2025

• Professor Lienhard is elected Honorary Member of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, for “for sustained contributions to thermodynamic and transport process engineering through modeling, experimentation, design, and patents; for a pioneering open-access textbook; and for leadership in sustainability research in academia”, 12 June 2025. (news article)


Professor John Lienhard addresses audience at J-WAFS 10th Anniversary Celebration

• Video about the 20 year collaboration of MIT and Community Jameel, featuring Professor Lienhard, 10 July 2024.
• J-WAFS’ 10th Anniversary is celebrated as Professor Lienhard ends his service as Director of J-WAFS, 22 May 2025.
• Trent Lee received the 2025 Outstanding UROP Student Award — School of Engineering, 14 May 2025.

2024

• Professor Lienhard receives the 2024 Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Desalination and Reuse Association, 11 December 2024.
• Our paper, Lithium Concentration from Salt-Lake Brine by Donnan-Enhanced Nanofiltration, receives a best paper award from ACS Environmental Science & Technology, December 2024.


Current and former group members at Gordon Conference on membranes, August 2024 (left to right: Qianhong She, Zi Hao Foo, Akshay Deshmukh, David Warsinger)

• Sam Heath receives Best student poster award at Singapore International Water Week! (in Theme 2, Delivering Water from Source to Tap-Treatment) 21 June 2024.
• UROP Trent Lee receives the Peter Griffith Prize in Undergraduate Experimentation! 15 May 2024.
• The Sixth Edition of A Heat Transfer Textbook has been released! This edition includes a substantially revised chapter on mass transfer, including revised problems and a new solution manual for this chapter. 18 April 2024.
• 2024/2/08: Our article, A. Deshmukh, J.H. Lienhard, and M. Elimelech, “Heat Diffusion During Thin-Film Composite Membrane Formation,” in J. Membrane Science is
  selected as Editor’s Choice Article for January 2024. (free to read)
  There are still fun things to do with classical heat conduction!
• 

  
  Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys., 2024,26, 749-759
  https://doi.org/10.1039/D3CP02003G

  2024/1/14: Our article is on the cover of Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics! Solvent-driven fractional crystallization (SDFC) enables the efficient isolation and recovery of high-value metals and critical materials from brines and wastes. We used a two-variable speciation-based solution model to correlate VLE (organic Henry’s law coefficient and water activity), SLE (organic-induced salt crystallization), and salt-induced LLE separation of H2O-NaCl-MeCN mixtures.

2023

• Prof. Lienhard is asked Can desalination solve water scarcity? by the TILClimate Podcast of the MIT Environmental Solutions Initiative, 26 October 2023.
• UROP Trent Lee receives 3^rd place award in the MIT Energy Initiative Research Slam competition on 15 September 2023!
• Zi Hao Foo awarded ACS Industrial & Engineering Chemistry Division’s Best paper related to sustainability at ACS 2023 Fall Conference, for: Z.H. Foo, A. Deshmukh, A.D. Wilson, and J.H. Lienhard V, “Low Temperature Heat-driven Hypersaline Water Extraction with Dimethyl Ether,” 15 August 2023.
• Zi Hao Foo receives a MathWorks Graduate Student Fellowship! 27 June 2023.
• Professor Lienhard is recognized as Distinguished Alumnus by the Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Department at UCSD (former Applied Mechanics and Engineering Sciences Department), 2 June 2023.
  

  Prof. Lienhard receives Distinguished Alumnus award from Carlos Coimbra.

• Zi Hao Foo receives a Best Student Poster Award, 32^nd North American Membrane Society Annual Meeting, 16 May 2023.
• Gradiant Corporation, a start-up from our lab, reaches $1B valuation, 16 May 2023.
• Samuel Heath receives the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship! 29 March 2023.

2022

• Our review paper on solvent separations is the cover article of Trends in Chemistry, November 2022. Foo et al., “Solvent-Driven Aqueous Separations for Hypersaline Brine Concentration and Resource Recovery,” Trends in Chemistry 4(12):1078-1093, 1 December 2022.
• Video: Interview with Prof. Lienhard at the International Desalination Association World Congress, Sydney. 13 October 2022.



• Olin-Harmony-MIT team wins the US Bureau of Reclamation’s More Water, Less Concentrate Prize and receives $150,000 following field trials at the Yuma AZ desalination plant. Our winning system, constructed at Olin College, used the bladder-driven, batch reverse osmosis technology invented and developed in our lab. 9 September 2022.
• Prof. Lienhard receives the 2021 ASME-AIChE Donald Q. Kern Award, for outstanding contributions to process engineering that have advanced energy-efficient thermal and membrane desalination systems and liquid jet impingement cooling at high heat flux. 11 July 2022.
  

  Prof. Lienhard receiving the Kern Award plaque from Prof. Joel Plawsky (RPI).

• In memory of Professor Peter Griffith of the MIT Heat Transfer Laboratory, June 2022.
• Dr. Akshay Deshmukh is selected as a 2022-2023 MIT Energy Initiative Fellow! 8 June 2022.
• Prof. Lienhard is re-elected to the Board of Directors of the International Desalination Association. 29 April 2022
• Danyal Rehman receives the Martin Family Fellowship for Sustainability! 28 March 2022.
• Video: Repurpose Diablo Canyon for Economical Water & Energy? Drs. Lienhard, Buongiorno, and Parsons address the MIT Club of Northern California about the potential use of the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Plant for carbon-free power and desalination. 16 March 2022.
• Prof. Lienhard’s paper on heat transfer in flat-plate boundary layers is the most accessed paper in the Journal of Heat Transfer for 2021.
• Gradiant Corporation, a start-up from our lab, is called “the first half-unicorn in the water sector” by Global Water Intelligence Magazine, 23(1):6, 20 January 2022.

Half of a unicorn (Edward Topsell, 1658)

2021

• Professors Lienhard & Buongiorno discuss the potential for carbon-free energy and water from nuclear power in MIT News: Options for the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant, 8 November 2021. Webinar on the report including remarks by former US Secretary of Energy, Dr. Steven Chu. Editorial by The Washington Post endorsing our report.
• Team from our group selected as semifinalists in Geothermal Lithium Extraction Prize and will receive $40,000. Video: MIT Hybrid Osmotic-Electrokinetic Membrane Extraction for Geothermal Lithium. 4 November 2021.
• Olin-Harmony-MIT team are selected as finalists in BOR’s More Water, Less Concentrate prize and will receive $115,000, 15 July 2021.
• In memory of Professor Ivan Catton, who was Professor Lienhard’s undergraduate and MS thesis advisor, 22 June 2021.
• Zi Hao Foo receives a MathWorks Graduate Student Fellowship, 22 June 2021.
• Fusion Reactor First Wall Cooling, MIT Innotherm Colloquium moderated by Prof. Lienhard, 26 May 2021.
• Danyal Rehman receives a J-WAFS Graduate Student Fellowship! 12 May 2021.
• Our work on chemical-free membrane cleaning is featured in MIT News: Using mechanics for cleaner membranes, 10 May 2021.
• Flora Klise, UROP student in our group, is featured in MIT News: Innovations in water accessibility, 5 May 2021.
• Professor Lienhard is elected Fellow of the American Society of Thermal and Fluid Engineers, March 2021.
• Video: IDA Talks — Professor Lienhard comments on solutions for water supply, and the role and sustainability of desalination. March 2021.
• Our paper on chemical-free membrane cleaning (Goon et al.) is Editor’s Choice in the Journal of Membrane Science for February 2021. (also on WeChat!)
• Orisa Coombs, UROP student in our group, is featured in MIT News: Reducing inequality across the globe and on campus, 7 February 2021.



• Sandymount Technologies, a start-up based on beverage concentration technology from our lab and using HPRO, has been acquired by Alfa-Laval. Congratulations to Dr. Ronan K. McGovern, Founder & CEO! (January 2021)

2020

• MIT Innotherm Colloquia moderated or curated by Prof. Lienhard (on YouTube)
  • Thermal desalination by membrane distillation (10 Nov 20)
  • Dry is the new cool: Advanced dehumidification for high perform. cooling (27 Oct 20)
  • Earth’s energy balance (2 Sep 20)
  • Thermal management of electric vehicles: New engineering challenges (19 Aug 20)
• UROP Orisa Z. Coombs named a First Place Presenter in the Mechanical Engineering Research Exhibition, 9 October 2020.



• Pocast interview with Harmony Water, the MIT Clean Energy Prize 2nd place winning team from our group, August 2020.
• “MIT research on seawater surface tension becomes international guideline,” MIT News, 9 July 2020.
• SuperUROP Carson I. Tucker receives the Peter Griffith Prize for outstanding undergraduate experimental work, for her research on batch RO, May 2020.
• “Understanding how fluids heat or cool surfaces” about Lienhard’s paper on heat transfer in flat-plate boundary layers, showing that the transition region cannot be ignored. MIT News, 28 April 2020. (Additional resources)
• Quantum Wei’s team, Harmony Water, wins 2nd place in the MIT Clean Energy Prize, 24 April 2020.
• Quantum Wei’s team, Harmony Water, wins 3rd place in the MIT Water Innovation Prize, 22 April 2020.
• Alumna Dr. Yagnaseni Roy is appointed assistant professor at the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore. She will work in the Centre for Sustainable Technologies. April 2020.



• Our group’s seawater surface tension correlation is made an international standard guideline by the International Association for the Properties of Water and Steam! (doi to paper)

2019

• Prof. Lienhard receives the 2019 ASME Edward F. Obert Award for outstanding paper in thermodynamics presented over the previous two years, for “Entropy Generation Minimization for Energy-Efficient Desalination,” 12 November 2019. (presentation) (preprint)
• Prof. Lienhard elected to Board of Directors of the International Desalination Association, 27 September 2019.
• Yvana Ahdab receives the Martin Family Fellowship for Sustainability, 6 May 2019.
• Quantum Wei receives Student Best Paper Award for his paper on Batch Reverse Osmosis (with Carson I. Tucker, Priscilla J. Wu, Ali M. Trueworthy, and Emily W. Tow) at the 2019 Membrane Technology Conference and Exposition (AMTA/AWWA), New Orleans, 28 February 2019.
• Nature Catalysis paper on “Turning desalination waste into a useful resource” in MIT News, 13 February 2019.

2018

• Video: Prof. Lienhard is Chief Guest for the Convocation (Commencement Speaker) of the Indian Institute of Technology Ropar, 3 December 2018. (40:41 to 1:03:30)
• Prof. Lienhard elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), 27 November 2018.
• Kishor Nayar named to Forbes 30-under-30 for his work on electrodialysis technology, 13 November 2018.
• Cooling buildings worldwide about Omar Labban’s work on energy-efficient, membrane-based, air conditioning systems, in MIT News, 11 July 2018.
• Study finds potential in brackish groundwater desalination about Yvana Ahdab’s collaboration with USGS researchers, in MIT News, 5 July 2018. Also covered by The University Network.
• Team from our lab (Tow, Swaminathan, Warsinger) wins the More Water, Less Concentrate prize competition for a solution based on our batch RO technology, 4 April 2018.
• Prof. Lienhard receives Committed to Caring Award for graduate advising, MIT Office of Graduate Education, 11 April 2018.
• MIT Water Night Best Poster Competition, March 2018
  • UROP Janny Cai receives Runner-up for “Resource recovery from desalination brine: energy efficiency and sodium hydroxide production”
  • Andrew Bouma receives Honorable mention for “Counterflow reverse osmosis”



• Video: Prof. Lienhard speaks on prospects for reducing energy consumption in desalination at Universidad de Alcalá, Spain, for the 1st conference of master classes of Acciona Agua, 15 February 2018.
• Prof. Lienhard #4 on Water & Wastewater International’s Top 25 Global Water Leaders, a listing of thought-leaders in the water industry, 10 January 2018. MIT’s growing global leadership in water achieves industry recognition, MIT News, 21 February 2018.

2017

• Toward efficient high-pressure desalination, about Emily Tow’s high pressure fouling studies, in MIT News, 16 October 2017.
• Video: Prof. Lienhard interviewed by MIT Tea With Teachers 10 October 2017.
• Yvana Ahdab wins Best Student Research Poster Award at the 2017 Groundwater Protection Council Annual Forum, Boston, 28 September 2017.
• Andrew Bouma and Quantum Wei receive Honorable Mention at the 2017 MIT Mechanical Engineering Research Exhibition, Sept. 2017.
• Omar Labban receives the Rasikbhai L. Meswani Fellowship for Water Solutions, June 2017.
• From Sea to Tap: can the oceans solve water scarcity?, Op-Ed in by Prof. Lienhard: The Mark News 22 June 2017; Arab News, 25 June 2017; Japan Today, 27 June 2017; Cyprus Mail, 26 June 2017; Peruvian Times, 27 June 2017.
• Video: Professor Lienhard speaks at the EAT Stockholm Food Forum, on Science and Technology for a Food Secure Future, 12 June 2017.
• May 2017
  • Jaichander Swaminathan receives MIT Carl G. Sontheimer Prize for Creativity in Research
  • Emily Tow receives MIT Meredith Kamm Memorial Award
• March Madness 2017!
  • Yvana Ahdab receives NSF Graduate Fellowship
  • Emily Tow selected as an MIT Graduate Woman of Excellence
  • Kishor Nayar receives Best Poster Award at MIT Water Night
• Emily Tow wins Best Student Paper Award at the 2017 AMTA/AWWA Membrane Technology Conference and Exposition in Long Beach, 16 February 2017.

2016

• Batch desalination bests standard RO in MIT News, 18 November 2016.
• David M. Warsinger receives the Best Oral Presentation Award at the 9th International Desalination Conference in Abu Dhabi, 15 November 2016.
• Jaichander Swaminathan interviewed in The Hindu, 7 November 2016.
• Teaching the Unteachable, about Glicksman and Lienhard’s new book, in MIT News, 21 October 2016.
• Low Carbon Desalination Workshop at MIT, 17-18 October 2016, in MIT News.
• Omar Labban receives the Grand Prize for Outstanding Presentation, Emily Tow receives the Esteemed Presenter Award for Excellence in Impact, and Quantum Wei receives Honorable Mention at the 2016 MIT Mechanical Engineering Research Exhibition, Sept. 2016.
• Emily Tow wins a Best Poster Award at Singapore International Water Week, 13 July 2016.
• Quantum Wei receives the First Place Student Oral Presentation Award for his paper at the Universities Council on Water Resources Conference, July 2016.
• MechE Connects news articles, July 2016:
  • Talking Shop: Professor John H. Lienhard V. A Resource in Crisis
  • Student Spotlight: Jaichander Swaminathan
  • 2.500: Desalination
  • Prof. Lienhard acts as an Amicus Curiae in Prof. Leonard’s legal brief on Deflategate, 24 May 2016. (brief)
  

  Professor Lienhard discusses MIT research on water and food at the MIT Campaign Launch, 7 February 2016.
  Photo credit: Rose Lincoln for MIT

• Video: Prof. Lienhard speaks about water and food research at the launch of the MIT Campaign for a Better World, 5 May 2016.
• Bailey Montaño receives the 2016 MechE SuperUROP Award for his research on membrane distillation with our group, May 2016.
• J-WAFS Food and Water Symposium and Rabobank-MIT Food and Agribusiness Innovation Prize, 27-28 April 2016.
• Video: Prof. Lienhard delivers the John R. Freeman Lecture of the Boston Society of Civil Engineers, 11 April 2016. Desalination for water supply: is the energy consumption manageable?
• David M. Warsinger receives the UCOWR Outstanding Dissertation Award in Science and Engineering, from the Universities Council on Water Resources, March 2016.
• Can Flint Happen Here?, Boston Globe Op-Ed on New England’s water supply by Prof. Lienhard, Dr. W. Sung, and Prof. A.J. Whittle, 3 March 2016.

2015

• How to Share Water Along the Nile, New York Times Op-Ed on the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam by Prof. Lienhard and Dr. K.M. Strzepek,
  29 Sept. 2015.
• Jaichander Swaminathan receives Best Presentation Award and David Warsinger receives Best Poster Award at the International Desalination Association World Congress on Desalination and Water Reuse, 3 September 2015
• Toward cheaper water treatment, about spin-off company from our lab, 17 July 2015
• Jaichander Swaminathan and David Warsinger win first and second place best poster awards, respectively, at the American Water Works Association Annual Conference and Exposition, 10 June 2015
• J-WAFS: A nexus for water and food research at MIT, in MIT Spectrum, Summer 2015
• Professor Lienhard receives the 2015 ASME Heat Transfer Memorial Award, for Art of Practice.
• David Warsinger receives Outstanding UROP Graduate Mentor Award, April 2015.
• Ronan McGovern receives the Ilya Prigogine Prize of Thermodynamics from the Joint European Thermodynamics Conference (JETC) for his doctoral thesis, March 2015.
• Our group’s paper Entropy Generation Analysis of Desalination Systems (Mistry et al., 2011) receives a Best Paper Award from the journal Entropy, 16 February 2015.
• Video: Renewable Water, Professor Lienhard at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, 21 January 2015.

2014

• 2014 MIT Water Summit, includes several members of our group in leading roles, 12 December 2014.
• Searching for global water and food solutions, about the new Abdul Latif Jameel World Water and Food Security Lab, in MIT News, 4 November 2014
• Getting the salt out, in MIT News, 21 October 2014
• Video: Professor Lienhard at Technology Review’s EmTech Conference, 23 September 2014.
• A New Kind of Power From Salt Water, Wall Street Journal front page, 29 August 2014.
• The power of salt, in MIT News, 20 August 2014
• Study shows forward osmosis not energy efficient, in MIT News, 23 July 2014
• Video: Solutions for Water Supply at 2014 Technology Day, with Professor Lienhard, 7 June 2014.
• Leonardo Banchik wins best poster award at Singapore International Water Week, 5 June 2014
• Abdul Latif Jameel World Water and Food Security Lab announced in MIT News, 6 May 2014.
• Report on high flux membranes, in MIT News, 13 February 2014

2013

• McGovern wins IDA Award in MIT News, 25 October 2013
• Video: Outrageous Osmosis with Leo and Emily by group members Leo Banchik and Emily Tow, August 2013. On YouTube



• Video: Equilibrium and Steady State, SUTD Concept Vignette by MIT Teaching and Learning lab, with Professor Lienhard
• Video: Entropy, SUTD Concept Vignette by MIT Teaching and Learning lab, with Professor Lienhard
• Our group’s HDH technology wins Technology Idol of the Year at 2013 Global Water Summit, Seville, Spain, April 2013
• Solar-driven Desalination with Phase-Change Energy Storage, Adina Technical Brief, April 2013
• New tech said to clean up fracking water, in NBC Science News, 5 February 2013.
• Purification on the cheap, in MIT News, 5 February 2013

2012 and earlier

• Professor Lienhard awarded ASME Technical Communities Globalization Medal, November 2012.


ASME President Marc Goldsmith awards Prof. Lienhard the ASME Technical Communities Globalization Medal, Nov. 2012.

• The Water-Energy Nexus, in MIT Spectrum, Spring 2012
• Video: Flocculation by group members Leo Banchik and Mohammad Mirhi, Spring 2012. On YouTube and in Khan Academy
• Video: Innovations in Clean Water Technology on WGBH’s Science for the Public, 20 Dec. 2011
• Author Interview: John Lienhard, Dover Publications, 21 Sept. 2011.
• Video: Research in Water Purification and Distribution at MIT in Rethinking Water workshop, May 2010 (starting at time 25:25)
• Drinkable Water for All, in MIT Spectrum, Summer 2010
• Subject 2.500 Desalination & Water Purification at MIT OpenCourseWare, 2009.
• Podcast on A Heat Transfer Textbook project, MIT Libraries series on scholarly publishing and copyright, 25 Feb. 2008