Rice’s Gustavo Scuseria wins Royal Society of Chemistry award

Rice’s Gustavo Scuseria wins Royal Society of Chemistry award

Rice University chemist Gustavo Scuseria won the 2017 Royal Society of Chemistry S F Boys – A Rahman Award. This biennial award from the London-based international organization for chemical scientists recognizes outstanding innovative research in the area of computational chemistry, including both quantum chemistry and molecular simulations. Scuseria will complete a lecture tour in the U.K. to share his research.

Gustavo Scuseria

“I am deeply honored to receive this award, whose previous winners are founding figures in electronic structure theory and quantum chemistry,” said Scuseria, the Robert A. Welch Professor of Chemistry. “I look forward to sharing exciting new results about our quest for solving the strong correlation problem during my U.K. university tour.”

Scuseria, who is also a professor of physics and astronomy and of materials science and nanoengineering, focuses on work that straddles the interface of quantum chemistry, condensed matter physics and materials science and, ultimately, the development of important materials for energy and the environment.

Scuseria’s list of honors includes the Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Award, a Creativity Extension Award from the National Science Foundation, an IBM Partnership Award, the Feynman Prize in Nanotechnology Theory, a Humboldt Research Award, a Lisa Meitner Minerva Lectureship from Israel and a Distinguished Israel Pollak Lecturer from the Technion.

Born and raised in San Fernando, Buenos Aires, Scuseria has been a Rice faculty member since 1989. He is co-editor of the Journal of Chemical Theory and Computation and serves on the Scientific Advisory Board of the Max-Planck Institute for Solid State Research in Stuttgart, Germany, and the Scientific Advisory Board on the Many Electrons Initiative of the Simons Foundation in New York. He is vice president of the International Academy of Quantum Molecular Science and a fellow of the American Chemical Society, the American Physical Society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Guggenheim Foundation and the Royal Society of Chemistry.

The Royal Society of Chemistry, which has more than 54,000 members and a heritage that spans 175 years, advances excellence in the chemical sciences. It recognizes achievements by individuals, teams and organizations in advancing the chemical discipline. Fifty previous winners of Royal Society of Chemistry awards have gone on to win Nobel Prizes for their work.