Professor Walter G. Chapman is the William W. Akers Professor of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering. He is also a Guest Professor at Hamburg University of Technology. Professor Chapman has previously served as Associate Dean of Engineering for Energy Research, as Chair of the Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering Department, and as the Director of the Energy and Environmental Systems Institute at Rice University. Among his recognitions are the Humboldt Prize, the Donald L. Katz Award, multiple teaching awards and an Outstanding Young Alumni Award from Clemson University where he received his B.S. degree in Chemical Engineering in 1983. He was awarded his Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from Cornell University in 1988. After spending two years as a Research Engineer with Shell Development Company, he joined the Rice faculty in 1990.
Dr. Chapman’s research group uses tools such as molecular simulation, computer visualization, statistical mechanics, and NMR to discover how material properties and structure depend on molecular forces. Professor Chapman’s present research program focuses on polymer solutions and blends, associating fluids, confined fluids, and flow assurance associated with natural gas hydrates and asphaltenes. Professor Chapman's theoretical models and computational algorithms (including the SAFT equation of state and the polymer density functional theory iSAFT) are widely applied in the energy and high performance materials industries and they are the subject of research by numerous other academic groups. His group and collaborators have recently developed molecular dynamics algorithms enabling new applications of NMR relaxation in energy, soft materials, and design of MRI contrast agents.