Four FSU faculty named National Academy of Inventors Senior Members

The National Academy of Inventors (NAI) has named four Florida State University faculty members as 2025 NAI Senior Members.

NAI Senior Members are active faculty, scientists and administrators with success in patents, licensing and commercialization and have produced technologies that have had real impact on the welfare of society. Senior Members collectively hold more than 5,700 U.S. patents and represent over 100 NAI Member Institutions worldwide.

FSU’s 2025 inductees are Hoyong Chung, Yaacov Petscher, Prashant Singh and Branko Stefanovic. The university now has five Senior Members among its faculty.

“Congratulations to these FSU faculty members recognized by the National Academy of Inventors,” said Vice President for Research Stacey S. Patterson. “Their research is making lasting, positive change outside of the lab. The faculty honored by NAI come from four different colleges across Florida State, which speaks to the wide-ranging excellence and influence of FSU faculty.”

Chung is an associate professor in the FAMU-FSU College of Engineering. As a faculty member in the Department of Chemical and Biomedical Engineering and the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, his work spans traditional engineering disciplines to yield innovative breakthroughs in polymer science. He holds 16 patents.

He is developing renewable alternatives to petroleum-based polymers and polymers with controlled degradability and recyclability. Although some biomass-based polymer feedstocks exist, they often face challenges such as high costs, limited availability, poor performance and no methods for producing high-value functional materials.

He has focused on developing technologies to overcome those limitations, including a recent innovation that synthesizes polycarbonate from biomass lignin and carbon dioxide, resulting in a highly durable and infinitely recyclable polymer. That technology is now exclusively licensed to a biofuel company, which is using it to capitalize on lignin byproducts from biofuel production.

Chung has also developed adhesive polymers capable of bonding to both internal organs and skin, delivering drugs to targeted areas with precision and aiding in disease diagnosis. These advancements are licensed to a biomedical materials company, with potential applications in wound care, drug delivery and diagnostics.

Petscher is associate dean for research and professor in the College of Social Work, associate director of the Florida Center for Reading Research (FCRR) and director of the Quantitative Methodology and Innovation Division at FCRR. His work is focused on measurement, causal modeling, studying individual differences in reading using complex methodologies and the development of data-based assessments and tools to support literacy development.

He leads researchers who apply rigorous research methods and advanced statistical analyses to research related to improving social, educational, behavioral, psychological and emotional outcomes across the developmental spectrum from birth to adulthood. Their tools are licensed to educational publishers for use in schools.

Petscher is a co-inventor on four patents, including a system for using assessment without testing. This work is part of a collaboration with Cambium Learning Group, whose Core 5 reading development system has benefited more than 18 million students in the U.S. in making the critical shift from learning to read, to reading to learn.

Singh is an associate professor in the Anne Spencer Daves College of Education, Health, and Human Sciences who researches the development of rapid methods for the detection of foodborne pathogens. He holds two patents, with eight pending, for his research.

He has performed landmark work on developing methods for detecting seafood species identification and pathogenic Escherichia coli. In his recent research, he developed a quick and cost-effective method to test the authenticity of seafood samples. His testing solution was licensed by SeaD Consulting, a seafood company working on developing innovative solutions for the seafood industry. In the last six months, data collected using his seafood testing method has resulted in a wave of news reports revealing widespread mislabeling of shrimp species.

Data from Singh’s laboratory was used in a 2024 complaint to the Federal Trade Commission, which resulted in new FTC guidance for the restaurant industry on the illegality of misleading customers about the origin of seafood served — helping to ensure that customers are getting what they pay for.

Stefanovic is a professor in the College of Medicine who studies the molecular mechanisms of liver fibrosis. He holds four patents for research breakthroughs that have helped him to pioneer new antifibrotic drugs targeting the key molecular interaction of this mechanism.

Organ fibrosis is estimated to contribute to 45 percent of all deaths in the developed world. Efforts to develop treatments for the disease have yielded drugs that have serious side effects and are unsuitable for long term therapy.

Stefanovic discovered the molecular interactions that control excessive biosynthesis of type I collagen, the protein responsible for pathogenesis of fibrosis. His work has opened a new field in development of specific antifibrotic drugs, which are designed to specifically target the altered collagen biosynthetic pathway and represent first in class specific antifibrotic therapeutics.

Chung, Petscher, Singh and Stefanovic will join other new NAI Senior Members for an induction ceremony during the NAI annual meeting June 23-26 in Atlanta.

Visit the NAI website for a full list of Senior Members and more information about the Senior Members program.

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