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Orlando Rojas, professor of bio-based colloids and materials at Aalto University in Finland, is the recipient of the 2015 Nanotechnology Division Technical Award and IMERYS Prize. The award recognizes Rojas’s outstanding contributions, which have advanced the industry's technology. 

“This award is very significant as a recognition to the efforts conducted by my research groups in the US and Finland that utilize lignocellulose for the development of new materials and nanostructures,” said Rojas.  “. It is also an appreciation to the creativity and scientific skills of my students and collaborators who are making inroads in the application of nanotechnologies for renewable materials. This distinction stimulates our work to promote and disseminate knowledge in this exciting area and to address the many challenges currently met by industry and society.”

Rojas received his undergraduate degree from Universidad de Los Andes in Venezuela, before obtaining his master’s degree in paper engineering from the Polytechnic University of Catalonia in Spain. He subsequently received a PhD in Chemical Engineering from Auburn University. Other academic training includes postdoctoral fellowships in KTH and the Institute for Surface Chemistry in Stockholm.

Prior to his current position as professor of bio-based colloids and Materials at Aalto University in Finland, Rojas was professor in the departments of forest biomaterials and chemical and biomolecular engineering at North Carolina State University. Earlier in his career he was a senior scientist appointed by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in the Royal Institute of Technology, a postdoctoral fellow in the Institute for Surface Chemistry in Sweden, and research assistant at Auburn University.

Rojas was appointed as Finland Distinguished Professor from 2009-2014 and was Chair of the Division of Cellulose and Renewable Materials of the American Chemical Society from 2009-2011. He was elected with the distinction of Fellow of the American Chemical Society in 2013, an accolade that is testament to the exceptional level of his scientific and professional contributions. Other merits include his appointment as a Faculty Scholar of NCSU and his receiving the ACS Division Award of Cellulose and Renewable Materials.

TAPPI congratulates Rojas and will honor him on June 24 at the Georgia Aquarium as part of the gala dinner for the 2015 TAPPI International Conference on Nanotechnology for Renewable Materials, June 22-25, at the Hyatt Regency in Atlanta, Ga.

TAPPI is the leading association for the worldwide pulp, paper, packaging and converting industries and publisher of Paper360°, Tissue360° and TAPPI Journal.