Category: Research

Phosphorus eaters—Using bacteria to purify iron ore

eiseleresearchMany iron ore deposits around the world are extensive and easy to mine, but can’t be used because of their high phosphorus content. Phosphorus content in steel should generally be less than 0.02 percent. Any more and steel becomes brittle and difficult to work. 

Tim Eisele
Tim Eisele
Chemical Engineering

Beneficiation plant processing, which treats ore to make it more suitable for smelting, only works if the phosphorus mineral grains are bigger than a few micrometers in size. Often, phosphorus is so finely disseminated through iron ore that grinding and physically separating out the phosphorus minerals is impractical.

Michigan Tech researcher Tim Eisele is developing communities of live bacteria to inexpensively dissolve phosphorus from iron ore, allowing a low-phosphorus iron concentrate to be produced. “For finely dispersed phosphorus, until now, there really hasn’t been a technology for removing it,” he says.

Phosphorus is critical to all living organisms. Eisele’s experiments are designed so that organisms can survive only if they are carrying out phosphorus extraction. He uses phosphorus-free growth media.

“We’ve confirmed that when there is no iron ore added to the media, there is no available phosphorus and no bacterial growth.”

Tim Eisele

Eisele is investigating two approaches, one using communities of aerobic organisms to specifically attack the phosphorus, and another using anaerobic organisms to chemically reduce and dissolve the iron while leaving the phosphorus behind. He obtained organisms from local sources—his own backyard, in fact, where natural conditions select for the types of organisms desired. Eisele originally got the idea for this approach as a result of the high iron content of his home well water, caused by naturally-occuring anaerobic iron-dissolving organisms.

On the right, anaerobic bacteria dissolve iron in the ferrous state. On the left, recovered electrolytic iron.
In the beaker on the right, anaerobic bacteria dissolve iron in the ferrous state. On the left, recovered electrolytic iron.

Eisele cultivates anaerobic and aerobic organisms in the laboratory to fully adapt them to the ore. “We use mixed cultures of organisms that we have found to be more effective than pure cultures of a single species of organism. Using microorganism communities will also be more practical to implement on an industrial scale, where protecting the process from contamination by outside organisms may be impossible.”

Chemical Engineering and Materials Science Labs Available to Harvey Displaced Researchers

March for ScienceFour Michigan Tech labs, so far, have responded to a request by scientific honor society Sigma Xi and the March for Science for researchers to open their labs to scientists displaced by Hurricane Harvey. Rudy Luck (Chem), David Shonnard (ChemEng), Paul Sanders (MSE) and the Great Lakes Research Center all have invited researchers and students impacted by Harvey to work in their labs.

In its call for lab space, Sigma Xi wrote, “some researchers in the storm’s path will be displaced from their laboratories for an extended period. These individuals may require extraordinary measures to continue their work. Sigma Xi is joining with March for Science to assemble a list of research laboratories nationwide that are willing to accommodate faculty, postdocs and students who need to temporarily relocate.”

Nationwide, 290 labs have signed up so far. To see the list of labs click here.

By Jenn Donovan.

Biofuels Conversion, Biochemical & Thermochemical

Shonnard Lab @ Michigan Technological University
Houghton, MI
David Shonnard
drshonna@mtu.edu

Alloy Research

Sanders Alloy Research Lab @ Michigan Technical University
Houghton, MI
Paul Sanders
sanders@mtu.edu
Al, Fe, Ni, Cu, Mg alloy development; modeling, casting, thermo-mechanical processing, mechanical testing, SEM/TEM
may be able to provide basic housing (basement bed, bath)

NASA Funding on Lake-Effect Snowstorm Models

Pengfei Xue
Pengfei Xue

Pengfei Xue (CEE) is the principal investigator on a project that has received a $104,168 research and development grant from NASA. Mark Kulie (GMES/GLRC) is the Co-PI on the project, ” Evaluation and Advancing the Representation of Lake-Atmosphere Interactions and Resulting Heavy Lake-Effect Snowstorms across the Laurentian Great Lakes Basin Within the NASA-Unified Weather Research and Forecasting Model.”

This is the first year of a potential four-year project totaling $327,927.

NSF Funding on Deep Learning in Geosystems

Zhen Liu
Zhen Liu

Zhen (Leo) Liu (CEE) is the principal investigator on a project that has received a $227,367 research and development grand from the National Science Foundation.

Shiyan Hu (ECE/MTTI) is Co-PI on the project “Image-Data-Driven Deep Learning in Geosystems.” This is a two-year project.

By Sponsored Programs.

Abstract

Breakthroughs in deep learning in 2006 triggered numerous cutting-edge innovations in text processing, speech recognition, driverless cars, disease diagnosis, and so on. This project will utilize the core concepts underlying the recent computer vision innovations to address a rarely-discussed, yet urgent issue in engineering: how to analyze the explosively increasing image data including images and videos, which are difficult to analyze with traditional methods.

The goal of this study is to understand the image-data-driven deep learning in geosystems with an exploratory investigation into the stability analysis of retaining walls. To achieve the goal, the recent breakthroughs in computer vision, which were later used as one of the core techniques in the development of Google’s AlphaGo, will be studied for its capacity in assessing the stability of a typical geosystem, i.e., retaining walls.

Read more at the National Science Foundation.

Verification and validation—Predicting uncertainties early on

Shabakhti Research

Mahdi Shabakhti
Mahdi Shahbakhti
Mechanical Engineering–Engineering Mechanics

The verification and validation (V&V) process for a typical automotive vehicle and powertrain electronic control unit takes approximately two years, and costs several million dollars. V&V are essential stages in the design cycle of an industrial controller, there to remove any gap between the designed and implemented controller. Computer modeling has brought about improvements over the years, but the gap remains.

Michigan Tech researcher Mahdi Shahbakhti has made significant progress to remove that gap, using system models to easily verify controller design. His solution features an adaptive sliding mode controller (SMC) that helps the controller deal with imprecisions in the implementation of the system.

The research is funded by the National Science Foundation GOALI program, or Grant Opportunities for Academic Liaison with Industry. Shahbakhti’s team and fellow researchers from the University of California, Berkeley, and Toyota USA in Ann Arbor, Michigan are nearing the end of their three-year collaborative GOALI project.

“Analog-to-digital conversion (ADC) is one of the main sources of controller implementation imprecisions, mostly due to sampling and quantization,” says Shahbakhti. “Our approach mitigates ADC imprecisions by first identifying them in the early stages of the controller design cycle. We first developed a mechanism for real-time prediction of uncertainties due to ADC and then determined how those uncertainties propagated through the controller. Finally we incorporated those predicted uncertainties into the discrete sliding mode controller (DSMC) design.”

“Analog-to-digital conversion (ADC) is one of the main sources of controller implementation imprecisions, mostly due to sampling and quantization.”

Mahdi Shahbakhti

Shahbakhti and his team tested an actual electronic control unit at Michigan Tech in a real time processor-in-the-loop setup. Their approach significantly improved controller robustness to ADC imprecisions when compared to a baseline sliding controller. In a case study controlling the engine speed and air-fuel ratio of a spark ignition engine, the DSMC design with predicted uncertainty provided a 93 percent improvement compared to a baseline sliding controller.

Toyota works closely with the research team to integrate GOALI project results into the design cycle for its automotive controllers. The company provided team members with an initial week of training on its V&V method of industrial controllers, and also participates with Shabakhti’s team in online biweekly meetings. “The concept of this project is fundamental and generic—it can be applied to any control system, but complex systems, such as those in automotive applications, will benefit most,” notes Shahbakhti.

What’s in the air? Understanding long-range transport of atmospheric arsenic

Coal-fired power plant on the Navajo Nation near Page, Arizona
Coal-fired power plant on the Navajo Nation near Page, Arizona

Once emitted into the atmosphere, many air pollutants are transported long distances, going through a series of chemical reactions before falling back to the Earth’s surface. This makes air pollution not just a local problem, but a regional and a global one.

Shiliang Wu
Shilliang Wu, Geological & Mining Engineering & Sciences, Civil & Environmental Engineering

“If you’d been living in London in December 1952, you’d probably remember what air pollution can do—in just a couple of weeks, a smog event killed thousands of people,” says Michigan Tech researcher Shilliang Wu.

“Today, photos of air pollution in China and India flood the Internet,” he adds. “Air pollution remains a significant challenge for the sustainability of our society, with detrimental effects on humans, animals, crops, and the ecosystem as a whole.”

An assistant professor with a dual appointment in Geological and Mining Engineering and Sciences, and Civil and Environmental Engineering, Wu examines the impacts of human activities on air quality, along with the complicated interactions between air quality, climate, land use, and land cover. Using well-established global models, he investigates a wide variety of pollutants including ozone, nitrogen oxides, volatile organic compounds, aerosols, mercury, and arsenic.

Wu’s research team recently developed the first global model to simulate the sources, transport, and deposition of atmospheric arsenic including source-receptor relationships between various regions. They were motivated by a 2012 Consumer Reports magazine study, which tested more than 200 samples of rice products in the US and found that many of them, including some organic products and infant rice cereals, contained highly toxic arsenic at worrisome levels.

“Our results indicate that reducing anthropogenic arsenic emissions in Asia and South America can significantly reduce arsenic pollution not only locally, but globally.”

Shilliang Wu

“Our model simulates arsenic concentrations in ambient air over many sites around the world,” says Wu. “We have shown that arsenic emissions from Asia and South America are the dominant sources of atmospheric arsenic in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres, respectively. Asian emissions are found to contribute nearly 40 percent of the total arsenic deposition over the Arctic and North America. Our results indicate that reducing anthropogenic arsenic emissions in Asia and South America can significantly reduce arsenic pollution not only locally, but globally.”

Wu’s model simulation is not confined to any region or time period. “We can go back to the past or forward to the future; we can look at any place on Earth. As a matter of fact, some of my colleagues have applied the same models to Mars,” he says, adding: “In any case, the atmosphere is our lab, and we are interested in everything in the air.”

 

Students Needed for AutoDrive Design Job

AutoDriveThe Electrical, Computer Engineering, and Mechanical Engineering and Engineering Mechanics Departments will hold a community forum at 5 p.m. this Thursday (June 29, 2017) in EERC 100 concerning the AutoDrive Autonomous Vehicle competition.

Michigan Tech is one of eight schools selected to participate in this three year competition. In this forum, we will discuss the high level details concerning the first year of the competition and ways the greater campus community can get involved.

The competition team is also currently looking for motivated students with engineering and software design experience to assist the team on critical design activities during the month of July. Several paid positions are available to exceptionally well-qualified students.

By Jeremy Bos.

Accelerated healing—Understanding physical and chemical cues in tissue repair

Rajachar Research

Rupak Rajachar
Rupak Rajachar
Biomedical Engineering

Made of fibrous connective tissue, tendons attach muscles to bones in the body, transferring force when muscles contract. But tendons are especially prone to tearing. Achilles tendinitis, one of the most common and painful sports injuries, can take months to heal, and injury often recurs.

Michigan Tech researcher Rupak Rajachar is developing a minimally-invasive, injectable hydrogel that can greatly reduce the time it takes for tendon fibers to heal, and heal well.

“To cells in the body, a wound must seem as if a bomb has gone off,” says Rajachar. His novel hydrogel formulation allows tendon tissue to recover organization by restoring the initial cues cells need in order to function. “No wound can go from injured to healed overnight,” he adds. “There is a process.”

Rajachar and his research team seek to better understand that process, looking at both normal and injured tissue to study cell behavior, both in vitro and in vivo with mouse models. The hydrogel they have created combines the synthetic—polyethylene glycol (PEG), and the natural—fibrinogen.

“Cells recognize and like to attach to fibrinogen,” Rajachar explains. “It’s part of the natural wound healing process. It breaks down into products known to calm inflammation in a wound, as well as products that are known to promote new vessel formation. When it comes to healing, routine is better; the familiar is better.”

“To cells in the body, a wound must seem as if a bomb has gone off.”

Rupak Rajachar

The team’s base hydrogel has the capacity to be a therapeutic carrier, too. One formulation delivers low levels of nitric oxide (NO) to cells, a substance that improves wound healing, particularly in tendons. Rajachar combines NO and other active molecules and cells with the hydrogel, testing numerous formulations. “We add them, then image the gel to see if cells are thriving. The process takes place at room temperature, mixed on a lab bench.”

Hydrogel
SEM image of the fibrinogen-based hydrogel

Two commonly prescribed, simple therapies—range of motion exercises that provide mechanical stimulation, and local application of cold/heat—activate NO in the hydrogel, boosting its effectiveness.

“Even a single injection of the PEG-fibrinogen-NO hydrogel could accelerate healing in tendon fibers,” says Rajachar. “ Tendon tissues have a simple healing process that’s easier to access with biomaterials,” he adds. Healing skin, bone, heart, and neural tissue is far more complex. Next up: Rajachar plans to test variations of his hydrogel on skin wounds.

NSF Funds Research and Development on Wearable Electronics

Ye Sun
Ye (Sarah) Sun

Ye (Sarah) Sun (ME-EM/ICC) is the principal investigator on a project that has received a $330,504 research and development grant from the National Science Foundation. Shiyan Hu (ECE) is the Co-PI on the project, “Understanding and Mitigating Triboelectric Artifacts in Wearable Electronics by Synergic Approaches.”

This is a three-year project.

By Sponsored Programs.

Silicon Solar Cell Research in the Journal of Optics

Journal of OpticsAlumni Chenlong Zhang (MSE), Jephias Gwamuri (MSE) and electrical and computer engineering students Sandra Cvetanovic and Mehdi Sadatgol coauthored an article with Durdu Guney (ECE) and Joshua Pearce (MSE/ECE), Enhancement of hydrogenated amorphous silicon solar cells with front-surface hexagonal plasmonic arrays from nanoscale lithography, in the Journal of Optics.

doi.org/10.1088/2040-8986/aa7291