Bipin V. Vora Receives Prominent Research Award

Illinois Tech Armour College of Engineering Adjunct Faculty Bipin V. Vora was selected by the American Chemical Society to receive its annual George A. Olah Award in Hydrocarbon or Petroleum Chemistry. Vora was specifically recognized for “the successful development and commercialization of technologies for catalytic dehydrogenation, the conversion of methanol to olefins, and the production of biodegradable detergents.”

He is a faculty member in Illinois Tech’s Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering.

Vora received his B.S. in Chemistry from the University of Mumbai in 1963 and his B.S. in Chemical Engineering and M.S. in Chemical Engineering from the University of New Mexico in 1966 and 1967, respectively.

He has had an illustrious career with 95 patents to his name, 22 of which he is the sole inventor.

Vora says working on the development of the propane and isobutane catalytic dehydrogenation process, which is now named the Honeywell UOP Oleflex process, was particularly memorable.

“I led the project from concept to commercialization, which took more than a decade of great teamwork,” he says.  

Vora has been inducted as a fellow of the National Academy of Engineering, a foreign fellow of the Indian National Academy of Engineering, and a fellow of the National Academy of Inventors.  

Photo: Adjunct Faculty Bipin Vora (middle) holding the George A. Olah Award on stage at the awards ceremony in San Diego.