Tom Truskett head shot photo

Professor, Chemical Engineering, UT Austin

Faculty Investigator, IRG 1

Thomas M. Truskett holds the Dick Rothwell Endowed Chair in Chemical Engineering and is Professor of Chemical Engineering and Physics at the University of Texas at Austin. He earned a bachelor of science in chemical engineering from the University of Texas at Austin in 1996 and a doctoral degree in chemical engineering from Princeton University in 2001, where he studied statistical mechanics of the liquid state, the glass transition, and structuring of disordered media. He then pursued post-doctoral research at the University of California, San Francisco, where he investigated water, hydrophobic interactions, and modeling of biomolecular systems. In 2002, he joined the University of Texas at Austin faculty, and served as Department Chair of Chemical Engineering from 2013-2021. Dr.  Truskett’s research group studies soft condensed matter, including molecular fluids, colloidal suspensions, protein solutions, and glassy solids. He was the 2007 Van Ness Award Lecturer of the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, the 2008 Thiele Lecturer of the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at Notre Dame, the inaugural Dudley A. Saville Lecturer of the Department of Chemical Engineering at Princeton University in 2009, and the 2017 William E. Schiesser Lecturer of Scientific Computing at Lehigh University. He is an Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellow, a David and Lucile Packard Foundation Fellow, a recipient of the National Science Foundation’s CAREER Award, the 2007 recipient of the Allan P. Colburn Award and the 2016 CoMSEF Impact Award from the American Institute of Chemical Engineers. Dr. Truskett has been elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the American Physical Society (APS) and the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineers (AIMBE). In 2014, Tom received the O’Donnell Award for Engineering from the Texas Academy of Medicine, Engineering, Science, and Technology.