Debora Rodrigues
Dean’s Professor and Chair of the Environmental Engineering and Earth Sciences Department, Clemson University
2016 Research Award Winner
Debora F. Rodrigues is the Chair of the Environmental Engineering and Earth Sciences Department at Clemson University. She was the President of the Association of Environmental Engineering and Science Professors between 2023-2024 and received the organization’s Distinguished Service Award in 2020 and 2024. Rodrigues came to Clemson University from the University of Houston, Texas, where she was the Ezekiel Cullen Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Director of the Environmental Engineering Graduate Program in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering. Rodrigues’s multidisciplinary research encompasses environmental engineering, environmental microbiology, molecular genetics, and materials sciences and engineering approaches. Much of her work is related directly to the water–energy nexus. For instance, she has worked to reduce total energy costs in water and wastewater treatment—which typically account for about 40% of total energy consumed in municipalities—by developing new alternative and clean bio- and nano-technologies. Her research integrates bio-inspired polymer nanocomposites and biological treatments to remove water contaminants. These technologies aim to produce clean alternative sources of energy, such as producing biofuels or recycling essential nutrients in contaminated water for reuse in agriculture.
Rodrigues is an Associate Editor of npj Clean Water and of the Journal of Hazardous Materials. Because of her outstanding research contributions, she has served as a Program Officer for several National Science Foundation (NSF) initiatives and was presented with the NSF CAREER Award in 2012. Other numerous awards include the Inaugural Emerging Investigator Research Award from the Sustainable Nanotechnology Organization in 2014. In 2017, she was selected to participate in the Frontiers of Engineering program organized by the National Academy of Engineering. Rodrigues has more than 110 publications, and her breakthroughs in the water–energy nexus have resulted in three international and two national patents.
Rodrigues holds a PhD in Microbiology and Molecular Genetics from Michigan State University; an MS in Environmental Microbiology from the University of São Paulo, Brazil; and a BS in Biology and Biology Education, also from São Paulo. She was a postdoctoral associate in the Environmental Engineering Program at Yale University.