- Chair, Advisory Panel, Professor, Biological & Env Engineering, Cornell University
- Job Title: Professor
- Affiliation: Department of Biological and Environmental Engineering, Cornell University
- Phone: 607-255-5544
- Email: lpw1@cornell.edu
- Website: http://walkerlab.bee.cornell.edu
Dr. Larry P. Walker is a Professor in the Department of Biological and Environmental Engineering at Cornell University, and the Director of the Northeast Sun Grant Institute of Excellence – leading a fourteen-state regional research and economic development program focused on biofuels and bioproducts. He is also the Director of Cornell’s Biofuels Research Laboratory – a new state-of-the-art industrial biotechnology laboratory that mimics all the essential steps in a cellulosic biorefinery. During his 30 years at Cornell, Dr. Walker has been involved in a number of biomass to energy projects, including an assessment of NYS biomass resources available for ethanol production, farm-scale methane production and co-generation, the application of nanotechnology to discover and study important biocatalysts for biofuels and industrial biotechnology, and the optimization of solid-state fermentation for the production of natural products. Throughout his career he has sought to integrate his research outcomes into a systems engineering perspective on how to evolve sustainable biobased industries. Dr. Walker has served in numerous leadership roles including membership on the National Biomass Research and Development Technical Advisory Committee. He is Co-Editor in Chief for the journal, Industrial Biotechnology, a member of the Education Committee of the American Council of Renewable Energy, and a member of the Advisory Board for the Presidential Forum on Renewable Energy. In 2009 he was elected as a fellow in the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering, and he was awarded the Outstanding Faculty Award from the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences Alumni Association and the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.