Chairman, Scientific Advisory Board

Professor Hoffmann is currently Professor Emeritus of Chemistry at Cornell University.

In 1981, Hoffmann was the recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his work on course of chemical reactions. Other notable rewards include: National Medal of Science (1983), Priestley Medal (1990) and the Lomonosov Gold Medal (2011). He is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and a Foreign Fellow of the Royal Society. Hoffmann is best known for introducing quantum mechanical ideas to organic, inorganic, and solid state chemistry.

Hoffmann graduated in 1955 from New York City’s Stuyvesant High School, where he won a Westinghouse science scholarship. He received his Bachelor of Arts degree at Columbia University (Columbia College) in 1958. He received his Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1962, while working under the direction of subsequent 1976 Nobel Prize in Chemistry winner William N. Lipscomb, Jr. His best known research was then done collaborating with another Nobel Laureate, R.B. Woodward, the preeminent organic chemist of the 20th century. In 1965, Hoffmann joined the Department of Chemistry at Cornell University. In his recent research he works on solid state compounds of lithium.

Lawrence Swonger, Director and Technical Advisor

Lead Inventor

Mechanical engineer with over 20 years of process design and automation experience.

Jerome I. Feldman, Chairman Emeritus

Mr. Feldman is currently Chairman of the Board of the alpha-En Corporation. He is also Chairman of the New England Colleges Fund and a Trustee of Northern Westchester Hospital Foundation.

Mr. Feldman founded National Patent Development Corporation (NPD), which was devoted to searching out new inventions and assisting major corporations in licensing their technologies. Among the technologies Mr. Feldman helped introduce were: soft contact lenses (1971 with Bausch & Lomb); surgical staples (via U.S. Surgical, which was sold to Tyco for $3 billion in 1998); and high silica glass to store nuclear waste (via Duratek, which was later sold to the Carlyle Group). Mr. Feldman has taken eleven companies public, and holds a JD from New York University.