CARBON SOLUTIONS - Key Persons
Elena Bekyarova received her PhD degree in Chemistry from the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences in 1995. As Senior Researcher at the Institute of General and Inorganic Chemistry (Bulgaria) she worked on the synthesis, characterization, adsorption properties and catalytic activity of activated carbon - supported catalysts for environmental remediation. From 2001 to 2002 she worked on the processing and characterization of advanced carbon nanotube structures for energy storage as an STA postdoctoral fellow at the Japan Science and Technology Corporation. In 2003 she joined the research group of Professor Robert C. Haddon at the University of California - Riverside, where she pursued research on the purification, chemical modification and characterization of carbon nanotubes and their application for electronic devices with a focus on chemical and bio-sensors. In 2006 Dr. Bekyarova accepted the position of President and CEO of Carbon Solutions Inc.
Dr. Bekyarova has extensive experience in the synthesis, processing and characterization of carbon-based materials with a particular focus in the chemistry, processing and purification of carbon nanotubes and the fabrication of electronic devices, functional structures and composites based on carbon nanotubes.
Professor Haddon spent most of his career at Bell Laboratories (AT&T, Lucent Technologies), where he was Distinguished Member of Technical Staff in the Materials Chemistry Department. In 1997 he was appointed Professor of Chemistry and Physics at the University of Kentucky, and in 1998 he became Director of the Advanced Carbon Materials Center (NSF Materials Research Science and Engineering Center). In 1998 he co-founded CarboLex, Inc, a company that produces and sells single-walled carbon nanotubes. In 1999, he founded Carbon Solutions, Inc, a company that is focused on the chemical processing and dissolution of carbon materials for advanced applications. In 2000, he was appointed Distinguished Professor in the Departments of Chemistry and Chemical & Environmental Engineering and Director of the Center for Nanoscale Science and Engineerin(CNSE) at the University of California at Riverside (UCR).
His research interests have been directed toward the electronic structure and properties of molecules and materials, with particular emphasis on transport, magnetism, superconductivity, device fabrication, nanotechnology, and the discovery of new classes of electronic materials. He was named 1991 Person of the Year by Superconductor Week, and a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Physical Society "For work on organic electronic materials, including the prediction and discovery of superconductivity in alkali-metal-doped carbon-60."
Professor Haddon served as President and CEO of Carbon Solutions, Inc until 2006, before assuming his present position as Chief Technical Advisor to the company.