Month: January 2013

GMES Seminars & Socials

The Geological & Mining Engineering & Sciences at Michigan Tech will have Friday social for the spring semester will be a regular event, on Fridays at 3 pm in DOW 610. The social will be followed by a seminar of the spring seminar series.
Please join us for the social and seminar. Graduate students and faculty, if you are interested in presenting your work, you will have opportunities in subsequent seminars. Please let me know if you are interested for scheduling. External speakers will also be speaking as part of this seminar series, so feel free to invite outside speakers as interest and scheduling permit.
Note: Refreshment will be provided.

See details about the first Seminar
and watch the GMES calendar of events foir future announcements.

GMES Seminar: Cable Shovel Durabaility in Formation-Excavation Engineering

GMES Seminar: Cable Shovel Durability in Formation-Excavation Engineering
Muhammad Azeem Raza, Instructor, GMES, PhD Candidate of Mining Engineering

Cable shovel is a primary excavation unit in many surface mines around the world. The capacities of the shovels have seen an ever increasing trend to achieve the economies of large scale operation. The modern day shovels have 100+ tons per pass production capacities. The dynamic force of 100+ ton material combined with the dynamic cutting, friction and acceleration forces during the excavation result in severe stress loading of the shovel front end components. Stress and fatigue cracks appear, as a result of this cyclic stress loading, resulting in expansive breakdown, reduced efficiency and production loss. Numerical and analytical techniques can be used to model the stress and fatigue failures.
In this seminar we will discuss the challenges and on-going research in cable-shovel formation-excavation and durability studies. The talk will include: (i) kinematic and dynamic modeling of shovel, (ii) stress and fatigue failure modeling (iii) life expectancy of shovel front-end components.

Muhammad Azeem Raza, an instructor for GMES, will be presenting his work titled “Cable Shovel Durabaility in Formation-Excavation Engineering”. Mr. Raza is a PhD candidate for a degree in Mining Engineering at the Missouri University of Science and Technology, Rolla. He is also an assistant professor at the University of Engineering and Technology, Lahore where he taught for three years before coming to the US for his PhD.

Pennington concludes tour for Science, Technology and Innovation Expert Partnership (STIEP) speaker series

Wayne D. Pennington (GMES) American Geosciences Institute past-president, recently concluded a tour for the new Science, Technology and Innovation Expert Partnership (STIEP) speaker series. Part of the US Department of State’s Targets of Opportunity Program, the STIEP speaker series promotes science diplomacy abroad by connecting traveling scientists with local embassies and other community networks in the region. Participants have the opportunity to exponentially increase the reach of their research while simultaneously promoting key issues for science diplomacy, including the importance of innovation, the scientific peer review process, and promoting women in STEM fields.

Pennington traveled to Tyumen, Russia, in December to teach a short course on seismic petrophysics for members of the oil and gas industry there. While in Tyumen, in collaboration with the consulate in Yekaterinburg, Russia, Pennington had the opportunity to address two universities through the STIEP speaker series. Pennington presented to Tyumen State Oil and Gas University on time-lapse seismic observations of unintentional regional gas blowdown in the Gulf of Mexico, and to Tyumen State University about methods of unconventional oil and gas development.

“Speaking with local communities and young geoscientists about my research and recent advances in technology in the US was an invaluable opportunity” said Pennington. “I was particularly touched by the sincerity and depth of interest of the students and young researchers at those universities. The STIEP speaker series helps bring researchers together to address global challenges facing the international scientific community. In this case, the sustainable development of oil and gas resources.”

Cooperating partners for the Science, Technology and Innovation Expert Partnership include the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the American Chemical Society (ACS), the American Society of Microbiology (ASM), the American Institute of Physics (AIP), the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene (ASTMH), the Association of American Engineering Societies (AAES), the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), the National Academy of Sciences, the Smithsonian Institution, and the US Department of State.