Victor Zavala Tejeda

Victor Zavala Tejeda is the Baldovin-DaPra Professor in the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a senior computational mathematician at Argonne National Laboratory. He holds a B.Sc. from Universidad Iberoamericana (2003) and a Ph.D. from Carnegie Mellon University (2008), both in chemical engineering. His research focuses on control, optimization, data science, and their applications to energy and environmental systems. He has received numerous awards, including the NSF and DOE Early Career awards, PECASE, and the Vilas Mid-Career Award. His work spans sustainable energy systems, plastic recycling technologies, and process automation.

Education:

• PhD in Chemical Engineering, Carnegie Mellon University (2008)
• B.Sc. in Chemical Engineering, Universidad Iberoamericana (2003)

Research interests:

• Control systems and optimization for energy infrastructure
• Data-driven modeling of chemical processes
• Design of sustainable plastic recycling methods
• Integration of machine learning in process operations

Notable awards include the Harvey Spangler Award (2024), Vilas Mid-Career Award (2023), and the Presidential Early Career Award (2019). His recent publications address challenges in circular economy, energy storage, and computational topology for material analysis.

Teaching and advising involve advanced courses in chemical engineering and special topics in process systems engineering. His research group collaborates on projects related to decarbonization, waste-to-energy systems, and autonomous manufacturing processes.