Atam P. Dhawan, New Jersey Institute of Technology’s chief strategic innovation officer and senior vice provost for research, will receive the Research & Development Council of New Jersey’s 2026 Catalyst Award for his contributions to strengthening the state’s innovation ecosystem.
Dhawan will be honored Nov. 19 during the 47th Annual Edison Patent Awards Ceremony and Reception at Bell Works in Holmdel. The Catalyst Award recognizes individuals who connect people, institutions and resources to advance research and innovation throughout New Jersey.
The council cited Dhawan’s work bringing universities, government and industry together to address challenges that no single institution could solve alone.
“I am honored to receive this recognition, which reflects the collaborative work of colleagues and partners across academia, industry, government and our communities,” Dhawan said. “By bringing together different perspectives and capabilities, we can translate promising research from discovery to practical application and create solutions that improve lives and strengthen New Jersey’s innovation economy.”
One of the most recent examples of that work is the New Jersey PFAS Partnership Innovation Consortium, or NJ PFAS-PIC, which Dhawan founded and formally launched at NJIT in April. Administered by NJIT, the consortium brings together universities, companies, government agencies, utilities, nonprofits and community organizations to advance technologies for detecting, removing and replacing per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, commonly known as PFAS or “forever chemicals.”
Dhawan serves as executive director of NJ PFAS-PIC, whose leadership includes representatives from NJIT, Princeton University, Rutgers University, Stevens Institute of Technology, the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, water utilities and industry. The consortium is designed to support technologies through research, application testing, regulatory validation, scaling, commercialization and community adoption.
Dhawan brings universities, government and industry together to turn research into real-world solutions.
Dhawan also leads NJIT’s Center for Translational Research, which helps researchers move promising discoveries toward practical use and commercialization. The center is supported in part by a major National Science Foundation Accelerating Research Translation award for which Dhawan serves as principal investigator. Dhawan founded Technology Innovation Translational Acceleration (TITA) program several years ago at NJIT to provide seed funding to innovative technology projects with external industry and community partners for use-inspired applications based market validation leading to entrepreneurship and formation of start-up companies. The successful program led to the establishment of the center. Through the center and NJIT’s related collaborative translational research programs, the university has funded more than 45 projects, engaged more than 40 industry partners and supported the creation of four startup companies.
An accomplished biomedical engineer and inventor, Dhawan is a distinguished professor of electrical and computer engineering and executive director of NJIT’s Undergraduate Research and Innovation program. He pioneered an optical imaging technology used in devices for skin-cancer screening and the treatment of spider veins. He has published more than 215 research papers and book chapters and holds several patents, including three that have been licensed or commercialized.
Dhawan is an elected fellow of the National Academy of Inventors (NAI), Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering and International Academy of Medical and Biological Engineering. He serves on many advisory boards including the National Academy of Inventors Board of Directors, IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering Advisory Board, R&D Council of NJ, and NIH Point-of-Care Research Network Expert Advisory Board, which he chaired from 2019-2025. An NAI Innovation Ambassador, his previous honors include the 2021 IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society William J. Morlock Award for excellence in biomedical technology, New Jersey Innovate 100 Leaders Award (2024), and New Jersey Hall of Fame Innovator Award (2016)
The R&D Council’s Edison Patent Awards recognize inventors and innovation leaders whose work contributes to New Jersey’s research and technology economy. The 2026 ceremony will honor 15 patents from 13 organizations, along with Dhawan and other recipients of the council’s individual awards.
