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Dr. Matt Kropf

Associate professor of natural sciences
Director of the Harry R. Halloran Jr./ARG Energy Institute

PET Seneca Gas Pad

Dr. Matt Kropf is a skier, adventurer, back-country hiker, mountain biker, mountaineer, and certified wilderness first responder.

But that’s not his day job. He’s also an inventor, a leader, a physicist and a teacher. As the director of the Harry R. Halloran Jr./ARG Energy Institute at Pitt-Bradford, Kropf has spearheaded the development of new majors in energy and engineering, taken an active role in the design of our new George B. Duke Engineering and Information Technology Building, written successful grants for the installation of solar panels on campus, and been involved in the development of Pitt-Bradford’s hillside Quintuple Ridge property, where students are conducting the needed work to develop a network of recreational trails.

He has loved the outdoors, science and big ideas since he was a kid growing up in Canton, Ohio. When his kindergarten teacher asked his class to act out what they wanted to do when they grew up, he pantomimed a chemist pouring the contents of one test tube into another. (He still does something a bit like this as an amateur mixologist). At a Scholastic book fair in the third grade, he picked up a book that would focus the course of his science-loving life.

“I realized that chemistry was really physics,” he said. His high school physics teacher encouraged him to select a small college for his undergraduate degree in order to get the most interaction with faculty. He chose Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology in Terra Haute, Ind., before earning his doctorate in engineering science and mechanics at Penn State University.

As a graduate student, his interest in using microwaves in lieu of chemical catalysts may have led to some predicted, controlled explosions, but he prefers to talk about his love of the outdoors.

“I like to ski and hike,” he said, citing one of the reasons he loves being a professor. His work with students and fellow faculty members on bringing trails to the university’s 200-plus-acre forested hillside, Quintuple Ridge, merges his professional interest with his personal life.

After a decade at Pitt-Bradford, he is enjoying seeing how his former students are succeeding on their own and enjoys the freedom he has to pursue research of his own choosing. His research during his doctoral studies and as a professor have resulted in seven patents.

The first was for a biofuel process that he developed while in graduate school. The process uses microwaves to heat and ultrasound to mix chemicals, allowing him to cut the use of a dangerous and expensive catalyst.

That process is now being used in a small biofuel refinery in McKean County, AE Resources Inc., where Kropf has been able to continue doing research with students.

He received another two patents in 2016 for a process and system for ultrasonically cleaning titanium particles contaminated with cutting oils and lubricants. The new process is more environmentally friendly than the traditional method, which requires high temperatures and a lot of water mixed with highly concentrated industrial soaps and a long period of agitation. The new method, which Kropf worked on with Dr. Murray Small, cleans the chips with mildly warm water and a low concentration of biodegradable soap in a short amount of time.

In 2018, he invented a process that could capture the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide that is produced when natural gas is burned and trap it underground, for which he received four patents. The money for the development came through a grant from the National Science Foundation’s Innovation Corps Site at the University of Pittsburgh Innovation Institute. The Pitt Innovation Institute also helped him secure the patent for the process.

As director of the energy institute, he has also worked with facilities management on improving campus sustainability and applying for Pitt-Bradford to be recognized as a Tree Campus USA. He has also served on the University of Pittsburgh’s committee to prepare a university-wide sustainability plan.