. M.; Hayler, J. D.; Henderson, R. K.; Redman, A. M.; Shukla, L.; Shuster, L. E.; Sneddon, H. F. Updating and further expanding GSK's solvent sustainability guide. Green Chem. 2016, 18, 3879−3890. (12) Adams, J. P.; Alder, C. M.; Bullion, A. M.; Campbell-Crawford, M.; Hayler, J. D.; Henderson, R. K.; Oare, C. A.; Redman, A. M.; Sneddon, H. F.; Walker, M. D.; et al. Development of GSK's reagent guides − embedding sustainability into reagent selection. Green Chem. 2013, 15, 1542−1549. (13) Bryan, M. C.; Hamann, L.; Hughes, G.; Kopach, M.; Peterson, E.; Pourashraf, M.; Raheem, I.; Richardson, P.; Richter, D.; Sneddon, H. F. Sustainable Practices in Medicinal Chemistry: Current State and Future Directions. J. Med. Chem. 2013, 56 (15), 6007−6021. (14) Sneddon, H. F. Embedding sustainable practices into pharmaceutical R&D: what are the challenges? Future Med. Chem. 2014, 6 (12), 1373−1376. (15) McGonagle, F. I.; Sneddon, H. F.; Jamieson, C.; Watson, A. J. B. Molar Efficiency: A Useful Metric To Gauge Relative Reaction Efficiency in Discovery Medicinal Chemistry. ACS Sustainable Chem. Eng. 2014, 2 (3), 523−532.

David T. Allen, Editor-in-Chief

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University of Texas at Austin, USA

AUTHOR INFORMATION

Notes

Views expressed in this editorial are those of the author and not necessarily the views of the ACS. The author declares no competing financial interest.

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REFERENCES

(1) Katahira, R.; Mittal, A.; McKinney, K.; Chen, X.; Tucker, M.P.; Johnson, D.K.; Beckham, G. T. Base-catalyzed depolymerization of biorefinery lignins. ACS Sustainable Chem. Eng. 2016, 4 (3), 1474− 1486. © 2016 American Chemical Society

Received: August 18, 2016 Published: September 6, 2016 4490

DOI: 10.1021/acssuschemeng.6b01992 ACS Sustainable Chem. Eng. 2016, 4, 4490−4490