UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Sridhar Komarneni, Penn State distinguished professor of clay mineralogy, marked 50 years with the College of Agricultural Sciences March 1. He came to the University in 1976 in a career move he said he has never regretted.
“I feel highly satisfied with my career at Penn State,” he said. “The research I conducted and the teaching I have done over five decades have been a labor of love, and the time has flown by. I visited many countries to give invited lectures and made many friends. Because I traveled so much for work, I never took a sabbatical. That is how much I love working for Penn State and living in State College.”
In addition to conducting research, Komarneni continues to teach Soils 420: Remediation of Contaminated Soils, an undergraduate course offered every fall, and Soils 519: Nature of Soil Minerals, a graduate course offered every other fall.
Over his career at Penn State, Komarneni has been very productive, advising or co-advising 15 master’s degree students, advising or co-advising 17 doctoral students, producing more than 850 refereed journal articles and 11 books, and developing nine patents.
His expertise has been widely recognized, winning 41 major awards, including being elected fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 1991; elected fellow of the American Ceramic Society in 1993; elected fellow of the Soil Science Society of America in 1994; elected fellow of the American Society of Agronomy in 1995; admitted as a fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry in 2002; elected to the World Academy of Ceramics in 2004; named distinguished professor at Penn State in 2007; and receiving the Alex and Jessie C. Black Award for Excellence in Research in the College of Agricultural Sciences in 2000.
“After getting my Ph.D. in 1973 from the University of Wisconsin-Madison under the tutelage of Professor M.L. Jackson, a world-famous soil clay mineralogist and member of the National Academy of Sciences, I moved to Penn State,” Komarneni said. “This was my best decision, career-wise. I started working on a project related to shale rock as a nuclear waste repository.”
At Penn State’s Materials Research Laboratory, Komarneni developed new materials for different applications. His transition into materials science was an easy one, he explained, because all materials knowledge comes from naturally occurring minerals. For example, he explained that porcelain is made from clean kaolinite clay mineral and that knowledge of synthetic diamonds comes from the diamond mineral.
For five decades, Komarneni has been the consummate Penn State scholar, according to Troy Ott, Peter and Ann Tombros Dean of the College of Agricultural Sciences.
“Dr. Komarneni’s academic contributions to the college and his representation of the university both at home and abroad have long been exemplary,” Ott said. ‘He is an international leader in his field who has had an impact by ensuring his scientific discoveries can advance to the marketplace and solve problems or create new innovations. His record of guidance and mentoring of young scientists in clay mineralogy is impressive and personifies a servant leader.”
Fred Cannon, professor emeritus of environmental engineering, worked closely with Komarneni on a number of projects spanning 20 years. Cannon used the words “competent,” “distinguished,” “insightful,” “honorable,” “ethical,” “humble” and “pleasant” to describe him. According to Cannon, Komarneni has contributed world-class excellence to Penn in his field.
“It was always such a breath of fresh air collaborating with Dr. Komarneni,” he said. “We shared several million dollars of research grants. Much of our work pertained to improving ductile iron foundry processing. The molds into which molten iron is cast are made of sand, clay, coal, water and binders. Sridhar’s expertise pertained to the clay, while mine to the coal and water. We developed a process and commercialized it that offered tens of millions of dollars savings to the foundry industry. We also collaborated on removing perchlorate contaminants from drinking water.”
Komarneni said he has experienced a number of academic trends during his long career.
“In the ’70s and ’80s, there was a lot of emphasis on research related to a clean environment, and in the ’90s, the focus was on porous and catalytic materials for catalysis and nanocomposites for improving mechanical and other properties of materials,” he said. “In the 21st century, it is all about energy materials such as fuel cells, lithium-ion batteries and super capacitors for energy storage, water-splitting materials for hydrogen energy generation.”
Komarneni noted that he appreciates the movement toward interdisciplinary research at Penn State.
“The Materials Research Laboratory where I started was the first interdisciplinary lab at Penn State, which was started by a visionary, Professor Rustum Roy, who was my mentor,” he said. “Now it is the interdisciplinary Materials Research Institute, with which I have a joint appointment. There are several interdisciplinary programs at the present time that emphasize interdisciplinary research, and this is a big change that I have seen at Penn State.”
Clive Randall, director of the Materials Research Institute, noted that there is one constant thread running through Komarneni’s impressive body of research over his 50 years at Penn State — continuous innovation in important concepts through crystal chemistry and novel particle engineering.
“The work ranges from the novel synthesis of complex chemistries in nanomaterials to the encapsulation of nuclear waste products to the use of clay mineralogy to better control the release rates of fertilizers,” Randall said. “Even in the last couple of years, his group has fabricated novel composite particulate materials using graphene and nanoporous silica particles that are highly effective platforms for electrochemical biosensors.”
As his career winds down, Komarneni is dealing with visiting scholars, finishing research goals and collaborating with colleagues from abroad. Although he is a bit past traditional retirement age, he said his new retirement plan is to not talk about retiring.
Komarneni said he attributes his success to his wife, Sreedevi Komarneni, psychiatrist, who has been highly supportive.
“The old saying ‘behind a successful man, there is a successful woman’ does not apply here,” he said. “Rather, the saying should be ‘by the side of a successful man there is a successful woman.’”