RWTH: RWTH professor Matthias Wessling accepted into the Leopoldina

The Aachen professor Matthias Wessling was admitted to the National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina. Wessling – holder of the chair for chemical process engineering, pro-rector for research and structure of the RWTH and member of the scientific management of the DWI Leibniz Institute for Interactive Materials – is now the 13th RWTH member of the Leopoldina, founded in 1652.

The scientist occupied the Chair of Chemical Process Engineering at the RWTH in 2010 when he was offered an Alexander von Humboldt professorship. In 2019 he was awarded the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize. Wessling and his group are researching the synthesis of bio-inspired interactive material systems. With the help of existing and new materials, complex interactive structures are developed and their structural-functional behavior is analyzed and described in the interaction with stable or temporally changing driving forces. In recent years, fundamental research work within his ERC Advanced Investigator Grant has focused on the control of complex physico-chemical flow phenomena at the membrane/fluid interface.

“Being admitted to the Leopoldina is a great honor for me personally. But it is also recognition of the creative contributions of my employees, doctoral candidates and students over many years. This appointment will continue to motivate me and our team to research the physico-chemical principles and applications of synthetic membranes in the fields of artificial organs, energy storage, hydrogen technologies, CO2 capture and utilization, biomass utilization and also water desalination,” explains Wessling.

The Leopoldina is one of the oldest science academies in the world. As the National Academy, it has represented German science in international committees since 2008. It is economically and politically independent and deals with future social issues from a scientific point of view and conveys the results to politics and the public.