The University of Nevada, Reno honored its best on Wednesday, May 13, 2009 during the annual Honor the Best ceremony. More than 70 University faculty, staff and students were honored.
Narasimharao (Rao) Kondamudi, PhD Student in our department, got the Outstanding Graduate Student Researcher award from the University. Congratulations Rao!
Several teams from the University of Nevada, Reno had high placings on April 24 during the 2009 Donald W. Reynolds Governor’s Cup competition, held in Reno.
Graduate winners
Second place ($10,000 prize): Northern Nevada Nanotubes. Team members: Alison Pyne (Finance); Justin Culver (Chemical Engineering); Umer Javed (Chemical Engineering); Tim Stutz (Chemical Engineering); Stuart Greenfield (Economics). Faculty adviser: Gary Valiere, Management.
Undergraduate winners
Second place ($10,000 prize): Carbon Gold. Team members: Palkin Zed (Materials Science and Engineering/Marketing); York Smith (Chemical Engineering). Faculty adviser: Mano Misra, Materials Science and Engineering.
Lt. Governor’s Award winners
Presented to best energy-related business plan:
Undergraduate winner: ($5,000 prize): Carbon Gold. Team members: Palkin Zed (Materials Science and Engineering/Marketing); York Smith (Chemical Engineering). Faculty adviser: Mano Misra, Materials Science and Engineering.
NCED Commissioners’ Award
Presented to best business plan for economic development needs of rural Nevada:
$2,500 prize: Clean Bean. Team members: Jason Strull (Material Sciences); Rao kondamudi (Material Sciences). Faculty adviser: Mano Misra, Materials Science and Engineering. … read more »
Charles Coronella and Victor Vasquez, associ
ate professors in the chemical engineering department of the University of Nevada, Reno, are testing the viability of economically and efficiently converting any leafy or woody biomass into a commercially feasible fuel product. They are working on the pre-treatment portion of the biomass conversion process as part of a $4.6 million study by the Gas Technology Institute.
GTI research and development manager Larry Felix will be on campus Friday to give a free public seminar that includes an introduction to the thermochemical conversion of biomass into syngas, including the pre-treatment process the University researchers are studying. The seminar, titled “R&D Interests in Biomass Gasification” is in the Scrugham Engineering and Mines building, room 261, at 3 p.m. GTI is a not-for-profit research and development organization working to develop and bring to market energy solutions for more than 65 years.
“The development of technologies for cleaning syngas at high temperatures is an important current focus for research and development,” Felix said.
Coronella said they have experimented with wood and agricultural residue such as corn stalks and leaves, rice straw and switchgrass to make a product that is molecularly uniform and dense to optimize the gasification process of converting the biomass to fuel; to find a simple, efficient and cost-effective method.
“Biomass produces a dirty gas if it’s not pretreated,” he said. “The molecular composition of biomass is not ideal for gasification.” Their hydrothermal and dry heating processes produce a carbon-neutral black crumbly char, similar to coal but none of the problems of bad chemical compounds. The product is shaped and sized to behave more like coal, for use in existing processing equipment. … read more »