Joshua Otaigbe has had a circuitous career that spans three continents and has had great impact on education and research as well as on industrial practice. He specializes in polymer engineering and materials science and is currently a full professor in University of Southern Mississippi and Principal Partner of Flaney Associates LLC. He has enjoyed highly successful careers in industry and academia and has held numerous senior level appointments including Senior Project Leader and Engineer at Corning Incorporated and the Fulbright-Tocqueville Distinguished Chair Professor in Engineering in France for 2013-2014. The latter award is an appointment reserved for eminent scholars with substantial experience and publications in their respective fields. From 2003-2012, he was awarded invited visiting professorships in the Swiss Federal Institute of technology (ETH-Zurich) and the French Engineering Universities, Institut National des Sciences Appliquées (INSA) in Lyon, France. Otaigbe earned his PhD in polymer science and engineering from the University of Manchester Institute of Science & Technology in England in 1984. He joined The University of Southern Mississippi in 2002 as a professor of polymer engineering and science following a successful career at Iowa State University and elsewhere. At Iowa State University, Otaigbe became a tenured Associate Professor of Chemical Engineering and of Materials Science & Engineering, and Leader of Polymers and Composite Research Group. Otaigbe has won a number of awards, including the Fellow of the Institute of Materials, Minerals & Mining in the United Kingdom, Fellow of the Society of Plastics Engineers, Fellow of the Nigerian Academy of Engineering, and the prestigious U.S. National Science Foundation CAREER Award. He was listed as an honored member in Who's Who of American Inventors (1998-1999 edition). Otaigbe holds seven U.S. patents and has published more than 150 refereed archival scientific journal papers.
State Department Profile
Bureau of Consular Affairs, Passport Services
Office of Passport Integrity and Internal Controls
Joshua Otaigbe is the Jefferson Science Fellow with the Department of State Bureau of Consular Affairs Passport Services, Office of Passport Integrity & Internal Controls Division (CA/PPT/IIC). The Bureau of Consular Affairs formulates and implements policy relating to immigration and consular services and ensures responsive and efficient provision of consular services overseas. The CA/PPT/IIC division provides support services in the design and production of passports and other government security documents according to U.S. Government and international standards and specifications. Support services include working with manufacturers of raw materials and security features and U.S. Government Publishing Office (GPO) to produce passports for U.S. citizens, and to develop next generation passports that cannot be counterfeited. Otaigbe brings his expertise in polymer engineering and materials science as a subject matter expert and senior science adviser to the division's projects and activities that include efficient materials selection and processing and security features development via security printing. In this role, Otaigbe works with several government contractors, raw polymer materials and security inks suppliers, GPO, and other government agencies to make next generation passports and electronic passports that are durable, efficient, and secured with enhanced benefits during use, and to recommend new projects.
|
