NAI Selects Three Texas A&M University Faculty Members As 2020 Fellows

Three faculty members from Texas A&M University are among the 175 distinguished academic inventors selected as 2020 National Academy of Inventors (NAI) Fellows, the Division of Research announced today.

“I applaud the NAI for selecting these three outstanding researchers as 2020 fellows,” said Mark A. Barteau, vice president for research at Texas A&M University and an NAI Fellow. “This honor recognizes their scholarship, talent and innovation, as well as their ongoing commitment to Texas A&M’s mission to produce innovations and solutions that address our world’s greatest challenges.”

The NAI will induct the following Texas A&M faculty members during its 10th annual national meeting, which is scheduled for June 2021, in Tampa, Fla.:

• Bill McCutchen, associate professor and center director for the Texas A&M AgriLife Research and Extension Center in Stephenville. His research interests include using Raman spectroscopy to provide chemical fingerprints; developing wheat from pre-specified lines of wheat germplasm and cultivars; and developing and utilizing remote sensing technologies for actionable decisions by researchers and producers to make biological discoveries that advance the productivity and sustainability of agriculture.
• Duncan J. Maitland, Stewart & Stevenson Professor I, Department of Biomedical Engineering, College of Engineering, and assistant director for commercialization at the Texas A&M Engineering Experiment Station. Maitland’s research focuses on novel treatments of cardiovascular disease with an emphasis on stroke. His research projects include endovascular interventional devices, microactuators, optical therapeutic devices and basic device-body interactions and physics, including computational and experimental techniques. He founded Shape Memory Medical, Inc. to commercialize vascular embolic devices
• Richard Miles, University Distinguished Professor and holder of the O’Donnell Foundation Chair V, Department of Aerospace Engineering, College of Engineering. His research includes the use of microwaves, nanosecond high voltage pulses, surface dielectric barrier discharges, electron beams, MHD devices and lasers in driving and controlling aerodynamic phenomena; stand-off detection of explosives, hazardous gases and greenhouse gases by laser or microwave techniques; flow velocity measurement by laser ionization and molecular tagging; microwave and laser control of flame propagation, ignition and lean combustion operation; and development of advanced laser diagnostics for surfaces and for equilibrium and non-equilibrium gases and plasmas. Miles is a member of the National Academy of Engineering.

Their induction will bring to 14 the total number of current or past Texas A&M faculty members who have been selected as NAI Fellows since the organization named its charter fellows in 2012.

The NAI Fellows Program highlights academic inventors who have demonstrated a spirit of innovation in creating or facilitating outstanding inventions that have made a tangible impact on the quality of life, economic development and the welfare of society. To date, NAI Fellows hold more than 42,700 issued U.S. patents, which have generated more than 13,000 licensed technologies and companies, and created more than 36 million jobs. In addition, more than $2.2 trillion in revenue has been generated based on NAI Fellow discoveries.