Karen L. Wooley, Ph.D.

Imagine using insects as a source of chemicals to make plastics that can biodegrade later — with the help of that very same type of bug. That concept is closer to reality than you might expect. Today, researchers will describe their progress to date, including isolation and purification of insect-derived chemicals and their conversion into functional bioplastics.

The researchers will present their results at the fall meeting of the American Chemical Society (ACS). ACS Fall 2023 is a hybrid meeting being held virtually and in-person Aug. 13–17, and features about 12,000 presentations on a wide range of science topics.

“For 20 years, my group has been developing methods to transform natural products — such as glucose obtained from sugar cane or trees — into degradable, digestible polymers that don’t persist in the environment,” said Karen Wooley, PhD, the project’s principal investigator… Continue reading.

Texas A&M University Distinguished Professor of Chemistry Karen L. Wooley has been elected to the National Academy of Sciences.

Wooley, holder of the W.T. Doherty-Welch Chair in Chemistry and one of the world’s top chemists in the burgeoning field of materials and polymer chemistry and in creating new materials at the nanoscale level, is among the 120 new members and 26 foreign associates announced Monday, April 27 by the Academy on the final day of its 157th Annual Meeting in recognition of their distinguished and continuing achievements in original research. Election to Academy membership is a widely accepted mark of excellence in science and is considered one of the highest honors that a scientist can receive.

The 2020 election brings the total number of active members to 2,403 and the total number of international members to 501. International members are nonvoting members of the Academy, with citizenship outside the United States… Continue reading.

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE) has announced the induction of Karen L. Wooley, Ph.D., University Distinguished Professor and W. T. Doherty-Welch Chair, Chemistry, Texas A&M University, to its College of Fellows.

Election to the AIMBE College of Fellows is among the highest professional distinctions accorded to a medical and biological engineer. The College of Fellows is comprised of the top two percent of medical and biological engineers. College membership honors those who have made outstanding contributions to “engineering and medicine research, practice, or education” and to “the pioneering of new and developing fields of technology, making major advancements in traditional fields of medical and biological engineering, or developing/implementing innovative approaches to bioengineering education.”

Dr. Wooley was nominated, reviewed, and elected by peers and members of the College of Fellows for “transformative development of methods to construct intricate macromolecular structures and nanoscopic objects that serve as biomedically-functional polymer device technologies.“