Jeff Lievense
Genomatica’s Jeff Lievense is selected to receive the prestigious Raphael Katzen Award by the Society for Industrial Microbiology and Biotechnology (SIMB). The award celebrates distinguished contributions in the commercialization of biotechnology to make fuels and chemicals from renewable resources. The award will be presented at the 40th Symposium on Biotechnology for Fuels and Chemicals (SBFC) on May 1, 2018.Lievense’s career includes three decades of developing, commercializing and improving processes to produce chemicals including butanediol, propanediol, farnesene, citric acid and sucralose. Especially significant is Lievense’s delivery of processes and plants that meet demanding economic and performance targets, most recently proven with Genomatica’s butanediol process and the Novamont plant, according to the company. He has contributed to many leading firms including Amyris, Tate & Lyle, Eastman Kodak, Genencor and the Michigan Biotechnology Institute. His work earned the 2014 Outstanding Chemical Engineer Award from the Purdue University School of Chemical Engineering, and was instrumental in Genomatica receiving the 2013 Kirkpatrick Chemical Engineering Achievement Award for “the most noteworthy chemical engineering technology commercialized in the world” in the preceding two years.
Lievense earned his Ph.D. in chemical engineering from Purdue University, where he did research on yeast metabolism and fermentation process modeling. He graduated summa cum laude from the University of Michigan with a B.S in the bio option of chemical engineering.
“We’re so happy for Jeff, and honored that he has been a part of our team since 2012,” says Christophe Schilling, Genomatica’s CEO. “His experience has been invaluable in scaling our ideas from concept to commercialization. And his willingness to share and be a mentor to many of our talented scientists and engineers is creating the next generation of innovators to follow in his footsteps.”
For more information, visit: www.genomatica.com
