College of Engineering Blog

Category: Chemical Engineering

Pre-Schoolers Learn to Engineer

Published
By

85 parents and their PreK children from the Miigiziinsag Little Eagles Pre-School, KBIC pre-primary , KBIC early headstart, and BHK pre-school attended the first Family Engineering Fun Night held November 13th, 2019, at KBOCC. A pizza dinner was available at 5:30 pm with hands-on engineering activities from 6:00-7:00 pm. The event was conducted by Michigan Tech Center for Science and Environmental Outreach, with help from Michigan Tech students with the Chemical Engineering Honors Society Omega Chi Epsilon and Tau Beta Pi Engineering Honors Society student chapters, and funding from the Michigan Space Grant Consortium and the “For the Wisdom of the Children Grant from the American Indian College Fund.”

Man works at table with two children and another adult looking on.
Matt Friiswall and his children Iziah and Isabel work on designing a scoop to remove trash from the “pond”.
Adults work with students at a table in a crowded event.
Michigan Tech student Hailey Mikolitis (right) assists pre-school students Jarron Colbert and Treyson Tapani, who are testing the strength of two different arch designs.
Three people arrange items on trays at a table.
All the right tools set up.
One adult is showing another a foil project at a table.
Michigan Tech volunteer training.
Continue Reading →

Engineering Students Attend WE19

Published
By
Romana Carden
Romana Carden
Mackenzie Brunet
Mackenzie Brunet

Ten members of the Michigan Tech chapter of the Society of Women Engineers (SWE) went to the 2019 national conference, WE19, November 7-9, in Anaheim, California. Advisor Gretchen Hein (EF) accompanied the delegation of eight undergraduates and two graduate students.

The WE19 conference was attended by more than 16,000 SWE members, both collegiate and professional, from across the nation, who enjoyed professional development breakout sessions, inspirational keynotes, a career fair, and multiple opportunities for networking.

Romana Carden, a 5th year student in engineering management, participated in the SWE Future Leaders (SWEFL) program. Along with Mackenzie Brunet, Carden went to the SWE Collegiate Leadership Institute (CLI), a day-long leadership development event. Both programs, led by female engineers working in industry and academia, help college students gain leadership skills.

Full list of students who attended:

Continue Reading →

Engineering Students at the Health Research Institute Slam

Published
By

Research Slam event photo of people in the labThe Health Research Institute hosted its first Research Slam Student forum Nov. 8, 2019. The event was divided into three categories: Two-Minute Introduction, Three-Minute Thesis, and Eight-Minute Talks.

Presenters from the Three-Minute Thesis and Eight-Minute Talk categories were judged on comprehension, content, audience engagement and ability to communicate their work and findings clearly.

The winners are:

Three Minute Thesis

Eight Minute Talk

  • 1st – Ariana Tyo, Biomedical Engineering
  • 2nd – Dhavan Sharma, Biomedical Engineering
  • 3rd – Wenkai Jia, Biomedical Engineering

Congratulations to the winners and thank you to all of the presenters for sharing your research with the HRI community. We would also like to give special thanks to our faculty judges: Tatyana Karabencheva-Christova (Chem), Sangyoon Han (BioMed), Samantha Smith (CLS), Jingfeng Jiang (BioMed), Marina Tanasova (Chem), Rupak Rajachar (BioMed), Traci Yu (BioSci), and Shiyue Fang (Chem).

Continue Reading →

Eisele, Chaterjee Appointed to State Mining Council

Published
By
Snehamoy Chatterjee
Snehamoy Chatterjee

Two Michigan Tech faculty members have been appointed to a state panel on mining. On Friday, Governor Gretchen Whitmer announced the members of the new Committee on Michigan’s Mining Future. The formation of the committee was initiated by legislation introduced by State Rep. Sara Cambensy of Marquette.

Among those appointed by Whitmer were Snehamoy Chatterjee (GMES) and Timothy Eisele (ChE). Chatterjee was chosen to represent current or former research faculty members who hold a master’s or doctorate degree in mining or geology at a university in Michigan. Chatterjee said he’s “Overwhelmed and very excited” to serve on the committee.

Eisele, appointed as the designee of Cambensy, teaches minerals processing and metals extraction at Michigan Tech. He said the establishment of the Committee on Michigan’s Mining Future makes perfect sense. “Michigan is a major mining state, ranking in the top 10 states for mining activity, with an annual value of approximately $2.7 billion. Much of this material is used in-state for construction and industrial purposes, and it takes a prominent place in the economy of the state.”

Timothy C. Eisele
Timothy C. Eisele

Michigan Tech, which was created as a mining school, suspended the mining engineering program in 2004. This summer the major returned to the University with a new multidisciplinary mining engineering degree program. Chatterjee said the committee appointments will help the mining engineering program. “This appointment will not only help me professionally but also it will improve the visibility of our reinstated mining engineering program both to the potential employers and prospective students.

Eisele said it is important the University be represented on the state’s new mining panel. “Michigan Tech has a long history of working with the Michigan mining industry, and many of our students are employed by them. This committee will provide advice to the state legislature to ensure that the industry can not only operate in the state, but also find ways to utilize wastes constructively, and work with universities like Michigan Tech to develop and adopt new technologies that will reduce their environmental impact.”

The committee is charged with evaluating government policies that affect the mining and minerals industry, recommend public policy strategies to enhance the growth of the mining and minerals industry, and advise on the development of partnerships between industries, institutions, environmental groups, funding groups, and state and federal resources.

By Mark Wilcox.

Continue Reading →

NSF Funds Collaborative Study on Energy System Transitions

Published
By

Michigan Satellite ViewKathleen Halvorsen (SS) is the principal investigator on a project that has received a $1,012,875 research and development grant from the National Science Foundation.

The project is entitled, “GCR: Collaborative Research: Socio-Technological System Transitions: Michigan Community & Anishinaabe Renewable Energy Systems.” Rebecca Ong, (Chem Eng) Chelsea Schelly, (SS) Joshua Pearce, (MSE/ECE) and Richelle WInkler (SS) are Co-PI’s on this project. This is the first year of a potential five year project totaling $2,723,647.

By Sponsored Programs.

Extract

The objective of this Growing Convergence Research project is to lay the foundations for a convergent, transdisciplinary field of study focused on understanding transitions in socio-technological systems. This project aims to converge social science theories of values and motivation with engineering and economics understandings of technological feasibility to develop a comprehensive understanding of how and why energy systems, in particular, are reconfigured to include renewable energy resources.

This project brings together scholars from resource management, chemical and materials engineering, electrical engineering, sociology, energy policy, philosophy of science, and regional planning to simultaneously explore the social, cultural, and technological dimensions of energy system transitions.

The project will investigate energy system transitions in eight case communities (two Anishinaabe Tribal Nations and six non-tribal Michigan communities) that vary along characteristics key to understanding energy transitions – including rural vs. urban, renewable energy sources, degree of transition, governance, and type of utility provider.

Read more at the National Science Foundation.

Continue Reading →

New High School STEM Internship Program at Michigan Tech

Published
By
Chris Adams working at a bench with Riley Stoppa
Biological sciences graduate student Chris Adams works in the GLRC fisheries lab with STEM intern Riley Stoppa.

A total of 13 high school students from throughout Michigan are participating in a 5-day internship at Michigan Tech July 15-19, 2019. Faculty and their graduate students voluntarily host the students in engaging research activities during the week. The faculty’s department, along with the College of Engineering and College of Sciences and Arts, together provide a $600 scholarship for the student that covers their transportation, lodging and meals.

The interns work with Michigan Tech faculty and graduate students in their research lab or doing field work outside. During the week, students tour the Michigan Tech campus and local area, ‘experience college living’ in a residence hall, and meet students from across Michigan and beyond!

In Dr. Parisa Abadi’s Mechanical Engineering Lab, students will be 3D printing nanomaterials. Dr. Tara Bal in the School of Forest Resources and Environmental Sciences (SFRES) will conduct invasive species monitoring and forest health assessments. Dr. Will Cantrell in Atmospheric Physics will have the intern investigating why some clouds rain, while others do not.

Dr. Daniel Dowden in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE) has his intern investigating which technologies will allow buildings to sustain minimal damage and be easily repairable after large earthquakes. Four faculty–Drs. Deering, Waite, Oommen, and Gierke in Geological and Mining Sciences and Engineering are providing a broad introduction of mapping geological features, conducting geophysical surveys, and working to construct a 3-D model of a geological feature. Dr. Casey Huckins and graduate student–Chris Adams in Biological Sciences–are monitoring Pilgrim River and measuring the results of a fish survey in the lab. Dr. Daisuke Minakata in CEE and Dr. Paul Doskey in SFRES, along with graduate students, are researching innovative drinking water and wastewater treatment technologies.

Dr. Michael Mullins in the Department of Chemical Engineering (ChE) has his intern researching ways to remove PFAs contaminants from water. Dr. Rebecca Ong in ChE has her two interns investigating biofuel production from native grasses. Dr. Chelsea Schelly in the Department of Social Sciences and Dr. Robert Handler in the Sustainable Future Institute are measuring food, energy, and water consumption in residential homes and looking for ways to reduce household resource consumption. Dr. Kuilin Zhang and his graduate student Qinjie Lyu in CEE have their intern studying traffic data collection, traffic signal timing, eco-driving, and using traffic simulation software.

The program is coordinated by the Michigan Tech Center for Science and Environmental Outreach, in partnership with Summer Youth Program who provides logistical support and supervises the students in the residence halls in the evening.

Funding for the program is received from the Michigan Tech College of Engineering, the College of Sciences and Arts, the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, the Department of Mechanical Engineering-Engineering Mechanics, the Department of Chemical Engineering, the School of Forest Resources and Environmental Science, the Department of Biological Sciences, the Great Lakes Research Center, Youth Programs, and an anonymous donor.

The STEM internship program is coordinated by Joan Chadde at Michigan Tech Center for Science and Environmental Outreach.

Continue Reading →

Outstanding Alumni and Friends to be Recognized at Alumni Reunion Dinner August 2019

Published
By

Reunion DinnerEngineering alumni will be among those recognized at the Alumni Reunion Awards Dinner on campus August 2, 2019.

Outstanding Young Alumni

Distinguished in their careers before the age of 35; achieved a position or some distinction noteworthy for one so recently graduated

Outstanding Service

Significant contributions to the success of the Board of Directors and/or the University

Distinguished Alumni

Outstanding contributions in both their careers and to Michigan Tech

Humanitarian Award

Volunteer leadership or service that has improved or enriched the lives of others and the welfare of humanity, and whose accomplishments reflect admirably on or bring honor to their Alma Mater

Continue Reading →

2019 Faculty and Staff Service Recognition

Published
By

On Tuesday, May 14, 2019, faculty and staff members, along with their guests, gathered at the Memorial Union Ballroom for an awards dinner recognizing 25, 30, 35, 40 and 50 years of service to Michigan Tech. Within the College of Engineering, the following employees were recognized:

25 Years

Jeffrey Burl, Electrical and Computer Engineering

Tony Rogers, Chemical Engineering

David Shonnard, Chemical Engineering

30 Years

Mary Crane, Civil & Environmental Engineering

Michael Mullins, Chemical Engineering

35 Years

Jiann-Yang Hwang, Materials Science and Engineering

Michael Pionke, Civil & Environmental Engineering

40 Years

Ashok Ambardar, Electrical and Computer Engineering

Congratulations to all of our honorees and thank you for your service to Michigan Tech.

Jeffrey Burl
Jeffrey Burl
Tony Rogers
Tony Rogers
David Shonnard
David Shonnard
Mary Crane
Mary Crane
Michael Mullins
Michael Mullins
Jiann-Yang Hwang
Jiann-Yang Hwang
Michael Pionke
Michael Pionke
Ashok Ambardar
Ashok Ambardar
Continue Reading →

Congratulations to the Newest Members of the Chemical Engineering Distinguished Academy

Published
By
portrait of James Brozzo '53, Master of Ceremonies
James Brozzo ’53, Master of Ceremonies

Michigan Tech’s Department of Chemical Engineering held its 2019 ChE Academy induction ceremony May 14 Miscowaubik Club in Calumet, Michigan. Three ChE alumni were welcomed into the Academy by Pradeep Agrawal, Professor and Chair of the Department of Chemical Engineering. James Brozzo ’53, was the Master of Ceremonies
—it was also his 88th birthday. All in attendance helped Mr. Brozzo celebrate his birthday at the event.

Members of the Distinguished Academy are those whose careers have been marked by extraordinary accomplishments or exemplary service to the profession. Inductees are nominated by department faculty. Academy members are role models of accomplishment for our undergraduate and graduate students.

portrait of Stephen Anderson
L to R: Michael Cleveland ’82, Stephen Anderson, and Tammi Anderson

Stephen Anderson—Class of ’98

Steve Anderson is Senior Vice President and General Manager for the Light Industries North America business segment within Nalco Water, an Ecolab Company. Ecolab is the global leader in water, hygiene and energy technologies and services that provide and protect clean water, safe food, abundant energy and healthy environments. With 2017 sales of $13.8 billion and 48,000 associates, Ecolab delivers comprehensive programs and on-site services to promote safe food, maintain clean environments, optimize water and energy use and improve operational efficiencies for customers in the food, healthcare, energy, hospitality and industrial markets in more than 170 countries around the world.

Throughout his 19 years with Ecolab, Steve has held various roles in the areas of sales, sales management, business strategy and general management. He started his career in the field as a territory manager following his graduation from Michigan Tech. During this time in the field and throughout his career, he has supported customers in the Institutional, Food & Beverage, Manufacturing, Power and Chemical industries.

With the ever-growing need for water use reduction and water safety programs throughout North America and around the world, Steve is responsible for continuing to build upon the programs most needed by Ecolab’s Light customers to minimize water, maximize the life of customer assets, protect their brand and their people, all at an optimized cost.

Alex Kowalski, with wife Holly and their two children.
L to R: Holly Kowalski, Annika Kowalski, Alex Kowalski, Isaac Kowalski, and Melvin Visser ’59

Alex Kowalski—Class of ’01

Alex Kowalski is CEO and owner of Performance Welding. Performance is an OEM contract manufacturer of metal assemblies based in Little Chute, Wisconsin. He acquired the distressed company in September of 2012 and brought in professional management for the turnaround. After he acquired Performance Welding, the company was profitable the very first year. Since then Alex has grown its revenue organically by 341 percent.

Prior to purchasing Performance, Alex was the President of INFO-PRO Mortgage Services, a privately held mortgage servicing company based in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin. Alex also spent time as the Director of Sales for a privately held real estate investment firm.

Alex, along with his wife Holly, own Kay James Design. Kay James is a graphic design business specializing in surface graphics, packaging design, and product aesthetics for consumer brands. Alex and Holly also own a commercial real estate portfolio that totals 250,000 square feet. The properties are located primarily in Wisconsin.

Alex has a BS in Chemical Engineering and a BS in Business Administration, both from Michigan Tech. Alex and Holly have two children, Annika and Isaac, and reside in Sherwood, Wisconsin.

portrait of Paula Wittbrodt at the podium of the spring 2017 Michigan Tech Commencement
Paula Wittbrodt

Paula Wittbrodt— Class of ’93

Paula Wittbrodt is currently the vice president of international business development and chief of staff to the group president international at Estée Lauder in New York City, and served as keynote speaker and recipient of an honorary PhD at 2017 Tech’s Spring Commencement.

Paula started her career working for Amway Corporation in Ada, Michigan as a process development engineer. She went on to earn an MBA from Columbia Business School in New York with a focus on Strategic Management. In 2005 Paula joined consulting firm A.T. Kearney, supporting Fortune 500 Clients with strategic initiatives in product development and innovation, marketing and strategic planning, organization redesigns, and other operational improvements. Next she joined Avon Products, Inc., initially with the company’s global business transformation team, next as global director, skin care new product engineering and development, and then spent two years in Shanghai, China as executive director of Avon’s new product engineering and development for Asia Pacific. Once back in New York with Avon, she led a global indirect sourcing transformation, building the infrastructure and capabilities to maximize value from the company’s investment, and finally took a role as global lead for sales and operations planning before joining Estée Lauder in 2012.

Over the years Paula has been involved many charitable activities supporting women in business, Junior Achievement, disaster relief activities, breast cancer research, and domestic violence. She is a member of the Michigan Tech Presidential Council of Alumnae.

View the Photo Gallery

Continue Reading →

Michigan Tech—at the Intersection of Engineering and Medicine

Published
By
Undergraduate research in the Biomedical Optics Laboratory at Michgan Tech
Undergraduate research in the Biomedical Optics Laboratory at Michgan Tech

There’s a lot of cutting-edge, health-focused research going on at Michigan Tech, in areas that engage undergraduates in hands-on research. This is because we care deeply about improving the human condition, and we teach this “first-hand.”

If you are interested in medicine, possess a desire to help others, and enjoy creative problem solving, read on. Michigan Tech researchers tackle genetics, cardiovascular disease, and cancer, just to name a few. Still more areas focus on improving health, fitness, clean water, sleep, medical imaging, and more.

In the College of Engineering alone, we have over 30 faculty—in biomedical engineering, chemical engineering, electrical and computer engineering, environmental engineering, materials science and engineering, and mechanical engineering—who engage in health-aligned research, engaging both undergraduates as well as graduate students in research.

Catching Viruses in the Lab
For example, in Chemical Engineering, students in Prof. Caryn Heldt’s lab “catch” viruses by understanding their sticky outer layers. The complex structures making the surface of a virus are small weaves of proteins that impact they way a virus interacts with cells and its environment. A slight change in protein sequence makes this surface slightly water-repelling, or hydrophobic, causing it to stick to other hydrophobic surfaces. Using this knowledge, they are finding new ways to detect and remove viruses before they make people sick, and also reduce cost and development time for new vaccines.

“I’m interested in how water around a virus can be controlled to decrease the cost of making vaccines and other medicines,” says Caryn Heldt. Her team conducts research using parvovirus because it’s small and chemically stable.

Accelerated Healing
In Biomedical Engineering, students in Prof. Rupak Rajachar’s lab are developing a minimally invasive, injectable hydrogel for achilles tendinitis, one of the most common and painful sports injuries. “To cells in the body, a wound must seem as if a bomb has gone off,” he says.  The team’s hydrogel formula allows tendon tissue to recover organization by restoring the initial cues that tendon cells need in order to function. Two commonly prescribed, simple therapies—range of motion exercises and applying cold or heat—boost the effectiveness of the hydrogel. Even a single injection can accelerate healing.

Prof. Rajachar and his team culture tendon cells with a bit of their injectable hydrogel in a petri dish, then watch under a microscope to see just how tendon cells respond over time. “In the presence of the hydrogel, cells of interest (called tenocytes) maintain their tendon cell behavior,” he says.

Human-Centered Monitoring
In Mechanical Engineering, students in Prof. Ye Sun’s Human Centered Monitoring Lab are turning embroidered logos into wearable electronics. Health monitoring devices like FitBit, apps on cell phones, and heart monitors are seemingly everywhere, but what if embroidery on clothing could replace these devices altogether? By using conductive thread and passive electronics‚ tiny semiconductors, resistors and capacitors‚ Prof. Sun and her team do it with stitching—lightweight, flexible, and beautiful embroidery. They’re also building a manufacturing network and cloud-based website for ordering.

Ye Sarah Suns hands are show holding a prototype of a flexible electronic circuit, where the stitches themselves become the circuit.
“I hope flexible, wearable electronics will interest a new generation of engineers by appealing to their artistic sides,” says Dr. Ye Sarah Sun. She is holding a prototype of a flexible electronic circuit, where the stitches themselves become the circuit.

Fighting Cancer with Fruit Flies
And in Biological Sciences, students in Prof. Thomas Werner’s lab perform transgenics, where they insert pieces of foreign DNA into fruit fly embryos, to determine the role genes play in the pigmentation of fruit flies. Biologists use fruit flies to study wing spots, metabolism, and aging. This is important because the same genes and major metabolic pathways in fruit flies affect cancer and other diseases in humans.

five fruit flies with striped bodies are shown. The genes that govern abdominal colors and patterns in fruit flies may provide insight into human cancer genes.
“There are a few hundred toolkit genes that all animals share and they build us as embryos and continue to help us as we develop,” says Prof. Werner. “But the differences in their regulation—when and where and how much they function—brings about the diversity of life.”

Engineers Go to Medical School
In case you are a student who is considering medical school, engineering majors stack up very well in acceptances to medical school, especially when considering research experiences and the associated research publications that our students co-author. In our Department of Biomedical Engineering alone, in 2017-18, BME majors had an 86% acceptance rate to med school.

I Followed My Heart
As a personal anecdote, my first university degree was a Bachelor of Science in Chemical Engineering. My curiosity about materials (especially metals) led me to a PhD in Materials Science. This multidisciplinary background led me to start a company with a cardiologist who needed my expertise. He had a vision for an improved angioplasty device to treat restenosis, which is when heart stents become narrow or blocked. Our company was based on my invention, related to applying tiny doses of radiation to a blockage to help in-stent restenosis. In all my career, this two years of work on this angioplasty device—it captured my imagination, my attention, and my heart (no pun intended). This intersection of engineering and medicine—it’s a life-changing experience to get personally engaged.

Now, if you’re interested in health care or working in a research lab, and you want to know more, please let me know—Callahan@mtu.edu

Janet Callahan, Dean
College of Engineering
Michigan Tech

Continue Reading →