Ray Baughman became the Robert A. Welch Professor of Chemistry and Director of the NanoTech Institute at the University of Texas in Dallas in August 2001, after 31 years in industry. He is a member of the National Academy of Engineering, the Academy of Medicine, Engineering and Science of Texas, the Academia Europaea, and the European Academy of Sciences and Arts; a foreign member of the European Academy of Sciences; a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry, the National Academy of Inventors, and the American Physical Society; an Academician of The Russian Academy of Natural Sciences; an honorary professor of 8 universities in China; and is on editorial or advisory boards of Science and other journals. Ray has 90 issued US patents and over 440 refereed publications, with over 40,500 journal citations and a Web of Science H-index of 88. He has received the Chemical Pioneer Award of the American Institute of Chemists (1995), the Cooperative Research Award in Polymer Science and Engineering (1996), the New Materials Innovation Prize of the Avantex International Forum for Innovative Textiles (2005), Nano 50 Awards from Nanotech Briefs Magazine for Carbon Nanotube Sheets and Yarns (2006) and for Fuel Powered Artificial Muscles (2007), the NanoVic Prize from Australia (2006), the Scientific American Magazine 50 recognition for outstanding technological leadership (2006), the CSIRO Metal for Research Achievement (2006), the Chancellor’s Entrepreneurship and Invention Award (2007), the 21 for the 21^st Century award (2007), the Alumni Distinguished Achievement Award of Carnegie Mellon University (2007), the Kapitza Metal of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences (2007), the Graffin Lectureship of the American Carbon Society (2010), the Tech Titans Award in Education (2011), Time Magazine recognition in 50 Best Inventions of the Year (2011), the SGL Carbon Award of the American Carbon Society (2013), the Tech Titans Technology Inventors Award (2015), the 2015 Inventor Award for Energy Harvesting Materials and Systems, and the R&D 100 Gold Award for Market Disruptor Product (2015). He was named the Honorable Yang Shi-Xiang Professor of Nankai University and the Honorable Tang Aoqing Professor of Jilin University in 2010, and was listed 30th in the Top 100 Material Scientists of the Decade (2000-2010) and the Top 1% Most Cited in Cross-Fields in 2018. Baughman Laboratories were established in his honor in China in 2014 at the Jiangnan Graphene Research Institute in Changzhou and in 2018 at the University of Science and Technology in Liaoning.