LeRoy Whinnery '85 is a principal member of the technical staff at Sandia National Laboratories in Livermore, California; over the years he has helped several IC students find summer research internships at Sandia (including Fulbright grant winner William Pomerantz '02 and Colgate-Palmolive senior research scientist Thomas Boyd '94). This past summer Whinnery (at left in photo) hosted current IC sophomore Matthew Sprague (at right), who made a presentation as part of his internship work. Sprague is majoring in chemistry and physics and minoring in music.

Whinnery, holder of seven patents in various areas of chemical research, recently came to South Hill to meet with first year biochemistry and chemistry majors in Glenn Vogel's first year seminar course. Whinnery also presented a seminar to the faculty and upper-level chemistry majors on "Impact Toughened Polyurethane Foams". His research will ultimately allow the prediction of the mechanical properties (shock, vibration, and impact) of these foams, based on manufacturer-supplied information, with possible application in the transportation industry (such as car bumpers and sensitive electronics).

Beside foams, Whinnery's research includes hydrogen getters used to increase the safety of battery-operated consumer products, triboluminescent materials that function as damage sensors, desiccants with improved mechanical properties used to enhance the reliability of electronics in weapon systems, microactuators based on conducting polymers used in valves and pumps, and solvent getters that ensure an ultra-clean environment for computer hard disks.