Thomas J. Bruno was group leader in the Applied Chemicals and Materials Division at NIST, Boulder, Colorado before retiring in 2019. He received his B.S. in chemistry from Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn, and his M.S. and Ph.D. in physical chemistry from Georgetown University. Dr. Bruno has done research fuels, explosives, forensics and environmental pollutants. He was also involved in research on chemical separations, development of novel analytical methods, and novel detection devices for chromatography. Among his inventions are the Advanced Distillation Curve method (for fuel characterization), and PLOT-cryoadsorption (for vapor sampling). He has published approximately 270 research papers, 7 books, and has been awarded 10 patents. He serves as associate editor of the CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics, and as Associate Editor for Fuel Processing Technology. Bruno was awarded the Department of Commerce Bronze Medal in 1986 for his work "on the thermophysics of reacting fluids", and the Department of Commerce Silver Medal in 2010 for "a new method for analyzing complex fluid mixtures for of new fuels into the U.S. energy infrastructure". He was named a Distinguished Finalist for the 2011 CO-Labs Governor's Award for High Impact Research, and received the American Chemical Society Colorado Section Research Award in 2015. He has served as a forensic consultant and/or an expert witness for the U.S. Department of Justice (notably during the federal trial of Terry Nichols for the Oklahoma City bombing), various United States Attorney's offices, and various offices of the U.S. Inspector General. He received a letter of commendation from Department of Justice for these efforts in 2002. He is currently working to develop science and technology education programs for the American judiciary. In this capacity he serves on the boards of the National Courts and Science Institute, and the Bryson Institute for Judicial Education.
Paris D. N. Svoronos is a professor in Chemistry at CUNY-Queensborough Community College. He earned a B.S. in Chemistry and Physics from the American University of Cairo and a Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from Georgetown University. Among his research interests are the synthesis of organosulfur chemistry, determination of antioxidants in beverages, electrochemistry, organic structure determination and trace analysis. He is particularly interested in undergraduate education and has authored and co-authored several widely-used laboratory manuals and workbooks in addition to several dozen publications. He was awarded several grants, both as a principal investigator including a $2,000,000 NSF grant, as well as a $760,000 Department of Education and a $800,000 NSF-ATE grant. He was selected as the 2003 Outstanding Professor of the Year by the CASE (Council for the Advancement and Support of Education) and Carnegie Foundation. He has been in the governing board of the American Chemical Society- New York section serving, among others, as its chair (2015), the chair of the Long Island subsection (2002), the co-chair of the Microwave topical group (2015-present) and chair of the Chemistry and History topical group (2018-present). He was in the board of the MARM organizing committee held in New York three times (2008, 2016, 2020). He was awarded several ACS awards including the Ann Nalley award (2016), the Stanley Israel award for promoting diversity in the chemical sciences (2018), the National ACS fellowship (2018) and the inaugural ACS-NY section Community College Professor of the Year award (2019). He is particularly proud of his students' academic progress, research accomplishments that include conferences presentations and publications.
