Simplifying manufacture of drugs, plastics earns UH chemist top honor

While Daugulis’ modesty keeps him from assuming there is a Nobel Prize in his future, one Nobel laureate, Harvard University chemist Elias J. Corey, has drawn on Daugulis’ research in his own work.

This year’s fellows include three chemists from Texas, with 64 colleges and universities represented in all among the winners. Daugulis plans to hire a graduate student with the two-year, $50,000 grant that the fellowship brings.

Daugulis has published 13 articles since joining the UH faculty in 2003. He earned his engineering degree from Riga Technical University in his native Latvia in 1991 and a Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1999. He worked as postdoctoral associate at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill from 2000-2003.

NOTE TO JOURNALISTS: A photo of Olafs Daugulis in his lab is available on the Web at http://www.uh.edu/news-events/archive/nr/2008/03march/olafs-daugulisph.html. A high-resolution photo is available by contacting Lisa Merkl.

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