The Arthur K. Doolittle Award recognizes an outstanding talk presented during a PMSE symposium at each of the Fall and Spring ACS National Meetings. The award has two awardees, one per meeting. Originally established by the Union Carbide Corporation as the Carbide Award, its name was later changed due to Arthur K. Dootlittle’s contribution to the ACS Division of PMSE, the field of polymeric materials, and financial contributions from royalties of his book, Technology of Solvents and Plasticizers. All oral PMSE presentations are eligible for nomination by symposium organizers on the basis of content with emphasis on originality, impact, and development of new concepts in polymeric materials. Recipients are selected by an anonymous panel of judges appointed by the PMSE Doolittle Award Committee. We are pleased to announce the winner of the Doolittle Award from the Fall 2025 ACS meeting, Dr. Edwin Chan
DR. EDWIN CHAN
National Institute of Standards & Technology
Lessons From a Microscopist to an Engineer: From Ballistic Impact to Sound Attenuation
Edwin Chan is the Project Leader of the Fundamentals of Polymer Mechanics Project in the NIST Materials Science and Engineering Division. He leads a research team that studies the elastodynamics of impact-mitigating materials and the interfacial mechanics of polymer interfaces.
Edwin earned a B.S. in Materials Science and Engineering from the Pennsylvania State University in 2000, an M.S. in Materials Science and Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2003, and a Ph.D. in Polymer Science and Engineering from the University of Massachusetts Amherst in 2007. His Ph.D. research was on the adhesion and mechanics of structured soft elastomers. Before joining the technical staff, Edwin was a National Research Council Postdoctoral fellow in the Polymers Division at NIST (2008-2011).
Edwin is the recipient of the 2024 NIST Bronze Medal Award, the 2022 Arthur S. Flemming Award, the 2022 US National Academy of Science Kavli Frontiers of Science Fellow, and the 2019 American Chemical Society Polymeric Materials: Science and Engineering Division Cooperative Research Award. He was awarded the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE) in 2016. He was selected to participate in the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) organized German American Frontiers of Engineering in Potsdam, Germany, in 2015. He is also a recipient of the 2013 Adhesion Society Young Scientist Award. He has over 60 publications, three book chapters, and seven patents.