The National Science Foundation (NSF) named Dr. Mircea Dincã, Associate Professor of Chemistry at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as the 2016 Alan T. Waterman Award recipient. This award is NSF's highest honor that annually recognizes an outstanding researcher under the age of 35 and funds his or her research in any field of science or engineering. Dr. Dincã pioneered "contributions to the synthesis and understanding of molecular porous solids with unusual electronic properties, especially for creative synthetic design leading to microporous materials with high electrical conductivity and redox activity".
Dr. Dincã is one of the most creative, productive, and innovative young scientists of his generation. He is recognized for interdisciplinary work spanning the fields of chemistry, materials science and engineering, and catalysis, to design new materials with novel electronic properties and functionality. An internationally known and prolific scholar, Dincã has developed a distinctive research program that synthesizes novel organic and inorganic hybrid materials, known as metal-organic frameworks (MOF), and enhances these materials with unprecedented electric conductivity and redox activity.
Dr. Dincã is revolutionizing the subject of microporous solids as he utilizes an array of novel methods to create materials displaying unparalleled characteristics. Recently, Dincã's research resulted in a new class MOFs that serve as porous conductors that exhibit high surface areas and "possess charge mobility values" exceeding the best conductive polymers. Materials exhibiting such properties have the potential for immense impact and myriad practical applications, including energy storage, thermoelectrics, sensing devices, and potential use in electrocatalysis.
In recognition of Dr. Dincã's outstanding research contributions, he has received the following awards and honors: Dream Chemistry award- Polish Academy of Science (2015), ExxonMobil ACS Solid State Chemistry Faculty Fellowship (2015), Dalton Lectureship - UC Berkeley (2015), NSF CAREER Award (2015), Keith Fagnou Lectureship - University of Ottawa (2015), Thomson-Reuters Most Cited Chemists List(2014, 2015), Cottrell Scholar Award - Research Corporation for Science Advancement (2014), Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship (2014), Dreyfus Fellowship in Environmental Chemistry (2013), 3M Non-Tenured Faculty Award (2013), and the Selected US (ACS) Representative for Transatlantic Frontiers of Chemistry Conference (2013). To date, Dr. Dincã has 57 publications as an independent researcher.
Dr. Dincã has received funding as a PI from the Division of Materials Research in the Mathematical and Physical Sciences Directorate (CAREER award 1452612).
