Two UA Professors Named Fellows in Top Science Group

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — Dr. Arun Gupta and Dr. Robin Rogers, both professors in the chemistry department at The University of Alabama, were named Fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Election as a AAAS Fellow is an honor bestowed upon AAAS members by their peers.

Gupta, who also holds an appointment within UA’s department of chemical and biological engineering, was elected as a Fellow for originating, developing and executing a wide range of research projects involving materials growth, characterization, processing and device applications of thin films. Gupta is a researcher in UA’s Center for Materials for Information Technology, or MINT.

Gupta has previously been recognized for his contributions to his field by the Humboldt Research Award from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, which grants awards to internationally-renowned researchers who are expected to continue producing cutting-edge achievements in their field.

Gupta earned master’s degrees from the Indian Institute of Technology and Columbia University and earned his doctorate from Stanford University. He has been on the UA faculty since 2004. Prior to joining UA he had worked for nearly 20 years at the IBM T. J. Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, N.Y.

Rogers was elected as a Fellow for his contributions to the field of ionic liquids by probing their fundamental nature while advancing their technological relevance, especially for advanced separations. Rogers holds the Robert Ramsay Chair in the chemistry department and is also the director of the Center for Green Manufacturing at UA.

In addition to this honor, Rogers was recently recognized by the American Chemical Society when he received the ACS Award in Separations Science and Technology. He received both his bachelor’s and doctoral degrees from The University of Alabama and has been on the faculty since 1996.

This year, 539 AAAS members were awarded the title of Fellow due to their scientifically or socially distinguished efforts to advance science or its applications. The American Association for the Advancement of Science, or  AAAS, is the world’s largest general scientific society, and publisher of the journal Science as well as Science Translational Medicine and Science Signaling.

AAAS was founded in 1848, and it includes 262 affiliated societies and academies of science, serving 10 million individuals.

The department of chemistry is part of the College of Arts and Sciences, which is the University’s largest division and the largest public liberal arts college in the state. College students have been selected for many of the nation’s top academic honors, including Rhodes Scholarships, Goldwater Scholarships, Truman Scholarships and members on USA Today’s Academic All-American teams.

In 1837, The University of Alabama became one of the first five universities in the nation to offer engineering classes. Today, UA’s fully accredited College of Engineering has more than 3,300 students and more than 100 faculty. In the last eight years, students in the College have been named USA Today All-USA College Academic Team members, Goldwater scholars, Hollings scholars and Portz scholars.