Rice’s Tour to testify before Congress March 15

MEDIA NOTE: The subcommittee’s hearing has moved from 10:15 a.m. EDT to 1 p.m. EDT March 15.

David Ruth
713-348-6327
david@rice.edu

Rice’s Tour to testify before Congress Wednesday

HOUSTON – (March 14, 2017) – James Tour, the T.T. and W.F. Chao Professor of Chemistry, professor of computer science and of materials science and nanoengineering at Rice University, will testify before the U.S. House Committee on Energy and Commerce’s Subcommittee on Digital Commerce and Consumer Protection at the hearing “Disrupter Series: Advanced Materials and Production” at 10:15 a.m. 1 p.m. EDT Wednesday, March 15, in Room 2322 of the Rayburn House Office Building, Washington, D.C.

As part of the “Disrupter Series,” the hearing provides the subcommittee’s members an opportunity to learn about emerging technology and their applications in the marketplace. The series continues at the hearing with an examination of materials, compounds and processes that are the building blocks for disruptive applications in the electronics, automotive, airline, energy and health care industries, to name a few. Read more on the series here.

Tour will provide remarks and then take questions from the committee.

Who:  James Tour, the T.T. and W.F. Chao Professor of Chemistry, professor of computer science and of materials science and nanoengineering at Rice University.

What: Testimony before the U.S. House Subcommittee on Digital Commerce and Consumer Protection.

When: 10:15 a.m. 1 p.m. EDT Wednesday, March 15.

Where: Room 2322 of the Rayburn House Office Building, Washington, D.C.

Joining Tour to testify before the committee will be Keith Murphy, chairman and chief executive officer, Organovo Holdings Inc.; Shane Weyant, chief executive officer and president, Creative Pultrusions Inc.; Hota GangaRao, the Maurice A. and Jo Ann Wadsworth Distinguished Professor, director, Constructed Facilities Center, director, Center for Integration of Composites into Infrastructure, West Virginia University; and Afsaneh Rabiei, professor, Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, North Carolina State University.

Robert Latta, R-Ohio, chairs the Subcommittee on Digital Commerce and Consumer Protection, and its ranking member is Janice Schakowsky, D-Ill.

Tour, a synthetic organic chemist, received his Bachelor of Science degree in chemistry from Syracuse University, his Ph.D. in synthetic organic and organometallic chemistry from Purdue University, and postdoctoral training in synthetic organic chemistry at the University of Wisconsin and Stanford University. After spending 11 years on the faculty of the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry at the University of South Carolina, he joined the Center for Nanoscale Science and Technology at Rice University in 1999 where he is presently the T. T. and W. F. Chao Professor of Chemistry, professor of computer science and professor of materials science and nanoengineering.

For more information or to schedule an interview with Tour, contact David Ruth, director of national media relations at Rice, at 713-348-6327 or david@rice.edu.

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This news release can be found online at news.rice.edu

Located on a 300-acre forested campus in Houston, Rice University is consistently ranked among the nation’s top 20 universities by U.S. News & World Report. Rice has highly respected schools of Architecture, Business, Continuing Studies, Engineering, Humanities, Music, Natural Sciences and Social Sciences and is home to the Baker Institute for Public Policy. With 3,879 undergraduates and 2,861 graduate students, Rice’s undergraduate student-to-faculty ratio is 6-to-1. Its residential college system builds close-knit communities and lifelong friendships, just one reason why Rice is ranked No. 1 for happiest students and for lots of race/class interaction by the Princeton Review. Rice is also rated as a best value among private universities by Kiplinger’s Personal Finance. To read “What they’re saying about Rice,” go to http://tinyurl.com/RiceUniversityoverview.