Mike Wolcott
Mike Wolcott directs the new Institute for Sustainable Design at WSU and serves as the Louisiana-Pacific Distinguished Professor of Wood Materials and Engineering. He researches the design, production, and use of sustainable building materials from renewable resources and coordinates university initiatives for the design of sustainable built environments. For more than a decade, Dr. Wolcott has led research teams developing novel building materials for the U.S. Navy, aiming to reduce toxic chemical exposure from docks, piers, and other shoreline structures. He serves on teams planning integrated biorefineries that will produce fuels, chemicals, polymers, and nanomaterials using cellulosic feedstocks.
Dr. Wolcott frequently keynotes at international conferences, is widely published, and has managed more than 75 industrial product research and development projects with more than 30 companies. His research emphases include wood composites design, wood-plastic composites, wood-polymer interaction, viscoelasticity, and adhesion. Professor Wolcott has received numerous honors, including two George Marra Awards for excellence in wood research, the Wood Award for excellence in graduate research, and the Cahn Award for research in dynamic contact angle analysis.