Coblentz Society Craver Award

The Coblentz Society has created an award to recognize young individuals who have made significant contributions in applied analytical vibrational spectroscopy.

The Craver Award is presented annually to an outstanding young molecular spectroscopist whose efforts are in the area of applied analytical vibrational spectroscopy. The candidate must be under the age of 45 on January 1st of the year of the award. The work may include any aspect of infrared (NIR, MIR, or Far), and/or THz, and/or Raman spectroscopy in applied analytical vibrational spectroscopy. The nominees may come from an academic, government lab, or industrial backgrounds. Click here for information on the Coblentz Society Craver Award.

2019 Coblentz Society Craver Award Recipient

Shawn (Xiaoyun) Chen is currently a senior research scientist working at Core R&D Analytical Sciences, the Dow Chemical Company, where he applies all types of optical spectroscopy tools for problem-solving in both Research & Development and Manufacturing and Engineering projects. Shawn has been leading Dow’s global optical spectroscopy technology network since 2013 and also the molecular structure capability since 2016. Shawn has mentored many junior spectroscopists and introduced many non-spectroscopist users such as process engineers and synthetic chemists to the wonderful world of in situ spectroscopy for reaction and process monitoring, and in-field deployment. Shawn’s current work involves the collaboration with many world-class experts in their own fields such as organic synthesis, catalyst discovery and development, reaction scale-up and optimization, and process analytical, and accelerate and improve their R&D processes by optical spectroscopy. Shawn has successfully introduced and implemented in situ spectroscopy to more than ten Dow sites globally, which has won him multiple awards within Dow.

Prior to joining Dow, Shawn obtained his PhD at University of Michigan 2002-2007, under the guidance of Professor Zhan Chen. His research focused on the development of sum frequency generation vibrational spectroscopy as a powerful tool to investigate biointerfaces. His thesis research won him multiple prestigious awards such as the 2007 Kasimir Fajans Award, nomination for 2008 National Distinguished Dissertation Award, and 2007 Distinguished Dissertation Awards. Shawn received his B.S. from Tsinghua University, Beijing, China, studying polymeric materials and their applications in tissue engineering.

Shawn has been a member of Society of Applied Spectroscopy and the Coblentz Society since 2013, and is currently serving on the Board of managers for the Coblentz Society, and as the Newsletter Editor for the Society of Applied Spectroscopy. Shawn has been chairing a session on industrial applications of vibrational spectroscopy at SciX every year since 2015.

Call For Nominations

Please refer to the Coblentz website for further details

Past Recipients

2018       Christy Haynes

2017 Martin Zanni

2016 Karen Faulds

2015 Ji-Xin Cheng 

2014 Lynne S. Taylor

2013 Rohit Bhargava -

2012 Duncan Graham 

2011 Michael W. George

2010 Boris Mizaikoff

2009 Takeshi Hasegawa

2008 John C. Conboy

2007 Katherine Bakeev