Theodore A. Koch Graduate Student Travel Award 2025 — 2026

Dear Friends, 

The Catal­y­sis Club of Philadel­phia (CCP) is tak­ing appli­ca­tions for the Theodore A. Koch Stu­dent Trav­el Award for the cur­rent 2025- 2026 meet­ing sea­son. The award is spon­sored in mem­o­ry of T.A Koch to rec­og­nize and reward grad­u­ate stu­dent achieve­ments in catal­y­sis research. T. A. Koch (1925–2014) was a chemist who worked at DuPont and spent his entire career devel­op­ing chem­i­cal process­es and bring­ing them from the bench­top to com­mer­cial­iza­tion with marked cre­ativ­i­ty and tenac­i­ty. The award will pro­vide finan­cial sup­port to the award­ed grad­u­ate stu­dents up to the amount of $1000 to attend a con­fer­ence of their choice. The amount can be used to cov­er reg­is­tra­tion fees and/or trav­el expens­es.
 
A Past Chair of the CCP and employ­ee of DuPont, Koch was wide­ly rec­og­nized as an inno­va­tor in the sci­ence and appli­ca­tion of catal­y­sis. Notable tech­ni­cal accom­plish­ments in Koch’s career includ­ed devel­op­ing a new cat­a­lyst for nitrous oxide destruc­tion (an ozone-deple­tion byprod­uct from Nylon man­u­fac­ture), devel­op­ing a new process for hydro­gen cyanide man­u­fac­ture, and improv­ing many poly­mer inter­me­di­ates process­es. Koch received the Award for Excel­lence in Cat­alyt­ic Sci­ence and Tech­nol­o­gy from the Catal­y­sis Club of Philadel­phia in 1994 and the Lavoisi­er Medal for Tech­ni­cal Excel­lence from DuPont in 1998. Ted always strived to grow and devel­op young sci­en­tists, and this trav­el award is a small effort to con­tin­ue his lega­cy of believ­ing in the next gen­er­a­tion of sci­en­tists.

Eli­gi­bil­i­ty:

Grad­u­ate stu­dents who are mem­bers of the CCP and have paid the annu­al dues. Selec­tion will be based on the poten­tial impact of the trav­el award on the student’s career goals, finan­cial need, and over­all mer­it. (The com­plet­ed appli­ca­tion form should not exceed three pages.) The attached appli­ca­tion form is due March 27th, 2026, and the win­ners will be announced at our CCP Sym­po­sium-Stu­dent Poster Joint Con­fer­ence.

Please send your appli­ca­tions to Jin­suo Xu (CCP Chair, jinsuoxu@​dow.​com).

Down­load Appli­ca­tion Form for 2025–2026 Koch Award »

Down­load Koch 2025–2026 Announce­ment

Best regards,
Jinsuo Xu
2025–2026 CCP Chair