Aaron Sadow, a scientist at Ames National Laboratory and director of the Institute for Cooperative Upcycling of P
lastics (iCOUP) has been named a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). The organization recently announced its 2022 class.
Sadow, who is also a professor in the Department of Chemistry at Iowa State University, was named a Fellow "for distinguished contributions to the field of chemical catalysis, particularly for research of molecular mechanisms and chemical transformations that promote sustainability,” according to the AAAS announcement.
Sadow's research efforts at Iowa State and at Ames National Laboratory include developing new catalysts and studying catalytic methods to efficiently transform chemical feedstocks into more valuable chemicals; the conversion of methane and natural gas into chemical reagents for synthesis; and chemical reactions that transform difficult-to-recycle plastic waste into recyclable liquid hydrocarbon lubricants, solvents and biodegradable surfactants.
Sadow earned a B.S. from Penn State in 1997 and a Ph.D. in chemistry from the University of
California, Berkeley in 2003, where he developed new catalytic methods for methane utilization.
He worked as a postdoc at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH Zürich) before
initiating his independent career as a scientist at Ames Laboratory and at Iowa State in 2005. His
expertise includes catalysis, organometallic and polymer chemistry, and rare earth chemistry.
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