ACS Honors Industry Scientists, Announces $2.5M Grant for Graduate Students
The American Chemical Society (ACS) honored researchers from Arkema, AbbVie and Merck, Amgen, DuPont and Eli Lilly during the 2025 Heroes of Chemistry awards held Aug. 19 at the ACS Fall 2025 conference in Washington, D.C. The annual program highlights teams whose work has led to commercial products that benefit society, according to ACS.
Among the honorees was an Arkema team recognized for developing Kynar HSV 900 PVDF, a binder material used in lithium-ion batteries. The material, introduced in 2005, was designed without fluorosurfactants and has since been adopted in lithium iron phosphate (LFP) technology for electric vehicles, the company said.
ACS also recently announced the Graduate Student Success Grant, a one-time, $2.5 million initiative to support graduate students whose research has been disrupted due to terminated or canceled funding. The program will provide up to 100 grants of $25,000 each for M.S. and Ph.D. students within one year of completing their degrees.
“This program addresses a growing concern — the disruption of graduate education due to the unexpected loss of research funding,” said Wayne E. Jones, ACS Chair of the Board of Directors and Director at Large in a press statement. “These grants will help the future of our scientific workforce and the pipeline of chemistry innovators.”
Applications will open Sept. 15, 2025, and close Oct. 1, 2025. One grant will be awarded per institution, with awardees notified by Oct. 15. Funds will be distributed in 2025.
The grant is administered by the ACS Board of Directors and reportedly is the organization’s first rapid response effort to address the impact of research funding interruptions.
