Rusty bike chains and crusty car batteries usually mean it’s time to clean the corroded areas and apply some grease or gel, but who thinks about it beyond that?
Answer: a chemical and materials science engineer, particularly one interested in corrosion science. Someone like Dev Chidambaram.
“It’s not very glamorous,” Chidambaram said, about his area of expertise. But, he noted, as long as humanity uses metals like steel and aluminum— crucial for things like bridges, aircraft and power plants — we’ll be solving corrosion problems.
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Chidambaram and his team use electrochemistry and spectroscopy to better understand and reduce corrosion of materials. It is an area he specializes in, and one in which he is receiving international recognition: the Electrochemical Society (ECS) has awarded Chidambaram its 2025 Rusty Award for Mid-Career Excellence in Corrosion. ECS is the oldest professional organization devoted to electrochemistry and was founded in 1902. Chidambaram will receive the award and present some of his research at the ECS’ October meeting in Chicago, Illinois.
“Professor Dev Chidambaram is a leader in the field,” Chemical & Materials Engineering Department Chair Victor Vasquez said. He cited Chidambaram’s development of a coating to protect metal from corrosion that is safer than hexavalent chromium systems, widely used since World War II but also carcinogenic, along with his recent research work funded by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE).
Vasquez also referenced Chidambaram’s development of two formulations to prevent corrosion and scaling in geothermal wells, both currently used by Ormat Technologies, a geothermal and renewable energy company.
“Equally important, he strengthens the community through exemplary service,” Vasquez said, “ ... and by mentoring the next generation of electrochemical and corrosion scientists as a longtime w88 casino games login, Reno professor, many of whom have gone to become leaders in their own fields.”
MER lab
For Chidambaram, the award recognizes the singular type of research done in his Materials and Electrochemical Research (MER) Laboratory in the Laxalt Mineral Research Building.
“To me, (the award) is validation of the work we do in our lab, and the work the students and our team members do,” he said. “They are the electrons of the electrochemistry lab”.
Chidambaram started the MER Lab after joining the w88 casino games login, Reno in 2009. He and about 10 researchers study various types of electron transfer processes — that includes work on materials that resist corrosion in harsh environments, like nuclear reactors, nuclear fuel cycles and high temperature solar. Chidambaram and team also work on fuel cells, aerospace materials, improving battery systems and developing new catalytic electrodes. Since he joined the University, Chidambaram has been the principal investigator on projects totaling nearly million. His work has resulted in nearly 275 publications and presentations and five issued U.S. patents.
“We excel in correlating the electrochemical behavior to surface chemistry,” Chidambaram said. Specifically, we design and developin situmethods to understand these mechanisms. Our students are some of the best in this niche topic. That is why our students are really sought after.”
The lab’s recent and current projects include a partnership with Idaho National Lab and Pennsylvania State University to make materials to be used in a specific part of a process that would remove uranium from used nuclear fuel, making it usable for next-generation nuclear reactors. Another project, with the w88 casino games login, Las Vegas and University of Houston, and funded by the DOE, involves extracting iron from its ore through an electrochemical process that would make extraction of iron from less prominent ores, like those found in the U.S., more viable.
Early start
Chidambaram’s focus on electrochemistry came early: he earned his bachelor’s degree in chemical and electrochemical engineering at the Central Electrochemical Research Institute in India, one of the country’s top research institutes and focused solely on electrochemical science and technology. He got into spectroscopy — study of absorption and emission of light and other radiation by matter, a branch of science that can help you understand what kind of corrosion is occurring — while earning his graduate degrees at the State University of New York at Stony Brook. Chidambaram holds two master’s degrees — in materials science and engineering and in biomedical engineering — as well as a Ph.D. in materials science and engineering.
After graduating from Stony Brook with a 2004 President’s Distinguished Doctoral Dissertation award, Chidambaram received the Goldhaber Distinguished Fellowship to work at Brookhaven National Laboratory, New York, where he was promoted to staff associate materials scientist. As an early career scientist, his work was recognized with awards from the Electrochemical Society, the International Society for Electrochemistry, Society for Applied Spectroscopy and the American Vacuum Society.
After joining the University, Chidambaram developed the Nuclear Materials emphasis, and more recently, the Batteries and Energy Storage Technologies Minor program, in which students make and test their own lithium-ion batteries, among other contributions. Chidambaram is the recipient of the 2023 w88 casino games login Regents Mid-Career Researcher Award, among other recognitions.
