Dionisios G. Vlachos

Unidel Dan Rich Chair in Energy Professor of Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering

Director, Catalysis Center for Energy Innovation (CCEI)
Director, Delaware Energy Institute (DEI)

Education 

• Doctorate – 1992 University of Minnesota
• Masters – 1990 University of Minnesota
• Bachelors – 1987 National Technical University of Athens

About Dionisios G. Vlachos

Vlachos is the Unidel Dan Rich Energy Chaired Professor of Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering and Physics and Astronomy at the University of Delaware. He is the Director of the Delaware Energy Institute (DEI). He directed the Catalysis Center for Energy Innovation (CCEI), an Energy Frontier Research Center (EFRC) funded by the Department of Energy (DOE), from 2009 to 2024.

Dion obtained a five-year diploma in Chemical Engineering from the National Technical University of Athens, Greece, in 1987, and his M.S. and Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota in 1990 and 1992, respectively. He spent a postdoctoral year at Minnesota’s Army High-Performance Computing Research Center. Dr. Vlachos joined the University of Massachusetts as an assistant professor in 1993, was promoted to associate professor in 1998, and joined the University of Delaware in 2000. He was a visiting fellow at EPFL in the fall of 2022 and Princeton University in the spring of 2000, a visiting faculty member at Thomas Jefferson University and Hospital in the spring of 2007, and the George Pierce Distinguished Professor of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science at the University of Minnesota in the fall of 2007. He held the positions of Elizabeth Inez Kelley and Allan and Myra Ferguson Prof. of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at the Univ. of Delaware during 2009-2016 and 2016-2020, respectively.

He received the Neal R. Amundson Life Achievement Award from the International Symposium on Chemical Reaction Engineering (ISCRE) and North American Symposium on Chemical Reaction Engineering (NASCRE), 2025, the Borealis Scientific Innovation Award (BSIA), Linz, Austria, 2024, the EPA Green Chemistry Challenging Award in 2024, was the ExxonMobil Visiting Chair Professor, National University of Singapore, Singapore, 2018-2021, and has been an AAAS Fellow since 2009. He has also received the 2021 Exceptional Achievements in Catalysis Award of the Catalysis Science & Technology Division (CATL) of the ACS, the 2020 Irving Wender Award for Excellence in Catalysis from the Pittsburgh-Cleveland Catalysis Society, the 2016 Catalysis Club of Philadelphia Award, the R. H. Wilhelm Award in Chemical Reaction Engineering from AIChE (2011), an NSF Career Award, and an Office of Naval Research Young Investigator Award.

Vlachos’ research focuses on circular economy and waste derivatization, multiscale modeling and simulation, process intensification and electrification, renewable fuels and chemicals, in silico materials prediction, and kinetic modeling. He pioneered multiscale modeling and fundamental foundational research in biomass and plastics recycling and upcycling.

He is the corresponding author of 700 refereed publications, with >51,000 citations, with an h-index of 125 (June 3, 2026; by Google Scholar). He has given over 350 plenary, keynote, and other invited talks. Professor Vlachos serves as the editor-in-chief of Reaction and Engineering Chemistry. He has also served as an executive editor of the Chemical Engineering Science and on the editorial advisory board of ACS Catalysis, Reaction Chemistry & Engineering, Industrial and Engineering Chemistry Research, Applied Catalysis A: General, and others.

Select Publications

For a complete listing of publications, please view the Full CV.

1. Z. P. Lai, G. Bonilla, I. Diaz, J. G. Nery, K. Sujaoti, M. A. Amat, E. Kokkoli, O. Terasaki, R. W. Thompson, M. Tsapatsis, and D. G. Vlachos, Microstructural optimization of a zeolite membrane for organic vapor separation. Science 300(5618), 456–460 (2003). DOI: 10.1126/science.1082169.
2. V. Choudhary, S. H. Mushrif, C. Ho, A. Anderko, V. Nikolakis, N. S. Marinkovic, A. I. Frenkel, S. I. Sandler, and D. G. Vlachos, Insights into the Interplay of Lewis and Bronsted Acid Catalysts in Glucose and Fructose Conversion to 5-(Hydroxymethyl)furfural and Levulinic Acid in Aqueous Media. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 135(10), 3997–4006 (2013). DOI: 10.1021/ja3122763.
3. S. B. Liu, P. A. Kots, B. C. Vance, A. Danielson, and D. G. Vlachos, Plastic waste to fuels by hydrocracking at mild conditions. Sci. Adv. 7(17), 9 (2021). DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.abf8283.
4. A. Chatterjee and D. G. Vlachos, An overview of spatial microscopic and accelerated kinetic Monte Carlo methods. J. Comput-Aided Mater. Des. 14(2), 253–308 (2007). DOI: 10.1007/s10820-006-9042-9.
5. J. C. Feng, J. L. Lansford, M. A. Katsoulakis, and D. G. Vlachos, Explainable and trustworthy artificial intelligence for correctable modeling in chemical sciences. Sci. Adv. 6(42), 10 (2020). DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.abc3204.
6. D. A. Hansgen, D. G. Vlachos, and J. G. G. Chen, Using first principles to predict bimetallic catalysts for the ammonia decomposition reaction. Nat. Chem. 2(6), 484–489 (2010). DOI: 10.1038/nchem.626.
7. Q. Dong, Y. G. Yao, S. C. Cheng, K. Alexopoulos, J. L. Gao, S. Srinivas, Y. F. Wang, Y. Pei, C. L. Zheng, A. H. Brozena, H. Zhao, X. Z. Wang, H. E. Toraman, B. Yang, I. G. Kevrekidis, Y. G. Ju, D. G. Vlachos, D. X. Liu, and L. B. Hu, Programmable heating and quenching for efficient thermochemical synthesis. Nature 605(7910), 470–+ (2022). DOI: 10.1038/s41586-022-04568-6.
8. I. Ro, J. Qi, S. Lee, M. J. Xu, X. X. Yan, Z. H. Xie, G. Zakem, A. Morales, J. G. G. Chen, X. Q. Pan, D. G. Vlachos, S. Caratzoulas, and P. Christopher, Bifunctional hydroformylation on heterogeneous Rh-WOx pair site catalysts. Nature 609(7926), 287–+ (2022). DOI: 10.1038/s41586-022-05075-4.
9. T. Y. Chen, M. Baker-Fales, and D. G. Vlachos, Operation and Optimization of Microwave-Heated Continuous-Flow Microfluidics. Ind. Eng. Chem. Res. 59(22), 10418–10427 (2020). DOI: 10.1021/acs.iecr.0c01650.
10. M. Salciccioli, M. Stamatakis, S. Caratzoulas, and D. G. Vlachos, A review of multiscale modeling of metal-catalyzed reactions: Mechanism development for complexity and emergent behavior. Chem. Eng. Sci. 66(19), 4319–4355 (2011). DOI: 10.1016/j.ces.2011.05.050.

Patents (h3)

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