Despite a cold winter season, I have exciting (“hot”) news to share with you: Joe Moidl (VP in Innovation, Technology and Quality from General Mills) is elected to become our new Advisory Council Board Chair, and Mike Dillon (President of Lexington Manufacturing) is our new Vice Chair. Congratulations to Joe and Mike! We are very grateful to Pat Gruber (CEO of Gevo) for his leadership as the Board Chair in the past two years; Pat will continue to serve on our Board and support our department.
At a special “BBE Awards and Winter Celebration” this past December, the Department cherished several major faculty awards in 2024 (Omar Espinoza’s Excellence in Academic Unit Service Award; Jason Hill’s Distinguished McKnight University Professorship; Joe Magner’s Dave Ford Award; Roger Ruan’s National Academy of Inventors Fellow induction; Jiwei Zhang’s Richard C. Newman Art of Teaching Award). Our Communication & Admin Specialist, Rachel Kraft Mattson, received the 2024 Outstanding Civil Service/ Bargaining Unit Award to recognize her exceptional work performance and contributions to the department.
More recently, on February 11, Professor Roger Ruan was elected into the National Academy of Engineering (NAE). Roger is a highly accomplished scholar, entrepreneur, and disciplined leader who makes our world a more sustainable place. Election to the NAE is one of the highest professional distinctions accorded to engineers. His election into NAE and earlier induction to the National Academy of Inventors (NAI) are strong testaments to his accomplishments.
On January 24, the BBE department celebrated Professor Bruce Wilson’s 34 years of dedicated service to the Department and the University. The classroom was turned into a party room, and was packed with faculty, staff, and Bruce’s current and former students, colleagues, family and friends. You can find Bruce’s retirement story online, but he will share his professional journey in a special department seminar on April 1. In addition, we celebrated BBE service anniversaries for several faculty and staff: John Chapman (20 years), Brett Barney and Bo Hu (15 years), Ce Yang, Kerry Holmberg, and Joe Magner (10 years), and Erik Joerres (5 years).
Through self-fundraising, our Food and Bioproducts Engineering Organization (FABEO) supported 12 BBE students to attend the 2025 Technical Association of Pulp and Paper (TAPPI) Student Summit in St. Petersburg, Florida this January. Students were able to explore career opportunities in pulp, paper, tissue, and packaging industries, network with industry experts and peers, and participate in professional development.
In this issue of the BioBriEf, we feature stories of three students: one BBE student - Ben Weber, and two SSM students - Sam Spaulding and Paige Peugeot. Our alumni spotlight highlights BBE alumna, Alexis Lipstein, who works for Ramsey County Park and Recreation as an Environmental Resources Specialist. For faculty research, we share the story about Professor Omar Espinoza's Cross-Laminated Timber (CLT) database for the reason behind wood becoming being more popular in high-rise builds across the world, and also an interesting perspective of the impact of road salt and water softeners on the environment by Sara Heger, Adjunct Assistant Professor.
The invitations to attend our BBE Scholarship Gala on April 24 and BBE/SSM Capstone presentations on April 30 are coming to your (e)mailbox. Please RSVP and join us to support our students!
Hua Zhao, Professor and Head