Henkel Award for Outstanding Graduate Research in Polymer Science and Engineering
The Henkel Award for Outstanding Graduate Research in Polymer Science and Engineering is given to recognize a graduate student or recent graduate who has completed an outstanding Ph.D. thesis in polymeric research.
2025 Award Winner
Elizabeth Murphy
Advised by: Professors Craig Hawker and Christopher Bates, University of California, Santa Barbara
PMSE is proud to introduce this year’s winner, Elizabeth Murphy. Elizabeth Murphy will receive her Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of California, Santa Barbara in March 2025 under the co-advisement of Professors Craig Hawker and Christopher Bates. Her graduate work focused on developing a versatile strategy for the accelerated discovery of block copolymers, integrating controlled polymerization, chromatographic separation, laboratory automation, and data-driven analysis. Elizabeth’s research accomplishments have been recognized with several awards, including the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship and the Edward J. Kramer Prize in Materials. Beyond her graduate research, Elizabeth has demonstrated a strong commitment to outreach, where she served as co-president of Chemistry Professional Development and as an outreach ambassador at the UCSB Materials Research Laboratory. Elizabeth will begin her career at The Dow Chemical Company in Collegeville, PA as a Senior Research Specialist in the Formulation, Automation, and Materials Science team.
The Henkel Award was established to recognize a PhD graduate student or recent graduate who has completed an outstanding PhD thesis in research at a university in the US or Canada. The award is administered and sponsored by the POLY/PMSE divisions of the ACS, the Polymer Education Committee (POLYED). The award has been previously sponsored by Unilever (1991-2003), National Starch (2006-2008) and AzkoNobel (2008-2013). Since 2014, it has been sponsored by Henkel Corporation.
The 2025 Henkel Award for Outstanding Graduate Research in Polymer Science & Engineering will be presented during at the American Chemical Society National Meeting in Washington, DC, in the POLY Division.
For further information about the award go to: https://polyacs.org/henkel-award-for-outstanding-graduate-student/
Sponsored By
Award Details
The award recognizes a graduate student or recent graduate for the outstanding Ph.D. thesis in polymeric research. The award consists of a plaque, $2000 honorarium, travel support, and a symposium organized by the primary nominator.
History
The award was originally established in 1991 and is operated by Polymer Education Committee (POLYED), the Polymer Chemistry (POLY) Division, and the Polymeric Materials: Science and Engineering (PMSE) Division.
Nominations
Nomination packages should follow package submission guidelines detailed below.
Nominations will be reviewed by members of the Henkel Outstanding Graduate Research Award Committee and others selected by the committee.
Past Recipients
Nominations and Award Process
Purpose
The Henkel Award for Outstanding Graduate Research in Polymer Science and Engineering is given to recognize a graduate student or recent graduate who has completed an outstanding Ph.D. thesis in polymeric research.
Rules of Eligibility
A nominee must be a member or affiliate of the POLY or PMSE division of American Chemical Society.
Nominees must currently be a PhD candidate or have earned their PhD during the three years prior to January 1 of the award year.
Nominations Process
Award package submission deadline is January 25 of each calendar year for consideration in that calendar year award.
Nominators must be a member or affiliate of the POLY or PMSE division and must be the nominee’s thesis supervisor or someone intimately familiar with the nominee’s work. A complete nomination package comprises:
- Nominee’s Curriculum Vita (CV) including Education & Training, Awards & Honors, list of Publications, list of Conference Presentations, Professional Activities & Affiliations
- Synopsis of nominee’s graduate work: 2 pages maximum
- Nomination letter from the thesis advisor: 3 pages maximum
- Up to two (2) letters supporting the nomination: 2 pages maximum per letter
- Up to three (3) representative first author publications from the nominee’s graduate work.
Nominees are judged on the basis of their contribution to the thesis research, the quality and level of innovation demonstrated, and the impact of their research on the science and technology of synthetic polymers or bio-polymers. Preference will be given to nominees who have not already been recognized by two or more ACS Awards with associated honorary symposium. Complete nomination packages collated into a single PDF file containing the above items in the specified order should be sent by email to Professor Patricia Calvo (pcalvo@ksu.edu). The title of the email should be “(Year) Henkel Graduate Award” where (Year) is the year of the nomination deadline.
Award Selection
Nominees are judged on the basis of their contribution to the thesis research, the quality and level of innovation demonstrated, the impact of their research on the science and technology of synthetic polymers or bio-polymers, and their service and contributions to the broader community. Preference will be given to nominees who have not already been recognized by two or more ACS Awards with associated honorary symposium.
Award Announcement and Nature
Awardees will be notified before the deadline for submission of the abstracts for the Fall American Chemical Society National Meeting.
The award consists of a plaque, $2,000 honorarium, and travel support to attend the Fall ACS National Meeting in the year of the award. The award winner is invited to participate in a half-day symposium organized by the primary nominator (usually, the awardee’s thesis advisor). Additionally, the award will be presented at the joint POLY/PMSE awards presentation during the ACS National Meeting, typically on Wednesday evening.
About Our Sponsor
Henkel values highly the development of outstanding scientists in the field of polymer science and engineering. Progress in the field is vital for the future development of high performance materials that will enhance current technologies and enable future ones. Thus, Henkel is proud to sponsor this award to demonstrate their commitment recognizing outstanding young scientists.
Full List of Award Winners
The previous sponsorship of this award by Unilever (1991-2003), National Starch (2006 – 2008), and AzkoNobel (2008-2013) is greatly appreciated.
| Year | Award Winner | Advisor(s) | Affiliation | Link |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | Elizabeth Murphy | Craig Hawker and Christopher Bates | University of California, Santa Barbara | Link |
| 2024 | Shu-Wang | Stephen L. Craig and Michael Rubinstein | Duke University | Link |
| 2023 | Christopher DelRe | Ting Xu | University of California, Berkeley | Link |
| 2022 | Jill W. Alty | Frank Leibfarth | University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill | Link |
| 2021 | Austin M. Evans | William R. Dichtel | Northwestern University | Link |
| 2020 | Jeffrey Lopez | Zhenan Bao | Stanford University | Link |
| 2019 | Jovan Kamcev | Benny D. Freeman and Donald R. Paul | University of Texas–Austin | |
| 2018 | Aleksandr V. Zhukhovitskiy | Jeremiah A. Johnson | Massachusetts Institute of Technology | |
| 2017 | John. W. Colson | William Dichtel | Cornell University | |
| 2016 | Maxwell Robb | Craig Hawker | University of California, Santa Barbara | |
| 2015 | Jessica Kramer | Tim Deming | University of California, Los Angeles | |
| 2014 | Felix Kim | Samson Jenekhe | University of Washington | |
| 2013 | Hua Lu | Jianjun Cheng | University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign | |
| 2012 | Garret Miyake | Eugene Chen | Colorado State University | |
| 2011 | Rong Tong | Jianjun Cheng | University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign | |
| 2010 | Haifeng Gao | Krzysztof Matyjaszewski | Carnegie Mellon University | |
| 2009 | Christopher Bettinger | Robert Langer | MIT | |
| 2008 | Nikolay Tsarevsky | Krzysztof Matyjaszewski | Carnegie Mellon University | |
| 2007 | Jason Rolland | Joseph DiSimone | University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill | |
| 2006 | Jiaxing Huang | Richard Kaner | UCLA | |
| 2003 | Christopher Bielawski | Robert Grubbs | California Institute of Technology | |
| 2002 | Kristi Kiick | David Tirrell | California Institute of Technology | |
| 2001 | Shu Yang | Christopher K. Ober | Cornell University | |
| 2000 | X. Linda Chen | Samson A. Jenekhe | University of Rochester | |
| 1999 | Scott G. Gaynor | Krzysztof Matyjaszewski | Carnegie Mellon University | |
| 1998 | James J. Watkins | Thomas J. McCarthy | University of Massachusetts at Amherst | |
| 1997 | D.-Y. Kim | Sukant K. Tripathy | University of Massachusetts Lowell | |
| 1996 | Kristi S. Anseth | Christopher Bowman | University of Colorado at Boulder | |
| 1995 | Rangaramanujam M. Kannan | Julia Kornfield | California Institute of Technology | |
| 1994 | Timothy J. Deming | Bruce Novak | University of California, Berkeley | |
| 1993 | Christopher N. Bowman | Nicholas Peppas | Purdue University | |
| 1992 | Richard Register | Stuart Cooper | University of Wisconsin, Madison | |
| 1991 | Christopher Gorman | Robert Grubbs | California Institute of Technology |