Teresa Karjala (Plumley)

Teresa Karjala is a Senior R&D Fellow in Dow’s Packaging & Specialty Plastics division and currently provides technical product leadership across the polyethylene business. Teresa received a B.S. from Michigan Technological University in 1987 and a Ph.D. from the University of Delaware in 1992, both in Chemical Engineering. After receiving her Ph.D., Teresa started her career at Dow and has progressed in technical leadership roles in polyethylene materials science, characterization with a particular focus on rheology, new business development, and product design. Over her career, Teresa developed expertise in various fundamentals of polyethylene and polymer physics, including tailoring polymer design and product development for specific application and performance targets, structure/property relationships and rheology, and high-pressure low-density polyethylene (LDPE) and linear low-density polyethylene (LLDPE) molecular and article structural characterization.

Teresa has contributed to the success of many Dow product lines, including NORDEL™, ENGAGE™, AFFINITY™, VERSIFY™, ELITE™, DOWLEX™, INNATE™, AGILITY™, and UNIGILITY™. These product lines are used in a broad range of applications such as food packaging; agricultural, lamination, shrink, stretch, and industrial films; extrusion coating; foams; hot melt adhesives; liners; and heavy-duty shipping sacks. Throughout Teresa’s career, she has successfully innovated from new business development projects to platform technology introduction to profitable growth via product line extension.

Teresa is an active contributor to intellectual property protection at Dow and is a top inventor with 106 granted U.S. patents. Beyond invention, Teresa has been a key technical expert in patent oppositions and patent litigation, protecting Dow products and technology. Teresa is a widely known expert in the field; she is a Society of Plastics Engineers (SPE) Fellow, has over 90 external presentations and publications, and over 300 Dow internal reports. She is a member of the Michigan Technological University ChE External Advisory Board (EAB) as well as the Physics of Fluids EAB. In addition to recognition as a SPE Fellow, Teresa holds two R&D 100 Awards, an Edison Award, an ACS Award for Team Innovation, and the Michigan Technological University Presidential Council of Alumnae Award. Teresa is an active member of SPE, ACS, AIChE, and the Society of Rheology.

She and her husband, Thomas Karjala (’87 MTU, Chemical Engineering), currently reside in Lake Jackson, Texas. They have two grown children, Katherine and Nicholas.

Excerpted from the 2025 Chemical Engineering Academy induction ceremony.