Michelle Seitz (Fed)

As Program Director for the plastics portion of NIST's Circular Economy Program, Michelle is responsible for overseeing and advancing the program's goals. This involves staying informed and sharing insights about internal and external developments, fostering collaboration within NIST and with external partners, strategically deploying initiative resources to maximize program impact, and representing the program and NIST externally. As there are synergies between the plastics and non-plastics portfolios within in the Circular Economy Program, Michelle works closely with Kelsea Schumacher to maximize the impact of the entire program.  

Previous to joining NIST, Michelle was as an AAAS Science and Technology Policy Fellow at the U.S. Department of Energy. She supported the Advanced Materials and Manufacturing Technologies Office's Circular Economy pillar with a focus on advancing plastics circularity via program, strategy, and technology development. She co-led the Transitioning to a Sustainable, Circular Economy for Plastics Workshop as well as co-authored the EERE Circularity for Secure and Sustainable Products and Materials: A Draft Strategic Framework. 

Michelle brings over a decade of industrial experience to her role. She was a Senior Scientist at DSM’s Material Science Center in the Netherlands, where she worked on applications from contact lenses to car parts. Her expertise is in polymer structure-processing-property relationships, adhesion, and characterization.

Google Scholar: publications and citations

• 3rd Place Quadrant Award, Quadrant Plastics (2011)
• Finalist,  Padden Award for Excellence in Polymer Physics Graduate Research, American Physical Society - Polymers Division (2009)
• Alan Gent Award, Adhesion Society (2008)
• Graduate Research Fellowship, National Science Foundation (2005)