Dr. Manuk Colakyan
CTO & Chair of Renmatix Scientific Advisory Board
Manuk joined Renmatix in 2010 and has more than 25 years of industrial experience at Union Carbide and Dow Chemical where he has held senior positions in the R&D and Engineering Departments, leading the Solids Processing and Reaction Engineering Groups, and as a resident Fellow. Dr. Colakyan’s areas of expertise include reaction engineering, catalysis, solids processing, process development and scale-up, fluidization, mathematical modeling and computational fluid dynamics. He has led a number of major capital projects involving the commercialization of new catalysts or catalytic processes and processes involving solids. With three degrees in chemical engineering, Dr. Colakyan is active in the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE), having served in various divisions, as chapter president, group chair, and programming chair for the Particle Technology Forum. He is the recipient of AIChE’s “Fluidization Processing Recognition” and Oregon State University’s “Academy of Distinguished Engineers” Awards.
Dr.Colakyan has helped Renmatix to mature and improve its technology. Dr. Colakyan’s background brings expertise in important applications with direct relevance to biofuel production, including: his status as a nationally recognized expert on fluidization, commercial scale implementation of reactors like the Renmatix cellulose-hydrolysis reactor, and solids processing/handling which is critical to our proprietary conversion from biomass feedstocks to biomaterials outputs. As the leader of our research and development effort, he manages multiple paths of investigation R&D efforts, and works with a team of highly qualified technical directors to ensure that the Plantrose™ Process scales up smoothly via efficient engineering, design, and scalable process technology.
Dr. Doug Cameron
Co-President and Director, First Green Partners
Dr. Doug Cameron, is the founder of Alberti Advisors. Previously, Doug was managing director and chief science advisor at Piper Jaffray. Prior to joining Piper, Doug was with Khosla Ventures in Menlo Park, Calif., one of the premier venture capital firms in clean technology investments. As chief scientific officer at Khosla Ventures, he led technical due diligence for many of the firm’s clean technology investments.
Prior to Khosla Ventures, Dr. Cameron was chief scientist and director of biotechnology at Cargill, Inc. in Minnetonka, Minn., where he built and led Cargill’s corporate biotechnology research group. Prior to Cargill, as a professor of chemical engineering at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, he taught biochemical engineering and established a leading research laboratory in the areas of metabolic engineering and bioprocess technology.
Dr. Cameron graduated from Duke University with a Bachelor of Science and an Engineering degree in biomedical engineering. He earned a PhD in biochemical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is a fellow of the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE), the Society of Industrial Microbiology (SIM) and the American Society for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). Cameron recently was given the Raphael Katzen Award for distinguished contributions to enable and further the deployment and commercialization of biotechnology to produce fuels and chemicals from renewable sources. He is also a consulting professor of chemical engineering at Stanford.
Ian C. Purtle
Former Chief Scientist & Director of Sustainable Energy, Cargill Inc.
Ian has a proven record of leadership and results in the global agricultural commodity and bio-fuel environment. With a profound understanding of the relationship between agricultural commodities and emerging bio-fuel opportunities, Ian has deep experience in the design, construction, and operation, of large processing facilities in multiple geographies.
Ian began with Cargill, Inc. in 1987 and has held a variety of roles overseeing plant operations, process solutions, and various business units. Ian holds an MBA from the University of Minnesota, and a BS from the University of New South Wales. His deep technical expertise and commercial experience are valuable skillsets that enrich the Renmatix R&D team and help to optimize downstream planning and operations.
Dr. Jeff Tester
Cornell University
Dr. Jeff Tester, is the Croll Professor of Sustainable Energy Systems in the School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at Cornell University. He also serves as Director of the Cornell Energy Institute and Associate Director for Energy in the Atkinson Center for a Sustainable Future. Prior to his appointment at Cornell in 2009, Dr. Tester was the H.P. Meissner Professor of Chemical Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and served as Director of MIT’s Energy Laboratory for 12 years (1989-2001). Professor Tester is a fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry and currently a member of the IPCC’s Working Group on Renewable Energy Sources. He also serves on the advisory boards for the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Idaho National Laboratory, Los Alamos National Laboratory, and the American Council on Renewable Energy.
For the last 25 years, Dr. Tester has been active in examining chemical processes in hydrothermal and supercritical media as they relate to fuel upgrading, renewable energy extraction and conversion and environmental control technologies. Major thrusts include biomass reforming and unconventional fossil fuel upgrading and chemical synthesis in biphasic water-carbon dioxide mixtures. In particular, experimental and theoretical studies currently under investigation include: hydrothermal liquefaction and gasification of a range of biomass feedstocks including lignin cellulosics from forest products, high lipid algal feeds and agriculture wastes and sludges; methods for clean chemical processing; and life cycle analysis of energy and mass flows. Dr. Tester also continues his interests in technologies associated with advanced drilling, geothermal energy recovery and conversion. Research in this area deals with phase transformations, chemical reaction kinetics and reaction pathway analysis, salt formation dynamics and separation, molecular thermodynamics in mixed water-hydrocarbon-salt systems, equation of state modeling, and process simulation and modeling.
Dr. Robert C. Brown
Iowa State University
Dr. Robert C. Brown, is the Anson Marston Distinguished Professor of Engineering, the Gary and Donna Hoover Chair in Mechanical Engineering, Professor of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Professor of Agricultural and Biosystems Engineering, Director of the Center for Sustainable Environmental Technologies (CSET), and Director of the Bioeconomy Institute at Iowa State University. His research interests include conversion of biorenewable resources into bioenergy and biobased products, combustion, gasification, fast pyrolysis, hydrogen energy, and hydrodynamics and heat transfer in fluidized beds. He has numerous publications and presentations to his credit. Dr. Brown earned PhD and MS degrees in mechanical engineering from Michigan State University. He has bachelor degrees in mathematics and physics from the University of Missouri.
Dr. Mani V. Subramanian
University of Iowa
Dr. Mani V. Subramanian, is Director, Center for Biotechnology & Bioprocessing (CBB) and Professor, Dept. of Chemical and Biochemical Engineering at the University of Iowa. His research interests include new promoters, enzymes for sensors, biomaterials for biochips, HTP methodologies for target validation, lead discovery, biocatalysis discovery, whole plant screens, and enzyme screens. A noted scholar-practitioner, he has held global leadership, research, and chemist roles for a leading global chemical manufacturer; been issued (16) while filing (7) US and World Patents, along with being the author of over 43 publications and delivering over 80 research presentations. Dr. Subramanian performed post-doctoral research in Microbial biochemistry/genetics at the University of Texas. He holds a Ph.D. in Biochemistry from Indian Institute Science. He also holds M.Sc and B.Sc degrees in Chemistry/Biochemistry and Chemistry & Biology from Bangalore University, India- respectively.
Edward Arnold
Group Manager, Jacobs Consultancy, Inc.
Edward Arnold,is a Group Manager at Jacobs Consultancy, Inc. in their Petroleum, Chemicals and Energy Group. In this role, Ed is responsible for leading the Consultancy’s Quantitative Risk Analysis and Investment Decision Analysis practice. In addition, he spends significant time helping Jacobs’ clients with new chemical process development and scale-up issues. Ed joined Jacobs Consultancy in 2005, after a 25 year career at UOP, where his focus was biotechnology process development, catalyst development and new technology risk analysis. While at UOP, Ed took a leave of absence to join ThermoGen/MediChem, an enzyme genetic engineering and bio-process development start-up firm, as General Manager of Sales & Business Development. Ed rejoined UOP shortly after ThermoGen/Medichem went public in 2000. Ed received BS degrees in Chemical Engineering and Biochemistry from the University of California at Davis, an MS in Industrial Microbiology from the Illinois Institute of Technology and an MBA from the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business.