Tequila Harris

Tequila Harris is an American mechanical engineer and professor. She is Professor of Manufacturing at the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering. She works on polymer processing and mechanical system design.

Education and early career Harris earned her Bachelor's degree at Lane College in 2000. She was a Master's student at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and became a postgraduate in 2003. In October 2006, Harris graduated with a PhD in Mechanical Engineering.

Career Harris joined the Georgia Institute of Technology as an assistant professor in 2006 She leads the Polymer Thin Film Processing group at Georgia Institute of Technology. She became principal investigator at National Science Foundation CAREER Award between 2010 and 2015. The award let her investigate Proton-exchange membrane fuel cells using theoretical and numerical modelling. She worked with the Jordan University of Science and Technology to study membrane biofouling due to chemicals and microbes. In 2015 she was accepted as a fellow at the Executive Leadership in Academic Technology and Engineering program at Drexel University.

She attended a ceremony at the White House with Kim Cobb as the National Science Foundation launched a new work-life balance initiatives.

Harris has been featured on the Stories from the NNI podcast of the National Nanotechnology Initiative for her work with polymer thin film manufacturing.

Honors and awards She won a second National Science Foundation award in 2017, allowing her to translate thin film fabrication from the lab to factory floor. She focuses on multi-layer thin film technologies for things such as organic solar cells, transistors and sensors. This includes looking at how defects influence transport properties in polymer membrane films. They also look at how fluid flows through porous media. She won the Lockheed Martin Inspirational Young Faculty Award. The Lockheed Martin Award is to recognize young professors who pose a great impact on their students lives and education.

She holds several patents for producing a proton-conducting membrane thin films. She was awarded the International Society of Coating Science and Technology L. E. Scriven Young Investigator Award in 2018. She is the first African-American to win the award since it began in the 1990s. Dong, Xiaobo; Lu, David; Harris, Tequila A. L.; Escobar, Isabel C. (2021). "Polymers and Solvents Used in Membrane Fabrication: A Review Focusing on Sustainable Membrane Development". Membranes. 11 (5): 309. doi:10.3390/membranes11050309. Chede, Sneha; Anaya, Nelson M.; Oyanedel-Craver, Vinka; Gorgannejad, Sanam; Harris, Tequila A. L.; Al-Mallahi, Jumana; Abu-Dalo, Muna; Qdais, Hani Abu; Escobar, Isabel C. (2019). "Desalination using low biofouling nanocomposite membranes: From batch-scale to continuous-scale membrane fabrication". Desalination. Nanomaterials for Water Desalination: Recent Advances and Future Challenges. 451: 81–91. doi:10.1016/j.desal.2017.05.007. Bhamidipati, Kanthi Latha; Didari, Sima; Bedell, Prince; Harris, Tequila A. L. (2011). "Wetting phenomena during processing of high-viscosity shear-thinning fluid". Journal of Non-Newtonian Fluid Mechanics. 166 (12): 723–733. doi:10.1016/j.jnnfm.2011.03.009.