Pablo G. Debenedetti is the Dean for Research, the Class of 1950 Professor in Engineering and Applied Science, and a professor of chemical and biological engineering at Princeton University. His research focuses on thermodynamics, statistical mechanics, and computer simulations of liquids and glasses.
Early life and education
Debenedetti was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in 1953. He graduated from the University of Buenos Aires in 1978 with a degree in chemical engineering, and worked as a process development engineer at the De Nora Company in Milan, Italy, between 1978 and 1980. He completed his master's degree in 1981 and his Ph.D in 1985, both in chemical engineering, at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where his thesis adviser was Robert C. Reid. He joined the faculty of Princeton University in 1985.
Research and career
Debenedetti's research focuses on theoretical and computational investigations of the structure, dynamics, thermodynamics, and statistical mechanics of liquids and glasses. He has published over 300 scientific papers. and a book, Metastable Liquids: Concepts and Principles Debenedetti has made numerous contributions to fundamental understanding of the microscopic structure of supercritical fluids, the theory of nucleation, the theory of hydrophobicity, the glass transition, protein thermodynamics, and the structure and thermodynamics of supercooled water. Using advanced sampling techniques, his group demonstrated computationally the existence of a metastable liquid-liquid phase transition in a molecular model of water. His work has been cited more than 33,000 times. He served as the chair of the Department of Chemical Engineering from 1996 to 2004 and was the vice dean of the School of Engineering and Applied Science from 2008 to 2013. He was appointed Princeton's Dean for Research in 2013.
Awards and honors
Debenedetti has received numerous awards and honors.
Alpha Chi Sigma Award, American Institute of Chemical Engineers, 2019
In 2008, he was named one of the 100 chemical engineers of the modern era by the American Institute of Chemical Engineers Centennial Celebration Committee.
Selected publications
P.G. Debenedetti, Metastable Liquids. Concepts and Principles. Princeton
S. Sastry, P.G. Debenedetti, F. Sciortino and H.E. Stanley, “Singularity-free interpretation of the thermodynamics of supercooled water.” Phys. Rev. E, 53, 6144.
S. Sastry, P.G. Debenedetti and F.H. Stillinger, “Signatures of distinct dynamical regimes in the energy landscape of a glass-forming liquid.” Nature, 393, 554.
J.R. Errington and P.G. Debenedetti, “Relationship between structural order and the anomalies of liquid water.” Nature, 409, 318.
P.G. Debenedetti and F.H. Stillinger, “Supercooled liquids and the glass transition.” Nature, 410, 259.
J.C. Palmer, F. Martelli, Y. Liu, R. Car, A.Z. Panagiotopoulos and P.G. Debenedetti, “Metastable liquid-liquid transition in a molecular model of water.” Nature, 510, 385.
A. Haji-Akbari and P.G. Debenedetti, “Direct calculation of ice homogeneous nucleation rate for a molecular model of water.” PNAS, 112, 10582.
