Jordan Peccia named the Golden Professor of Environmental Engineering
Jordan Peccia, newly named as the Thomas E. Golden Jr. Professor of Environmental Engineering, integrates biotechnology with engineering to address emerging environmental problems.
In his laboratory, Peccia focuses his research on human exposure to microbes in buildings and genetic studies to enhance biofuel development, among other areas. Along with quantitative engineering-based fundamentals and tools, he and his team have developed an extensive molecular biology skill set that includes transcriptomics, metagenomics, and computational biology.
A graduate of Montana State University-Bozeman, Peccia earned his Ph.D. in environmental engineering from the University of Colorado-Boulder. He conducted postdoctoral research at the University of Wisconsin-Madison before launching his academic career as an assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering at Arizona State University. He joined the Yale faculty as an assistant professor of chemical and environmental engineering in 2005. Prior to his new appointment, he served as a full professor of chemical and environmental engineering.
Peccia’s industry experience includes positions as consulting engineer and research engineer. As a private consultant, he has advised the federal government and start-up companies on photosynthetic biofuel production and microbial exposures in buildings. He has also provided consultation to federal, state, and local governments on human exposure to, and health impacts associated with, the land application of sewage sludge.
The Yale professor has published 79 peer-reviewed articles in professional journals. He serves as the associate editor of the Journal of Indoor Air. Peccia has been awarded grants from private foundations as well as federal agencies, including the National Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Health. He has delivered numerous invited lectures at universities nationwide and in China, Finland, and Israel, among other countries.
Peccia has been honored with the Teaching Excellence Award from Arizona State University, the Ackerman Award for Teaching and Research from the Yale School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, and the Graduate Mentor Award from the Yale Graduate School. He received a CAREER Award from the National Science Foundation in 2004. In 2017, he was elected a member of the Connecticut Academy for Science and Engineering.