Professor Alice P. Gast

Summary

Professor Alice P. Gast, an internationally renowned academic leader, scholar, and researcher, served as the President of Imperial College London from 1 August 2014 to 31 July 2022. She is now Professor Emeritus of Chemical Engineering at Imperial and advises venture capitalists and venture philanthropists.

Prior to her appointment at Imperial, Professor Gast was the 13th President of Lehigh University, Pennsylvania, USA, from August 2006 to August 2014. Other leadership roles include serving as the Vice-President for Research and Associate Provost and Robert T. Haslam Chair in Chemical Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology from 2001 - 2006.

Professor Gast’s academic interest is in surface and interfacial phenomena, in particular the behaviour of complex fluids. She has co-authored numerous scientific publications and a classic textbook on colloid and surface phenomena. She was a professor of chemical engineering at Stanford University from 1985 to 2001 and affiliated with the Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Laboratory.

She is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences; the American Institute of Chemical Engineers; the Royal Academy of Engineering; the City and Guilds of London Institute; and Académie des Technologies, France. She is a member of the US National Academy of Engineering.

Professor Gast was appointed to the board of directors of Chevron Corporation in 2012. She serves on the Academic Research Council for the Singapore Ministry of Education, and the Advisory Board for Technical University of Munich (TUM)’s Institute for Advanced Study, Germany. She recently joined the International Advisory Board for the University of Turku.

Professor Gast was educated at the University of Southern California and Princeton University. She is married to Bradley J. Askins, and they have two children, Rebecca and David.

Publications

Journals