Deji Akinwande, professor in the Cockrell School of Engineering at The University of Texas at Austin, has been named a 2023 Fellow of the Materials Research Society (MRS Fellow) for “contributions to the development of wafer-scale monolayer graphene, and the realization of flexible nanosystems.”

Akinwande holds the Temple Foundation Endowed Professorship No. 1 in the Chandra Family Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (Texas ECE). His research focuses on 2D materials and nanotechnology, pioneering device innovations from lab towards applications.

“Being named a MRS Fellow is a recognition of lasting distinction and as such I am extremely honored to be acknowledged for my contributions to graphene and 2D materials science and technology,” said Akinwande.

The MRS Fellows program recognizes outstanding contributions to the field, including research, leadership, and service that have advanced the mission of the materials community world-wide. It is intended to be a lifetime recognition of distinction in the field, rather than an award for a specific achievement. In any given year, the maximum number of new Fellows should be capped at 0.2% of the current total professional MRS membership.

“This is a well-deserved recognition of Deji’s role at the forefront of materials research,” said Texas ECE department chair Diana Marculescu. “His tremendous accomplishments are not only a great benefit to engineering, but he is also a valued member and leader of the Texas ECE community.”

Prof. Akinwande was elevated to IEEE Fellow in 2021, and he was named a Fellow of the American Physical Society in 2017. He has been honored with the 2018 Fulbright Specialist Award, 2017 Bessel-Humboldt Research Award, the U.S Presidential PECASE award by President Obama, the inaugural Gordon Moore Inventor Fellow award, the inaugural IEEE Nano Geim and Novoselov Graphene Prize, the IEEE “Early Career Award” in Nanotechnology, the NSF CAREER award, and several DoD Young Investigator awards.