Charles Westbrook, CI President (2008-2012), Prof. Robert J. Kee, and Katharina Kohse-Höinghaus, CI President (2012-2016), at the 36th International Symposium on Combustion in Seoul, Korea
In this first installment of a seven-part series of articles, The Combustion Institute recognizes combustion scientists who were honored with medals and awards during the 36th International Symposium on Combustion. Robert J. Kee is the 2016 recipient of the Bernard Lewis Gold Medal, for brilliant research in the field of combustion, particularly on pioneering development of chemically reacting flow simulations and the CHEMKIN family of models.
Prof. Kee holds the position of George R. Brown Distinguished Professor of Engineering at the Colorado School of Mines (CSM), United States. He joined the CSM faculty in 1996, following a distinguished career at Sandia National Laboratories, United States.
Prof. Kee has made important scientific contributions to computational modeling of chemically reacting flows in diverse fields, such as flame structure, surface chemistry and heterogeneous catalysis, thin-film chemical vapor deposition, and electrochemistry for fuel cells and batteries. His contributions have significantly advanced theoretical and computational capabilities to model the coupled interactions of complex chemistry and electrochemistry with mass and energy transport.
Prof. Kee is the principal architect and developer of the CHEMKIN family of software, which for over 25 years has been applied extensively to model chemically reactive systems. He was awarded the Silver Combustion Medal of The Combustion Institute in 1990 for his contributions explaining the structure and extinction of opposed-flow premixed flames. In 1991, he received the Bastress Award for Outstanding Contributions to Technology Transfer from Sandia National Laboratories. The Colorado School of Mines has recognized his accomplishments with several awards, including the Excellence in Research Award in 2016.
In addition to publishing some 200 archival papers, Prof. Kee is the lead author of an advanced textbook (Kee, Coltrin, and Glarborg, Chemically Reacting Flow, Wiley, 2003). His seminal paper on chemical vapor deposition in 1984 is among the 25 most-cited papers in the history of the Journal of the Electrochemical Society.
In 1992, he received the DOE Basic Energy Sciences Award for Sustained Outstanding Research in Materials Chemistry. Prof. Kee’s recent research is focused on modeling electrochemistry, with a wide range of applications that include fuel cells, Li-ion and Na-based batteries, ceramic ionic-electronic conducting membranes, fuel synthesis and processing, and microreactor technology.
Please join The Combustion Institute in congratulating Prof. Kee and the other honored 2016 award winners in the international combustion community. Questions regarding awards may be directed to: Office@CombustionInstitute.org.