Four Join Arkansas Academy of Chemical Engineers

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Pictured from left to right: Matthew Loach, Cameron Gross, Vincent Gaul, Daniel Smith

The Arkansas Academy of Chemical Engineers has inducted four new members.

The induction ceremony took place April 12 at the Inn at Carnall Hall in Fayetteville with more than 70 attendees.

The 2019 inductees were:

• Matthew Loach, B.S.Ch.E.'96
• Cameron Gross, B.S.Ch.E.'97, M.S.Ch.E. 2000
• Vincent Gaul, B.S.Ch.E.'92
• Daniel Smith, B.S.Ch.E.'85

After graduating in 1996, Matthew Loach began working for Albemarle Corporation where he completed certification as Six Sigma Black Belt. In 2001, Loach joined ExxonMobil Chemical Company and is now currently the global sales manager for the Polypropylene, Vistamaxx, and Adhesions businesses in Shanghai, China. He is responsible for ~3MT of sales and developing an organization of more than 125 sales professionals across the world. The University of Arkansas College of Engineering presented Loach with its Early Career Award in 2016.

While completing his master's degree, Cameron Gross joined Texas Instruments in Dallas in 1999 and will celebrate 20 years with TI in July of this year. In 2009, TI announced the world's first 300mm analog dedicated wafer fab, RFAB, and Gross joined the startup team as a manufacturing superintendent and worked in that capacity through 2017. In 2017, Gross was promoted to manufacturing manager for TI's plant in Sherman, Texas, and helped drive improvements in overall productivity and factory performance. In mid-2018, he re-joined the RFAB team in his current role as the manufacturing manager. 

While an undergraduate, Vincent Gaul's work with Charles Thatcher led to one of three patents on which he is co-inventor. In 2015, he became the process controls coordinator for Marathon Petroleum supervising a team charged with managing all process control for the refinery. In 2017, Gaul was promoted to process control supervisor managing groups with full responsibility of all process control applications in the 600-plus million barrels-per-day refinery.

Since graduating from the University of Arkansas in 1985 and joining Ethyl (Albemarle), Daniel Smith has held various positions with increasing responsibility in R&D including: process development, process design, process simulation and process evaluation. He is currently a Distinguished Advisor in Albemarle's Chemical Reactivity and Engineering Fundamentals group and is the functional leader of Albemarle's Reactive Hazard Evaluation program.

The Arkansas Academy of Chemical Engineers was founded in 2005 and functions as a nonprofit organization solely for the purpose of recognizing outstanding chemical engineers and providing support for the University of Arkansas Ralph E. Martin Department of Chemical Engineering.

The process for this year's induction began last summer, with nominations from current members of the Academy. Each inductee "shall hold a degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville granted at least 20 years prior to election" and is recognized for outstanding contributions to the field of chemical engineering, according to the Academy.

For more information about the Arkansas Academy of Chemical Engineers, click here.