Juan M. Lema

About

Juan Manuel Lema Rodicio was born in Santiago de Compostela, Galicia, Spain, on August 12, 1949, into a middle-class family. His father, Manuel, a Law graduate, managed the family business, while his mother, Adelaida, like many talented women of her time, devoted herself to caring for her family, leaving behind a career in Chemistry. He married Mariló Garabatos, a biologist and high school teacher, and they have two daughters: Marta, a Chemical Engineer, and Iria, a Graduate in Audiovisual Communication. They are also the proud grandparents of four grandchildren: Luis, Óscar, Daniel, and Martín. He attended preschool at La Enseñanza, a convent school, and completed his secondary education at Colegio La Salle. He studied Industrial Chemistry at the University of Santiago de Compostela (1966–1971), where he also pursued his doctoral studies (1971–1975) under the supervision of Prof. Tojo. During this period, he served as an Assistant Professor and, after completing his doctorate, as an Associate Professor at the University College of Vigo. In 1976, he joined the Autonomous University of Barcelona as an Associate Professor, also carrying out research stays at INRA (Lille, France) and INSA (Toulouse, France). In 1985, he returned to Santiago de Compostela as Professor of Chemical Engineering, a position he held until 2019. He is now Emeritus Professor of Chemical Engineering at the University of Santiago de Compostela. He has held several leading academic and institutional positions: Head of the Department of Chemical Engineering at both the Autonomous University of Barcelona (1981–1983) and the University of Santiago de Compostela (1991–2000); founder and first Director of the USC Technology Transfer Centre (1989–1990); founder and first Head of Environmental Engineering at USC (2001–2003); founder and first Dean of the USC School of Engineering (2003–2010); founder and first President of the Spanish Conference of Chemical Engineering Deans (CODDIQ, 2008–2012); and founder and first Director of CRETUS (Cross-disciplinary Research Centre in Environmental Technologies, 2015–2020). He has supervised 61 Ph.D. theses and authored more than 450 scientific papers and book chapters, achieving an H-index of 80 (Scopus), an FWCI of 1.47, and over 20,000 citations. Since 2020, he has been ranked among the top 2% of most impactful researchers worldwide in Biotechnology by Stanford University. He is also the author or co-author of 20 patents (nine European or international) and editor of the book Innovative Wastewater Treatment & Resource Recovery Technologies (IWA, 2017). His former doctoral students now hold prominent academic and professional positions: 12 are full professors in Spain, Mexico, Chile, Colombia and the United Arab Emirates,; 16 are associate professors in Spain, Mexico, Chile, the Netherlands, and Colombia; many others are researchers in universities and technology centres (Anfaco, Aimen, Ainia, Feuga, Giro, CetAQUA, Medrar…), or lead R&D in companies such as Repsol, Abiasa, Bialactis, Biena, and Inditex. Notably, seven of his former Ph.D. students were included in Stanford University’s 2022 ranking of the world’s top 2% most influential scientists. He has coordinated or participated in 71 research projects funded by the European Union (24), the Spanish Commission of Science and Technology (34), and the Galician Regional Government (13). He coordinated the COST Action Conceiving Wastewater Treatment in 2020 (Water 2020) and the Spanish Novedar-Consolider project, involving 12 research groups from Spain and the Netherlands. He has also led 16 major collaborative projects with industry on industrial and municipal wastewater treatment. As an international expert, he has worked with UNIDO (United Nations Industrial Development Organization, Vienna) in the field of industrial effluent treatment. Altogether, his research activities have raised more than €17 million in funding. He is currently an Academic (since 2016) and President (since 2019) of the Royal Galician Academy of Sciences. He holds honorary doctorates from the Autonomous University of Barcelona (2023), the University of Valladolid (2021), the Politecnico di Milano (2021), and the Catholic University of Valparaíso, Chile (2015). He has also been named Honorary Professor at the Beijing University of Chemical Technology (2024) and at the University of Queensland (2018). He is a Distinguished Fellow (2022) and Fellow (2014) of the International Water Association, recipient of the Golden Insignia of the University of Santiago de Compostela (2013), the Martínez Moreno Innovation Award (Madrid, 2011), the Gold Medal in Chemical Engineering from the University of Valladolid (2010), the Babcock Innovation Award (2004), the European Prize for Industrial Enzymes (Barcelona, 1993), and the Ingeniero Comerma Award (Ferrol, 1989).

Education