(528b) Witnessing the Stellar Career of Prof Tom Edgar

Professor Edgar’s and my academic careers started within a year of each other and continued at the same academic institutions at which we started over our careers – an uncommon practice in present day academia. The large State institutions in which our professional lives were embedded offered many diverse opportunities through which to contribute. Prof Edgar did so in an exemplary fashion – I could only try to keep up! Although the scope of our technical activities extended broadly over process systems engineering, we did overlap but not extensively. However, our professional activities have crossed and recrossed paths at various points in time and within the context of various organizations (AIChE, CACHE, CCR). In this presentation I will recap some these points of convergence as they exemplify the impact that Prof Edgar has had on our profession and in addition were very valuable for me personally. He is indeed a rarity – a leader in all spheres of academic life teaching, research, leadership / service but, above all, he is a valued colleague.