Philippe Fauchet, dean of the Vanderbilt School of Engineering, has been elected a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science this year.
Fauchet is recognized for “extraordinary scientific and engineering research accomplishment in photonics, energy, and the semiconductor/biology interface, and for distinguished academic leadership.”
He is among nine new fellows at Vanderbilt University and 391 fellows from around the country selected by their peers. The new fellows will be recognized Feb. 18, 2017, at the AAAS annual meeting in Boston.
“It is a tremendous honor to be nominated and elected by peers as an AAAS fellow, a group that includes the most esteemed scientists in their fields,” said Fauchet.
Fauchet’s research focuses on nanoscience and nanotechnology, and their applications to domains such as health and medicine, sensing or energy, for which he has been recognized by a number of awards and prizes. He is a widely published author, with more than 400 scientific publications, and a frequent speaker at scientific and technology meetings, with more than 100 invited or plenary presentations. He also has served as an adviser to a number of governmental and non-governmental organizations in the United States and in Europe.
Fauchet’s accomplishments include an “unwavering push to use silicon, the mainstay of the electronic and computer industry – for which industry has invested trillions of dollars over 40 years – in other fields such as energy, biosensing, and nanotechnology.” Examples include the discovery and use of a new silicon-based nanomembrane material, and the first integration of a visible-light silicon light emitter with silicon-integrated circuits.
The dean also is dedicated to creating and nurturing multidisciplinary groups to tackle major societal problems. In the 1980’s, Fauchet was one of the originators of Princeton University’s Center for Photonics and Opto-Electronic Materials. In the 1990’s, he created and ran the Femtosecond Laser Facility at the University of Rochester’s Center for Optoelectronics and Imaging. In 1998 he created the Center for Future Health, and in 2007 he created the Energy Research Initiative, both at Rochester.
At Vanderbilt, as dean he has continued building relationships and partnerships between and among colleagues within and outside the school and Vanderbilt University. Faculty members from various engineering and science departments, including medicine, nursing, economics and political science, and more, participate in the school’s nine intellectual neighborhoods.
Fauchet is a fellow of the Optical Society of America, the American Physical Society, the Materials Research Society, the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, and the International Society for Optical Engineering (SPIE), and serves on various boards for industrial and governmental entities.
Prior to joining Vanderbilt School of Engineering in 2012, Fauchet taught at Stanford University, Princeton University and the University of Rochester. He received a doctorate from Stanford University and a master’s degree from Brown University.
The School of Engineering has nine AAAS fellows among its current and emeritus faculty. The university now has 119 fellows, more than half of them — 64 — were elected during the past five years, reflecting remarkable momentum and growth of the institution’s academic standing.
Contact:
Brenda Ellis, (615) 343-6314
Brenda.Ellis@Vanderbilt.edu
Twitter @VUEngineering