Alfred Rudin is a member of the Professional Engineers of Ontario. Professor Rudin spent 14 years with a large Canadian chemical company in research, development, and production. He joined the University of Waterloo chemistry department where he is now a Distinguished Professor Emeritus. He is the author or co-author of 295 research papers and 25 patents. Dr. Rudin is also a fellow of the Chemical Institute of Canada, the Royal Society of Canada, and the Federation of Societies for Coatings Technology.
Prof. Phillip Choi received his B.A.Sc. in chemical engineering in 1988 from the University of British Columbia and his M.A.Sc. and Ph.D., also in chemical engineering, in 1992 and 1995, respectively, from the University of Waterloo. While pursuing his graduate studies, he received scholarships from the Federation of Societies for Coatings Technology and the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada to study solubility properties of non-ionic surfactants and polyolefin blends under the guidance of Professor Alfred Rudin and Dr. Tom Kavassalis of Xerox Corporation, currently VP - Strategy Planning.
Upon completion of his Ph.D., Prof. Choi worked in the coating industry as a development chemist developing high solids urethane and water-borne epoxy coating formulations. He then joined the Department of Chemical and Materials Engineering at the University of Alberta as a sessional instructor in 1996 and at the same time, carried out research in the area of polymer rheology in Prof. Michael Williams' lab. In 1997, he became an assistant professor and was promoted to the rank of full professor in 2006. In the 2003/2004 academic year, Prof. Choi spent a one year sabbatical in Prof. Wayne L. Mattice's lab of the Maurice Morton Institute of Polymer Science at the University of Akron studying crystallization behavior of polypropylene blends using the rotational isomeric state theory. Prof. Choi has supervised 9 postdoctoral fellows as well as 6 Ph.D., 8 M.Sc. and 30 B.Sc. theses over the past ten years.
Prof. Choi's current research interests lie in the areas of molecular simulation of polymers, statistical thermodynamics of polymer solutions and blends, structure-property relationships of branched polyethylene and of block copolymers used in nanoscopic drug delivery systems and adsorption behaviour of polymer on inorganic surfaces. He has published over 100 book chapters, referred journal articles and conference proceedings and is constantly in demand as manuscript reviewer for major polymer and physical science journals and proposal reviewer for various Canadian and American funding agencies. Prof. Choi is also an active consultant to various multinational organizations on issues related to polymer product development. He is currently the chair of the Edmonton section of the Canadian Society for Chemical Engineering and a board of director of the Canadian Society for Chemical Engineering. He is a registered professional engineer in the province of Alberta.
Prof. Phillip Choi won the Faculty of Engineering Undergraduate Teaching Award and was named the McCalla Professorship in 2007 at the University of Alberta recognizing his dedication to undergraduate education. In particular, he has accumulated 13 years of experience teaching introductory polymer courses to senior undergraduate and first year graduate students. He received an international IUPAC Travel Award in 2002 and a National Young Innovator Award from Petro Canada Inc. in 2002 and 2001, respectively, recognizing his work on molecular simulation of polymers.
