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Desirée Plata is the School of Engineering Distinguished Climate and Energy Professor and Director of Parsons Laboratory in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She earned a B.S. in Chemistry from Union College in 2003 and a Ph.D. in Chemical Oceanography and Environmental Chemistry from the MIT-Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Joint Program in 2009. Plata previously held faculty positions as Assistant Professor at Duke University and as John J. Lee Assistant Professor of Chemical and Environmental Engineering at Yale University, where she also served as Associate Director for Research at the Center for Green Chemistry and Green Engineering.
Her research focuses on novel material design, carbon-based materials, global carbon budgets and response strategies, oil and gas development, oil spills and remediation technologies, gas extraction and distribution systems, resource management, and environmental sustainability. Plata has received numerous awards and honors, including the NSF CAREER Award in 2016, the Odebrecht Award for Sustainable Development in 2015, the National Academy of Engineers Frontiers of Engineering Fellow designation in 2012 and 2020, National Academy of Sciences Kavli Frontiers of Science Fellow in 2011 and 2013, the Caltech Resnick Sustainability Young Investigator Fellowship in 2017, MIT’s Junior Bose Teaching Award in 2019, the Harold E. Edgerton Faculty Achievement Award in 2021, and the Frank Perkins Graduate Advising Award in 2022. She is co-founder of Nth Cycle and serves as co-director of the MIT Climate and Sustainability Consortium. In 2026, Plata was appointed associate dean of engineering in the MIT School of Engineering.
Explore MIT PhD student Audrey Parker's groundbreaking work on zeolite catalysts converting methane from U.S. dairy farms and coal mines to CO2, tackling key climate challenges with practical, scalable tech.
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