 |
For the 2005-2006 Academic Year, Shell Oil provided funds to recognize our outstanding graduate students. These funds assist the department in recruiting and retaining top students by rewarding students for hard work and excellence. We have utilized these funds to support fellowships for the students listed below.
Shamik Bhattacharya
Viet Pham
Brandon Shaw
Sk-Ali Ashfaque
Selma Atilhan
Susanna Wong
Michael Wang
Lisa Veltman
Divya Narayanan
Lay Myint
Jonathan Lunn
Allyson Laible
Ronnie Hassanen
Benjamin Cormier
Ali Abedi
Arwa Rabie
In July 2005, Dr. Dragomir Bukur left for a one-year appointment to teach chemical engineering undergraduate courses at TAMUQ. Dr. Bukur was due to return to the department in College Station in the summer of 2006. However, after a very successful year, Dr. Bukur’s appointment has been extended another year!
A review article published in May 2005 by Drs. David Ford, Dan Shantz, and Eric Simanek (Dept. of Chemistry) was in the top 10% of downloads from IOP journals in the third quarter of 2005. This is an invited review paper which was made possible by an NSF grant “ New Technologies for the Environment” on which the above mentioned are co-PIs. As Ford points out, this paper was stimulated, in particular, by their search for better ways to create organic-inorganic nanocomposite membranes for environmentally important separations.
Dr. David Ford, Associate Professor, holder of the K.R. Hall Professorship
and Associate Head for Undergraduate Program, was selected to receive an
Association of Former Students College Level Award. Porter Garner, Executive
Director of The Association Of Former Students, presented the awards to all
recipients at the Dwight Look College of Engineering’s Fall Faculty
Meeting, which was held on Wednesday, October 12, 2005.
To view article go to, click
here.
Courtesy of Texas A&M Engineering News
The journal’s regional editors selected Dr. Juergen Hahn, Assistant
Professor, for this award because of his contributions to the reviews. They
called him the “most thorough, comprehensive and objective” reviewer
this year. Hahn regularly reviews for 10 other journals. His research focuses
on process systems engineering, systems biology, modeling, analysis, simulation
and control of complex dynamic systems.
Courtesy of Texas A&M Engineering News, Notes, Vol. 5 No 1.
Dr. Juergen Hahn has been awarded a young investigator grant from the Petroleum
Research Fund, which is run by the American Chemical Society. Officially
it is called a ACS-PRF Type G grant. While the award amount is $35,000 over
a period of 2 years, it is the only young investigator grant that the ACS-PRF
has and one can only apply for it during the first three years as an assistant
professor.
Link to ACS: click here
Dr. Juergen Hahn was selected as an outstanding reviewer by the journal Automatica. Automatica is the flagship journal of IFAC (International Federation of Automatic Control). He was selected as an outstanding reviewer out of a pool of over 1250 people reviewing for the journal last year.
The Materials Characterization Facility (MCF) has a new director effective
9/1/05. Dr. Daniel Shantz replaced Dr. Richard Crooks as director of the
center. The center, the largest user facility supported by the College of
Engineering, the VPR and the College of Science, has a mission to support
and enhance the capabilities of researchers on the Texas A&M campus.
The center has extensive capabilities in microdevice fabrication, surface
characterization, and will substantially increase its capabilities in optical
microscopy with the impending addition of two confocal microscopes.
MCF’s website: click here
Each year during the Engineering Program Fall Faculty Meeting, outstanding
faculty are recognized through the presentation of various awards. This year,
two chemical engineering faculty were chosen to receive awards:
•
Dr. Victor Ugaz, Assistant Professor - TEES Select Young Faculty
•
Dr. Yue Kuo, Dow Professor - TEES Fellow
The awards were presented at the Engineering Program Fall Faculty meeting
on October 12. The department congratulates both of them for their accomplishments.
For more on the Engineering Program Awards, click
here.
Courtesy of Texas A&M Engineering News
Dr. Victor Ugaz introduced high school students and teachers to some of the exciting and cutting-edge research areas in Chemical Engineering at the 2005 Discover Engineering Conference sponsored by the Engineering Academic Programs Office in the Dwight Look College of Engineering at Texas A&M. Over 400 high school students along with nearly 100 parents, teachers, and counselors from all over Texas attended the conference held at TAMU on October 22. Dr. Ugaz delivered 3 workshops exploring the role of chemical engineers in the development of miniaturized "laboratory on a chip" systems for use in a variety of applications including portable DNA analysis devices.
Dr. Thomas Wood, who joined our faculty this fall as the inaugural holder
of the Mike O’Connor Chair II in Chemical Engineering, comes from a
faculty position from the University of Connecticut where he held the Northeast
Utilities Endowed Chair in Environmental Engineering Education. His research
areas are in biomedical and biomolecular as well as environmental engineering.
Since his arrival, he has been successful in obtaining the following new
grants: three NIH, one NSF, one DARPA, and one US Army Research Office.
To read more on this story, click
here.
Courtesy of Texas A&M Engineering News
The department has executed an agreement with the Universidad Industrial
de Santander (UIS) in Bucaramanga, COLOMBIA that includes student and faculty
exchanges as well as research cooperation. This project has had a very successful
launching during the past semester.
During the fall of 2005, we hosted eight undergraduate interns and one graduate
intern from UIS. In addition, we have one graduate student here for the PhD
program with three more due to arrive in March 2006.
Professors Balbuena, Ford, Hall and Seminario visited UIS in January 2006
to become acquainted with UIS faculty. Hopefully, these interactions can
lead to joint research projects. Both departments are delighted with the
joint agreement, and we anticipate a long and fruitful relationship.
A special guest was in the audience when students in Dr. Victor Ugaz's special topics elective course "Introduction to Microfabrication and Microfluidics" delivered their term project presentations on December 7. Sonia Azad, news anchor and producer at local television station KRHD was on hand to serve as a celebrity judge for the assignment which challenged students to communicate the main concepts and significance of a topic dealing with miniaturized chemical analysis systems in a way that could be understandable to a general audience, all within a 15-20 minute time limit. Sonia commented that she was very impressed with the students' overall knowledge and presentation skills, and that she was able to take away new knowledge about chemical engineering from their presentations.
The Chemical Engineering Department and the Mary Kay O’Connor Process Safety Center have established the Lamiya Memorial Safety Scholarship. On October 13, 2005, all graduate students were informed of this newly created scholarship and, at the same time, encouraged them to apply for the opportunity to be awarded a $1,000 scholarship. The criteria for the 2005 award was writing a 1000-word essay on “Safety Innovations In Research Projects?” to be turned in within a week’s time to Dr. Mannan.
The winner of the first Lamiya Memorial Safety Scholarship was Arnab Chakrabarty for his paper entitled “Safety Innovations in Research Projects”. The scholarship and plaque were presented to him during the morning general session of the Mary Kay O’Connor Process Safety Center International Symposium on October 26, 2005.
The following graduating seniors received awards in Fall 2005 from the department:
Outstanding Graduating Senior: Amber Smades
Chemical Engineering Excellence Senior Award: Christine
Phan, Jacob Kasper, Marcos Rosales
Kristen Gantt received a second place award in the undergraduate student poster competition at the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE) national meeting in Cincinnati, OH, held on October 30 - November 4, 2005. Her poster was titled "Investigation of Novel Convective Flow PCR", and was one of over 100 posters presented by chemical engineering students from across the nation.
Nitin Agrawal received a second place award for his oral presentation at the 14th Annual Chemical Engineering Graduate Research Symposium hosted by the Chemical Engineering GSC on September 12th. Nitin's presentation was entitled "Rapid DNA Amplification in Bouyancy Driven Closed Loop Microfluidic Systems".
Chih-Cheng (Roger) Lo, one of our PhD students, received a third place award for his oral presentation on the topic of single-stranded DNA electrophoresis at Student Research Week 2005. Student Research Week is an annual event sponsored by the TAMU Graduate Student Council that showcases university-wide research in a wide range of fields and provides a venue for students to present their work.
The plant design project competition for the Fall Semester of 2005 was sponsored
by Celanese Corporation with the judging leaders being Wayne Picard (Clear
Lake) and Ron Olsson (Bishop). Additionally, Myron Goforth of Dew Point Control
participated in the judging.
The project for this class was to select a process and to perform the conceptual
design to treat a sweet natural gas to maximize the return based on current
energy prices. Earlier in the semester each group had performed a full conceptual
process design of their process and had submitted a report that encompassed
the material balances, the process flow diagram drawings, safety and environmental
documentation, and economic analysis. The design competition was based on
a presentation of further analyses and optimization of the process that they
had selected using simulation and integration tools that were not used in
the first project.
The winning groups (and their members, left to right in the photos) are as
follows:
 |
1st place: Efficiency Engineering (David Kohtz, Amber Smades, Ron Olsson, Daniel McClellan, Marcos Rosales) |
 |
2nd place: KC and the Munshine Band (Christine Phan, Joseph Munn, Ron Olsson, Kasey Johnston, Robert Hahn) |
 |
3rd place: The Misfits (Frederick Woods, Shara Boquiren, Ron Olsson, Bridget Padden [front], Melvin Dubois [rear], Stephen Damaske) |
Honorably mentioned were the following groups:
Bare Minimum Engineering (Matthew Carr, Patrick Conroy, John Marshall, Nicholas
Maida)
Fantastic Four (Thomas Elsom, Ashley Hurley, Michael Karlin, Aaron Lack)
In October, two junior chemical engineering students, Kristen Gantt and Derek Moser, received GPA scholarships. Each of these GPA scholarships is in the amount of $2,800.
In addition to the Outstanding Senior award from the department, Amber Smades
was among six other Texas A&M University engineering students honored
on October 14, 2005, with the Craig C. Brown Outstanding Senior Engineer
Award. This award is the most prestigious honor bestowed on a graduating
senior in the Dwight Look College of Engineering and is given annually based
on students' outstanding scholastic achievement, leadership and character.
To read more about Amber and her achievements, click
here.
Courtesy of Texas A&M Engineering News
The Chemical Engineering Graduate Scholarship Committee recommended that
the following students receive the $1,000/year graduate scholarship: Daniel
Clopton, Benjamin Cormier, Ana Carolina Hortua, Allyson Laible, Jonathan
Lunn, Lay Myint, Billy Newton, ASM Obidullah, Rocio Sierra Ramirez, Michael
Wang, Susanna Wong, and Seung Yeu.
Congratulations to all the recipients on this honor which recognizes their
excellent performance!
Dr. Juergen Hahn and his students attended the Chemical Process Control
(CPC) conference. CPC is the most important conference for Dr. Hahn’s
research community as it is held only every 5 years and serves as the benchmark
for all control conferences. The developments from the last five years are
reviewed and future directions in process control are discussed.
The paper submitted by Hahn and Abhay Singh won the "Outstanding Contributed
Paper Award" for this conference.
The Food Protein Research & Development Center (FPRDC) now reports to
TEES Administration through the Chemical Engineering Division. FPRDC is an
engineering process development, innovation, and training center that focuses
upon adding value to diverse biological materials, waxes, petroleum and natural/botanical
oils, and water.
In addition to its research activities involving extraction and protein technologies,
extrusion technologies, fats and oils research, separation sciences, and
good laboratory practices services, it conducts 10-12 practical short courses
every year. The courses are “hands on” and allow one-on-one interaction
with instructors.
The department welcomes our new colleagues, and we anticipate enhanced interactions
with them.
Ford’s website: click here
The Food Protein Research and Development Center of the Texas Engineering
Experiment Station will hold the 16th Annual Membrane and Separations Technology
short course April 2-6 in College Station. Organized by the center’s
Separations Sciences group, the conference will feature lectures and presentations
on the fundamentals, new developments and applications of membrane and separations
technologies as well as daily pilot plant demonstrations. For more information,
contact Carl Vavra at cjvavra@tamu.edu,
979-845-2758, or click here.
Courtesy of Aggie Engineering Weekly
On September 1, the Department was awarded a prestigious $1 million "Department-Level Reform of Undergraduate Engineering Education" grant from the National Science Foundation. The purpose of these highly competitive grants (only about six are given across all engineering disciplines each year) is to assist departments in transforming student learning experiences to meet emerging needs of the U.S. workforce. Our partners in this project are Prairie View A&M University and Texas A&M-Kingsville.
The three-year project combines ideas in faculty development, curriculum change, and learning assessment to improve the educational outcomes for our students. As a result, our students will be able to apply fundamental ideas in chemical engineering over a greatly expanded range of time and length scales, and to emerging application areas such as biotechnology, nanotechnology, informatics, and novel materials. They will also be more highly skilled in open-ended design and synthesis tasks.
We welcome partnerships with industry and other academic institutions in this project. For more information, see our departmental website by clicking here or contact Professor Charles J. Glover at c-glover@tamu.edu.
Mr. and Mrs. Fox have established a prestigious faculty endowment. The Lanatter and Herbert Fox Professorship intends to support “teaching, research, as well as service and professional development activities of a nationally recognized scholar”.
To read more on Lanatter and Herb Fox, click
here.
Courtesy of Texas A&M Engineering News
The department again would like to thank the individuals who have generously
contributed to the Ackerman and Hanson memorial funds. The current total
for each fund is listed below:
In Memory of Aydin Ackerman Fund - $26, 995 to date
In Memory of Daniel T. Hanson Fund - $28,770 to date
To learn more about these funds or how to contribute please contact Valerie Green at val-green@tamu.edu.
A memorial fund was set up for Curtis James Fletcher, a graduate chemical engineering major from Porter who died on August 7, 2005. Curtis was an excellent student, a pleasant person and a loyal Aggie. His presence and enthusiasm will be missed in the department.
To learn more about this fund or how to contribute please contact Valerie Green at val-green@tamu.edu.
Two new donations have been given to the department for lockers. Recently,
we have added two more donors to our list: Dr. and Mrs. Anthony and Mr. Thomas
Clingenpeel made generous contributions.
Interested in this unique opportunity? - A unique feature of the Brown Building
is the hallway of lockers located on the first floor for chemical engineering
students. An opportunity exists to be recognized for a $1000 donation to
the Chemical Engineering Department. A name plate bearing the donor’s
name and class year, or in memory of a loved one, will be mounted on a locker
as a permanent reminder of his or her contribution. If you would like to
contribute, please send a check made payable to the Texas A&M Foundation
and indicate “CHEN Lockers” on the memo line. The donation may
be completed over a two-year period, if desired.
Courtesy of Chemical Engineering News, Special Issue, Dedication of Jack
E. Brown Engineering Building
At the beginning of the Fall 2005 Semester, T. Michael and Olive O’Connor
completed the O’Connor Chair II. His contribution was matched by funds
from TAMU to create the endowed chair.
An event to honor Mike O'Connor for endowing his second chair is planned
sometime in the near future. More will be announced in an upcoming newsletter.
On
June 13th, Assistant Professor Michael
Bevan was honored at the White House, along with 59 of the nation's brightest
young scientists and engineers, for being chosen as a recipient of a 2004
Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE).
The award, established by President Clinton in 1996, is the nation's highest honor for scientists and engineers at the outset of their independent research careers. Bevan was selected for the PECASE for his pioneering research on measuring and manipulating colloidal interactions involved in assembling nanoscale materials and devices on patterned surfaces.
Dr. G. Kemble Bennett, vice chancellor and dean of engineering offered the following praise for Bevan's accomplishment, "We are extremely proud of the contributions Dr. Bevan is making to the theory and practice of engineering, and he is most deserving of this prestigious recognition. He, indeed, is a bright, young star on the rise."
Read more from Texas A&M Engineering News or view pictures of the event at the White House.
Silas and Wood
The chemical engineering department continues to grow with the two newest additions to its faculty, Dr. James Silas and Dr. Thomas Wood.
Silas will join the department this summer as an assistant professor. He received his Ph.D. in chemical engineering at the University of Delaware under the direction of Professor Eric Kaler, and then went on to complete post-doctoral research at the University of Pennsylvania. Professor Wood, who will arrive in the fall, comes from a faculty position at the University of Connecticut.
Department Head Dr. Kenneth Hall remarked, “We are extremely pleased that Drs. Silas and Wood have agreed to join our department. I am confident that they will be fantastic additions to our faculty.”
One of the department’s new faculty members, Professor Perla Balbuena,
was recently rewarded for her achievements by being awarded the GPSA
Professorship in Chemical Engineering. "I am delighted that Dr. Balbuena
was chosen for this professorship," said Dr. Kenneth R. Hall, chemical engineering department head. "Her research is in areas that represent
the broad interests of the GPSA. She has an outstanding research record and is an excellent and conscientious teacher." Read more from Texas A&M Engineering News
Longtime supporter of chemical engineering at Texas A&M Ray Nesbitt has done it again with his most recent gift of $1.1 million dollars to the department. The bulk of the gift establishes the Ray B. Nesbitt Endowment for Faculty Excellence in Chemical Engineering. This $1 million fund will provide four endowed professorships to support the teaching, research, service and professional development activities of outstanding scholars. An additional $100,000 gift, earmarked for construction of a new chemical engineering building, was recognized by the naming of the Ray Nesbitt '55 Undergraduate Study Area. “Texas A&M gave us a great start that resulted in a very successful career with Exxon, and we want to share some of the benefits,” said Nesbitt, retired president of Exxon Chemical Co. and a vice chair for the university's One Spirit One Vision Campaign.
Read more from Texas A&M Engineering News
Texas A&M is known for the generosity of its former students, and there is no better example than that of Chemical Engineering graduate Arthur “Artie” McFerrin '65. The president and founder of KMCO, Inc. has committed $10 million to establish an endowed fund to support chemical engineering at Texas A&M.
In recognition of Artie's commitment, the Texas A&M System Board of Regents recently approved the naming of the department, which will now be known as the Artie McFerrin Department of Chemical Engineering. Funds from this endowment will be used to support a variety of department needs: faculty recruitment and retention, scholarships for needy students, graduate fellowships, and research equipment, just to name a few.
Dr. G. Kemble Bennett, vice chancellor and dean of engineering, said, "This is a most significant gift to bestow upon a department in our college. Mr. McFerrin built a successful career upon completion of his engineering education at Texas A&M, and we are proud to identify our Department of Chemical Engineering with his name."
Full story from Texas A&M Engineering News
McFerrin Announcement (PDF)
(5/25/05)
Chemical Engineering Professor William "Bill" Harris II passed away on May 7, 2005. His funeral was held on May 11th at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in College Station, TX. Harris joined the department in 1953 and served as a professor until his retirement in 1986. His research interests included alternative energy sources and fuel systems, and he was the holder of five U.S. patents.
(5/05)
Balbuena awarded GPSA Professorship
In recognition of her contributions as a teacher and researcher, Dr. Perla Balbuena was recently named as the holder of the GPSA Professorship in Chemical Engineering. Dr. Balbuena joined the department in the summer of 2004 and has since become a valuable member of the department. Her research interests include quantum and classical molecular simulations, thermodynamic and transport properties of materials, and she has been published in several highly respected journals. "I am delighted that Dr. Balbuena was chosen for this Professorship," said Department Head Dr. Kenneth Hall. "Her research is in areas that represent the broad interests of the GPSA, she has an outstanding research reacord, and is an excellent and conscientious teacher."
(2/22/05)
On May 12th the department held its Spring 2005 Graduation Reception honoring students who graduated this semester. In addition to the formal check presentations for the Plant Design Competition winners, the following undergraduate awards were given:
*Oustanding Senior Award - Eli Millican
*Omega Chi Epsilon Senior Award - Jeffrey Gribnau
*Chemical Engineering Excellence Award - Kimberly Babcock, Allen Bulick, Aaron Fuhr, Chad Holman, and Andrew Tomlinson
Congratulations and best of luck to all the graduates!
(5/12/05)
The annual Plant Design Competition took place on May 6th. In the plant design courses, students use high-powered computers to design processing facilities such as refineries, chemical plants, and more recently, pharmaceutical plants. This year's competition, hosted by Fluor Corporation, required students to design a plant for ultra-low-sulfur-diesel. James Turner and Matthew Reisdorf were on hand to judge the competition. The winning teams were:
*1st Place($100 each)
( from l. to r.)
Andrew Ryskoski, Jeremy Gribnau, Jeff Gribnau, and Eli Millican
*2nd Place($75 each)
( from l. to r.)
Nathan Nagel, James Garza, William Stehling, and Daniel McMillan
*3rd Place($50 each)
( from l. to r.)
Chad Holman, Kimberly Babcock, David Johnson, and Steven Partain
(5/12/05)
