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Washington State University
The Gene and Linda Voiland School of Chemical Engineering and Bioengineering

Faculty & Staff

George Bonheyo, PhD

George Bonheyo

George Bonheyo, Ph.D.
Adjunct Professor, PNNL

Biography

Dr. George Bonheyo is a Senior Research Scientist and the Biotechnology Team Lead in the Energy and Environment Directorate at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory’s Marine Sciences Laboratory in Sequim, Washington. He received his M.S. and Ph.D. in microbiology from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. After graduation, he was a National Science Foundation Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the UIUC Department of Geology, studying the biogeochemistry of carbonate precipitation and diagenesis. During this period, he developed plans for and launched a startup biotechnology company, GeoBiologics, Inc., which provided novel products and services for microbial detection, identification, and enumeration.

Dr. Bonheyo transferred his stake in the company in 2005 and joined the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory to develop a biotechnology program at PNNL’s Marine Science Laboratory. Current programs span fundamental through applied research in biosecurity, biofilms and biofouling, antifouling technologies, biocorrosion, bioremediation, and the transport, fate, and detection of bio-signatures. Dr. Bonheyo helped launch and has been a co-lead of PNNL’s 6-year, $16M Signature Discovery Initiative, a program developing principles, methods, and tools for identifying, testing, and applying signatures in domains such as health, the environment, nuclear and cyber security, and social networks.