ACS Research Conference: Chemistry and Chemical Engineering in MENA

Niveen M. Khashab is a Professor of Chemistry at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST). After her doctoral studies at the University of Florida, she joined sir Fraser Stoddart’s Lab at the University of California, Los Angeles, and then at Northwestern University working on supramolecular chemistry. Her current efforts focus on intrinsically porous materials (IPMs) for energy intensive separations and supramolecular assembled capsules (SACs) for encapsulation, delivery and biomedical applications. She is the recipient of the Crow Award in Organic Chemistry in 2004, AlMaraai Award for Nanotechnology in 2013 and the L’Oréal-Unesco Women in Science International Award in 2017. In 2021, she was named a fellow of the Royal Chemical Society. She is on the editorial board of 10 scientific journals (ACS, RSC, Wiley) and currently serving as an associate editor at Chemistry of Materials (ACS).

Christopher LaPrade is the Senior Manager for Global Engagement in the ACS Membership Division. In this role, Christopher works to develop ACS’s international collaboration efforts with U.S. and foreign government entities, partner chemical societies, institutes and multilateral organizations worldwide. Prior to joining ACS in 2014, Christopher worked in a similar role at the Society for Neuroscience (SfN) building global partnerships and institutional capacity in emerging scientific communities and worked in higher education in Aachen, Germany. Christopher resides in Washington, D.C. and holds an M.A. in International Business & Policy from Georgetown University.

Wesam AbuSaif graduated from the university of Jordan with B.Sc. in Chemistry in 1998. For the next 8 years, until 2006, Wesam worked in several pharmaceutical and bio-equivalence companies in Jordan and Dubai as a senior researcher in R&D departments. In 2007, he worked as sales manager with the exclusive agent of CAS and ACS in the Middle East. In 2013, he accepted a job offer from the Royal Society of Chemistry RSC to be the Regional Manager in the Middle East and Africa and in In June 2016, he accepted an offer to be the Regional Marketing Manager with ACSi in the Middle East. Wesam has an MBA from the University of Bradford (UK).