Chasiotis Travels to U.S. Capitol to Receive Presidential Early Career Award

AE Associate Prof. Ioannis Chasiotis (top row, seventh from the right) was among 100 young researchers honored at the White House and greeted by President Barack Obama on January 13 as recipients of the 2008 Presidential Early Career Awards for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE).

Chasiotis was nominated by the National Science Foundation (NSF). According to the NSF, “All NSF PECASE awardees are drawn from a pool of individuals who have already been selected through rigorous peer review to receive five-year grants through the Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Program. CAREER awardees are those who have proven themselves exemplary in integrating research and education within the context of the mission of their organization. The competition is rigorous: in 2008, NSF made 455 CAREER awards, from more than 2500 proposals reviewed.”  Only 20 of the 455 CAREER Awardees received the PECASE Award this year.

The Presidential Early Career Awards embody the high priority the Obama Administration places on producing outstanding scientists and engineers to advance the nation’s goals and contribute to all sectors of the economy. Nine federal departments and agencies join together annually to nominate the most meritorious young scientists and engineers—researchers whose early accomplishments show the greatest promise for strengthening America’s leadership in science and technology and contributing to the awarding agencies’ missions.

“You have been selected for this honor not only because of your innovative research, but also for your demonstrated commitment to community service and public outreach,” President Barack Obama said in a letter delivered to the winners during the ceremony. “Your achievements as scientists, engineers, and engaged citizens are exemplary, and the value of your work is amplified by the inspiration you provide to others.”

Young scientists and engineers with PECASE awards receive a five-year research grant to further their study in support of critical government missions. Supported by the National Science Foundation, Chasiotis’ project has been the study of the mechanical behavior of polymeric materials in ultra small volumes. At the nanoscale, these materials behave very differently from the way that polymers behave when fabricated in large quantities.

Chasiotis’ research interests focus on the experimental mechanics at the nanoscale, and, specifically, the fracture and fatigue of MEMS/NEMS and thin film materials, the deformation and damage mechanics of inhomogeneous/anisotropic materials and nanocomposites, the time and rate dependent mechanics of polymeric and metallic nanofibers and thin films, the mechanical properties and interfacial mechanics of individual carbon nanofibers and nanotubes in polymers, applications of scanning probe microscopy in mechanics, and MEMS tools for nanoscale experimentation.

AE Prof. Ioannis Chasiotis, middle, accepts the PECASE Award at the Jan. 13 ceremony at the White House. With him are John Holdren (left), Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, Assistant to the President for Science and Technology, and Co-Chair of the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, and Arden L. Bement, Jr., National Science Foundation Director.

He joined the AE faculty in 2005, and is affiliated with the Beckman Institute, the Micro and Nanotechnology Laboratory, and the Department of Mechanical Science and Engineering. Prior to coming to Illinois, Chasiotis was an assistant professor in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at the University of Virginia from 2001 to 2004.

Chasiotis recently was named a Donald Biggar Willett Scholar in the College of Engineering. He has also earned a number of other awards and honors in his career: an NSF CAREER Award in 2008, a 2007 Office of Naval Research Young Investigator Award; the 2007 Illinois College of Engineering Xerox Award for Faculty Research; the Best Paper Award from the journal Fatigue and Fracture of Engineering Materials and Structures in 2007, the 2005 Best Research Paper Award from the Society for Experimental Mechanics’ 6th International Symposium on MEMS and Nanotechnology; the 2000 American Academy of Mechanics Founders Prize and Grant; the 1999 Charles Babcock Memorial Award from the California Institute of Technology; and the 1998 American  Vacuum Society’s Outstanding Research Presentation Award.

Chasiotis earned a diploma in Chemical Engineering from the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki in Greece in 1996. He earned a master’s degree and Ph.D. in Aeronautics from the California Institute of Technology in 1998 and 2002, respectively.