Dan Luss has contributed significantly to education, research and professional organizations throughout his nearly 40-year career.

After receiving bachelor of science and master of science degrees in chemical engineering from Technion in Israel in the early 1960s, Luss received his doctorate from the University of Minnesota in 1966. He accepted an assistant professor position at his alma mater before relocating to Houston as an assistant professor in the chemical engineering department at the Cullen College of Engineering in 1967.

Within five years, Luss was promoted to full professor, the beginning of a remarkable tenure distinguished by his leadership of the chemical engineering department twice, from 1975 to 1995 and from 1999 to 2000, as chair. He was named a Cullen professor in 1984.

Throughout his tenure, Luss instructed countless courses, completely or jointly supervised nearly 75 Ph.D. and master’s theses, and published more than 200 journal articles. As chair of the department for more than 20 years, he laid the foundation for one of the best chemical engineering programs in the nation.

Nearly 40 years of research garnered Luss more than $6.7 million in funding, either as the principal investigator or in joint research endeavors. His research focuses on the dynamic features of chemically reacting systems, hot spots formation in packed-bed reactors, production of synthesis gas in membrane reactors and electrical and magnetic field formation during high-temperature solid reactions.

Luss has served as a member of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers’ council and president of the International Symposium on Chemical Reaction Engineering, U.S.A. In addition, he is the editor of the Plenum Book series in chemical engineering, the editor of Review in Chemical Engineering and a member of the editorial board of IEC Research and Catalysis Reviews-Science and Engineering.

Luss was elected to the National Academy of Engineering in 1984. He has received several American Institute of Chemical Engineers awards, including fellow of the AIChE, the Wilhelm Award, the Professional Progress Award, the Allan P. Colburn Award and eight Best Paper Awards from the Southwest section of AIChE.