Kevin Hicks

Kevin Hicks, Ph.D., is the Research Leader of the Sustainable Biofuels and CoProducts Research Unit of the Eastern Regional Research Center (ERRC), ARS, USDA in Wyndmoor (suburban Philadelphia) PA. He obtained his Ph.D. from the University of Missouri – Columbia in Biochemistry in 1979.  At ERRC, where he has worked for 32 years, Kevin leads a team of 25 scientists and engineers conducting research to develop sustainable biofuels and coproducts from agricultural commodities and byproducts.  Biofuels Dr. Hicks has researched include ethanol, biodiesel, and “drop-in” green gasoline and diesel.  CoProducts include valuable sugars, novel foods and feeds, cholesterol-lowering lipids with antioxidant properties, and functional polysaccharides, including arabinoxylans with many uses in food and non-food systems. Dr. Hicks is the author of approximately 250 peer-reviewed and technical publications and 10 patents as well as numerous presentations to national and international audiences.  He has won 11 major awards for his work and has served as an officer in the Carbohydrate Division of the American Chemical Society and in several other professional societies. He was recently inducted into the Philadelphia Society for Promoting Agriculture, the Nation’s oldest agricultural organization, established in 1785.