Chemist gets $4.6M grant to look for novel ways to synthesize polymers

Image: Texas A&M University at Qatar

Texas A&M University at Qatar chemist Hassan S. Bazzi has been selected to receive a $4.6 million grant to develop new ways to synthesize polymers as part of the National Priorities Research Program – Exceptional Proposals (NPRP-EP) program sponsored by the Qatar National Research Fund (QNRF).

Bazzi’s project, “Synthesis of Novel and Sustainable Functionalized Linear and Cyclic Polymers via Olefin Metathesis,” is one of two Texas A&M at Qatar proposals funded during the latest cycle, the sixth provided thus far by the QNRF.

Bazzi, who also serves as assistant dean of research and graduate studies at Texas A&M at Qatar, will be collaborating on the project with the California Institute of Technology’s Robert Grubbs, co-recipient of the 2005 Nobel Prize in Chemistry and holder of the QAPCO Chair in Polymer Science and Engineering at Texas A&M at Qatar.

Bazzi and Grubbs plan to use their grant funding to develop novel and environmentally friendly ways to synthesize polymers that, like polyolefins, are produced on an immense scale in Qatar.

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