ACS Award For Creative Invention: Antonio Facchetti

Sponsor: ACS Corporation Associates

Citation: For seminal contributions to the chemistry and characterization of organic electronic materials and their integration into commercially viable unconventional electronic and photonic devices.

Current position: chief scientific officer, Polyera Corp., and adjunct professor of chemistry, Northwestern University

Education: B.S., industrial chemistry, A. Righi Institute; M.S., Ph.D., chemistry, University of Milan

Facchetti on his scientific role models: “One was my Ph.D. adviser, professor Giorgio Pagani of the University of Milan. He introduced me to organic and heterocyclic chemistry, and his most important lesson was to be curious as a path to scientific discovery. The second one is professor Tobin Marks of Northwestern University. He taught me new chemistries, not to be afraid to challenge myself to enter new research fields, and how to appreciate and value stimulating collaborations. Both Pagani and Marks pushed me a lot, thus I learned what it means to work very hard, as they do.”

What his colleagues say:“With the creativity and talent of a world-class synthetic chemist, the in-depth theoretical understanding of a solid state physicist, and the practicality of an engineer, Facchetti designed, prepared, characterized, and implemented the key materials and materials concepts to create new generations of high-performance printable materials.”—Tobin J. Marks, Northwestern University