Post on 01-Apr-2016
description
IngenuitySTUDENTS P.4Creating for Good in Ghana
AWARDS P.25Faculty join Engineering and Science Hall of Fame, National Academy of Inventors
ALUMNI P.8Married alumni face future as one
FACULTY P.24Bringing big innovation to nanotech
SHRINKINg FRACKINg’S FooTpRINTJason Trembly and Russ College researchers focus on solving the challenges facing fracking and its future
the russ college of engineering and technology • 2013–2014
INTELLIgENCE FLoATS
Senior civil engineering student Sarah
Koska jumps for joy as “The Yellow
Submarine,” the Russ College’s student
concrete canoe team, floats back up to
the top of Cleveland’s Hinckley Lake at the
first round of the Ohio Valley Regional
American Society of Civil Engineers’ 2013
Concrete Canoe Competition.
For more great student news, see pages 6–7.
02 | DEAN’S LETTER
04 | STUDENT PROFILE
06 | STUDENT ACHIEVEMENTS
08 | RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT
10 | RESEARCH AWARDS
12 | ALUMNI PROFILE
14 | ALUMNI ACHIEVEMENTS
16 | OUR CULTURE
20 | FEATURE STORY
24 | FACULTY PROFILE
25 | FACULTY NEWS
26 | CLASS NOTES
28 | CO-OP PROFILE
29 | CREATE FOR THE FUTURE
Editorial CrEdits
ExECutivE Editor Colleen Carow, BSJ ’93, MA ’97, MBA ’05
assoCiatE Editor Adrienne Cornwall
WritErs Colleen Carow Adrienne Cornwall Kaitor Kposowa, MA ’14 Arian Smedley
PhotograPhErs Jill Bateman, MA ’13 Rebecca Miller, MA ’14
dEsign Ologie, Columbus, Ohio
12
04
ALUMNI pRoFILE
What happens when two Engineering
Ambassadors find true love? For Russ College
alumni Daniel and Sadie Evans, it’s a journey
that started in Stocker Center and created
their future together.
STUDENT pRoFILE
Claire Hall, BSChE ’14, digs in with her fellow
Russ College teammates on their recent service
trip to Ghana, helping bring better education
to a rural village and building relationships
with its people.
Share your comments, feedback, and
memorable Russ College moments by
writing us at INgENUITY@oHIo.EDU or
INgENUITY MAgAzINE, RUSS CoLLEgE, SToCKER CENTER 177, 1 oHIo UNIvERSITY, ATHENS, oH 45701.
From TheDean’s DeskWelcome to our tenth issue of Ingenuity magazine!
We thought it only fitting to re-engineer the magazine in celebration of this anniversary
and our new creative identity, which we call “Create for Good.” You may have encountered
it on our website, in our halls on campus, in Ohio Today magazine, or at one of our alumni
events. We think it captures our values about “improving the human condition” (the words
of our namesake, Fritz Russ, BSEE ’42, Hon ’75). Or, in other words, it means educating
young engineers and technologists to work toward good in both societally beneficial and
sustainable ways.
You may shudder at the notion of an engineering and technology college developing a
creative identity. That’s for corporations, right? But we always knew there was something
unique about this place. And because academic institutions are facing greater competition,
and also because we’re proud of who we are, we thought it was time to figure out how to
talk about who we are.
I hope this issue is a fresh surprise for you. With a new look and feel, more in-depth stories,
more news about students and faculty, and beautiful photography, we listened to you. Thank
you for responding to our survey with clear and candid feedback, so we can better articulate
Russ College’s strengths. You’re welcome to share more thoughts at ingenuity@ohio.edu.
I hope this issue also makes you stop and think. As thought leaders, we want to evoke and
inspire. In last year’s letter, I said that our role in the shale oil and gas area would be one
of research, support, technology development, and educational offerings. We come to you
now with an in-depth look at what we offer. I couldn’t be more proud, and whether you’re
an alumnus, a student, a former or current faculty member, or a Russ College friend, I hope
you are, too.
Sincerely,
DENNIS IRWIN, pHD, pE
Dean moss Professor of engineering education Thomas Professor of engineering Fritz J. and Dolores h. russ College of engineering and Technology
02 03
Ingenuity | Spring 2014
Russ College learning community students played puppetmaster for Athens’ 2013 Halloween Block Party. As part of the collaborative “Honey for the Heart” art project led by local artists Patty Mitchell and Robert Lockhead—also a mechanical engineer—20 pre-engineering students brought their budding technical know-how to the production, helping build oversized, wearable puppets for a parade. Students got a professional development boost and experienced a creative application for engineering while also growing their teamwork and communication skills.
Photograph by David Hooker, BSJ '92
“Being connected to a place like this village is different from classroom experiences,” Giesey said. “When you’re not connected, you may care, but it is centered on you. Connections make our students care because they see how their work affects real people living around them.”
The rural village’s goal? Attract and retain the best teachers it can, a project that started seven years ago to offer better education to the village children, who followed the “obruni,” or “white visitors,” through the village streets every day.
The Ghanaian capital proved to be overwhelming, from the language barrier to the streets lined with stalls hawking a random assortment of wares.
“There were crabs being sold on the side of the road, children’s toys, water bottles, all these things you wouldn’t expect,” Sova said.
one item they needed for the building project was geotech fabric for the septic system design they were planning. After striking out on this important filtration component, they began formulating a plan B on the 14-hour trip to maase, arriving just before midnight Friday.
They were greeted by a small group of locals and a table set for dinner—including whole fish, which took the group by surprise.
“most of us hadn’t eaten a fish like that,” said Sova.
04 05
Sunday morning, which was mother’s Day at home in the U.S. and also in maase, took the group to the village church for a birthday celebration and afterward, to a meal with the village elders of traditional peanut stew and rice.
When students realized they wouldn’t be using Western utensils, the elders demonstrated a more simple design by shaping the rice ball into a spoon with their hands.
“The messier you get, the better the food is,” declared Sova.
As the project continued, each day saw a massive amount of labor—like the two men who dug the massive hole for the tank in a day and a half—and each night saw the students adjusting their designs and plans for the following day.
“We had mass amounts of paper in front of us at the table, and we had all our ideas mapped out in front of us,” hall said of the late nights, which also included chocolate and games of Uno. “That was the point where I was like, ‘Wow, this is what people do as engineers.’”
The student engineers managed to complete the design and installation of the teacher housing’s septic tank, including an anaerobic digestion pit, a few days shy of their two weeks on site. With the help of village elders, they recruited labor for the digging, masons for the tank construction, and burlap coffee sacks to stand in for the geotech fabric they were missing.
Their accomplishments are the most recent of several projects completed with the help of russ College students since 2004, when Giesey initiated the idea in coordination with the village chief, Nana K. owusu-Kwarteng, who at the time was director of the Institute of the African Child and a PhD student in education administration at ohIo.
over the six trips Giesey has made—plus two more led by other russ College faculty—service teams have built a solar-powered water pumping system, analyzed the electric power distribution system in the village, and worked on the beginning stages of the teacher housing. russ Vision Funds, which support students as they pursue activities beyond the classroom that will develop their meta-engineering and meta-technology skills, made this year’s trip possible by helping cover the costs of the students’ travel and supplies.
Since the group’s departure, residents have put up the roof superstructure, which the next team of Bobcats Building a Better World will help complete with a rainwater collection system in may.
hall hopes to return for this project because, as she discovered, the experience is about more than engineering: to celebrate their final night in maase, their hosts at the hotel prepared a dinner, bringing together all of the people who contributed to this work toward the future life of the village.
“All of a sudden, at the end of two weeks, I was surrounded by all these people that I was now close with,” said hall. “I’m a sophomore from Tiffin, and here I am in Ghana, helping this community.”
For a closer look at more photos from the trip,
visit www.po.st/ghana.
» Colleen Carow contributed to this story.
When four russ College engineering students departed for maase in rural Ghana at the start of summer break, they admittedly had no idea what to expect.
“It was really intimidating, but it was still a sense of adventure,” said Nicole Sova, a chemical engineering major from olean, N.Y., about her arrival in Ghana’s capital, Accra.
The group spent nearly two weeks building a septic system for teacher housing in the West African countryside, and the experience held much more in store for them than they realized: a sense of community with the residents and elders who helped bring their plans and engineering skills to life.
Sova and the rest of the group—including senior civil engineering major evan Boso of Athens, ohio, senior industrial and systems engineering major michael Felgenhauer of Westlake, ohio, junior chemical engineering major Claire hall of Tiffin, ohio, and Associate Dean of Academics Jeff Giesey—are members of Bobcats Building a Better World, a russ College student organization that helps disadvantaged communities improve their quality of life through environmentally and economically sustainable engineering projects. Along the way, students become internationally responsible engineers and technologists.
Ingenuity | 2014
on Saturday, they first glimpsed the construction site to find another surprise waiting: a tree had rooted itself in the center of the house. They quickly got to work removing the tree, testing the soil and surveying the slope of the site with a quick lesson from Boso—the only civil engineering student—on how to use a theodolite, which is used to measure angles.
At the end of the night, they gathered to troubleshoot their designs and put in a call for help to civil engineering student Joe Cook, the group’s president, who was back in the States having dinner with his girlfriend, for a final check on their redesign.
WhenCulturesConnect
The story of students who traveled across the world to help a community and forge new friendships
By Adrienne Cornwall / Photography by Evan Boso, BSCE ’14
“ CoNNECTIoNS MAKE oUR STUDENTS CARE bECAUSE THEY SEE HoW THEIR WoRK AFFECTS REAL pEopLE LIvINg ARoUND THEM.”
— Jeff GIesey, assoCIate Dean for aCaDemICs
STUDENTpRoFILE
Pictured from left to right: Village resident Luanga Ofori, Evan Boso, BSCE ’14, tribal elder Kwaku Ofori, and Mike Felgenhauer, BSIT ’14, take a break from digging the anaerobic digestion pit.
Village children play in front of a house on one of Maase’s two paved streets.
Within a day or so of arriving in Maase, the BBBW team reached the consensus to abandon the original design. Luckily, they had arrived with a plan B—the anaerobic digestion pit—and were able to reach the organization’s president, senior civil engineering major Joe Cook, via phone to consult on the modified design.
CIvIl enGIneers make ChIlD’s play of CrIb upCyClInG
Want to see a child light up? One sure bet is to
offer a new toy—or four, like civil engineering
students at the Russ College did this spring
for tots at OHIO’s Child Development Center.
Using 16 of the center’s old cribs that no
longer met safety standards, a team from our
student chapter of the American Society of
Civil Engineers, led by Department Chair Deb
McAvoy, repurposed the parts to create two
sensory tunnels and two combination painting
and chalkboard easels. In December 2013, the
students offered a new design—a child-size
desk with chalkboard sides—to CDC parents for
purchase as a fundraiser for the center.
Taylor engineers Top sCholarship win
Senior Benjamin Taylor earned a well-deserved award for scholarly excellence and leadership in industrial engineering as the recipient of the Institute of Industrial Engineers (IIE) President’s Scholarship in April 2013. Aside from being the president of OHIO’s student chapter of IIE, Taylor serves as a peer mentor for Learning Communities, as a student grader for two different courses, and as an active member of Students for Liberty, Alpha Lambda Delta, and Tau Beta Pi. The industrial and systems engineering major is also an Engineering Ambassador and senior representative to the department’s Board of Advisors.
Teams disTill hard work inTo awards
Green technology is the wave of the future, and the Russ College had two student teams ride it to win at the annual WERC Environmental Design Competition in Las Cruces, N.M., in April. Tasked with creating fully operational, bench-scale designs for solar distillation and nitrate-removing water treatment systems, the chemical engineering students took on the additional lab time on top of senior design projects. They were honored with two $500 judge’s choice awards for their solar distillation and nitrate removal designs and a $1,000 special recognition prize for the bench-scale distillation design. More than the monetary rewards, the students took away a sense of pride in completing the challenge. “Even though we didn’t win first place, I was still proud of our accomplishment,” said team member Liz Cohenour.
weaver aims high for nasa fellowship
Senior Matt Weaver is helping to shed new light on water treatment options with his research on a new nanomaterial, based on boron nitride, replacing the existing mercury-based UV lamps that are now standard for treating water. NASA took interest in the technology because of its usefulness in space, where mercury is particularly hazardous from the lack of atmospheric ionization, and this year awarded Weaver a second Space Technology Research Fellowship. Weaver hopes his studies this year under Associate Professor of Electrical Engineering Wojciech Jadwisienczak will produce a prototype for a low-cost UV lamp design so that astronauts, who must recycle water in space, as well as terrestrial humans, have a safer method of producing potable water.
Get the inside scoop on what students are up to by visiting the new Russ College news center at ohio.edu/engineering/news
06 07
m.a.C.s. team ploWs to vICtory onCe more
It was a three-peat in 2013 for electrical engineering students, who took their champion autonomous
snowplow back to Minneapolis, Minn., for a third consecutive win in only three contests—against
seven other universities—at the Institute of Navigation’s (ION) Autonomous Snowplow Competition.
The team turned “M.A.C.S.” loose on rival Miami University of Ohio at the OHIO v. Miami football
game last fall, plowing through the Miami logo and pumping up the crowd. Then, they returned
to perform some good at the 2014 competition. Instead of creaming the competition again, former
team members acted as ION safety officers and official competition liaisons. See the Miami game
action at ohio.edu/engineering/news/multimedia.cfm/.
Ingenuity | 2014
erGonomICs team folDs a better pIzza box
Pizza-box folding got an ergonomic
makeover by engineering, technology, and
science students in a national student design
competition, where the Russ College team
beat out 34 other teams with its solution to
make the task safer and more efficient. Team
H-Factor included students from industrial
and systems engineering, food and nutrition,
and civil engineering working together to
solve the complex problem that incorporated
engineering, human process analysis, and
physiology factors. Their design, which uses
a jig to hold the box while it is folded by a
worker, won each of them first-place cash prizes
and $5,000 in travel funds to meet with the host
company, Alabama-based Auburn Engineers.
laWless reWarDeD for servICe anD stuDy
Juggling the demands of an engineering
degree program with a military commitment
is no easy feat, and doing it extremely well
deserves special recognition. The Award of
Merit from the Society of American Military
Engineers offers just that, and this year it
recognized civil engineering student and
Ohio University ROTC service member Joseph
Lawless as one of only 20 in his service
branch in the country to demonstrate such
exemplary performance. Lawless takes service
and engineering seriously, as he plans to
take his skills to the Army Corps of Engineers
before pursuing structural engineering in the
private sector.
BoBCaTs flying on The safe side
Ohio University’s Flying Bobcats student pilots flew straight to the top of the safety rankings for the fourth consecutive year in the regional Safety and Flight Evaluation Conference competition, hosted by the National Intercollegiate Flying Association at Western Michigan University in October. With safety-focused events, including navigation, landing, and equipment proficiency, the event showcases the Russ College flight team’s priority to create for good in the cockpit by putting safety first.
designing To make a differenCe
Mechanical engineering senior design teams have amassed more than $70,000 in competition prizes, including this year’s big win: the $20,000 top prize in the national Ability One Network Design Challenge focused on assistive design for people with disabilities. Winning team EZSqueeze designed a compressed-air machine that relieved much of the physical exertion of transferring thick polishing fluid from large to smaller bottles, enabling more employees with disabilities to do the work and reducing waste by more than 60 percent. Two other teams capped off the year’s winnings with $1,000 gold and $750 silver prizes from the national J.F. Lincoln Foundation college-level design competition in December.
STUDENTACHIEvEMENTS
enGIneers float WInnInG DesIGn
It’s sink or swim at the American Society of Civil
Engineers Concrete Canoe Competition. After
several years of cracking under water pressure
at the regional competition, the 2013 Russ
College vessel proved seaworthy as the team
submerged it and watched it float back to the
surface of Medina, Ohio’s Hinckley Lake. Their
modifications to the concrete recipe and canoe
design brought “The Yellow Submarine” back
to the surface in one piece at the Ohio Valley
Regional Conference contest, hosted by the
University of Akron. Watch their design story
on our multimedia page at www.ohio.edu/
engineering/news/multimedia.cfm/.
digging deep for innovaTion
An exciting new application of coal has been enabled by an ohio University-patented technology: the “Coal to Graphene,” or C2G, process, invented by russ Professor of Chemical engineering Gerardine Botte, director of the Center for electrochemical engineering research. In the energy-efficient and clean process, coal can be selectively manipulated to synthesize a clean, advanced, and high-value material. emerging as a promising nanomaterial due to its unique combination of superb properties, the resulting graphene has applications in multiple ohio markets, such as energy storage, aerospace, electronics, military, lubricants, and elastomers, and others. According to Botte, graphene is currently being produced from graphite in an expensive process—and there are no known sources for graphite in the U.S., with about 70 to 80 percent coming from China. Botte, supported by a $250,000 grant from the ohio Department of Development, plans to show that all types of ohio coal can be used for graphene synthesis, opening a new industry for ohio coal.
safeTy firsT
The next generation of safety engineers are getting a boost from a National Institute for occupational Safety and health (NIoSh) training grant. The money funds a two-year master’s program in industrial and systems engineering with a focused curriculum on occupational safety. Led by Associate Professors Diana Schwerha and Gary Weckman, working in the Center for Advanced Systems and Transportation Logistics engineering, students not only complete coursework but also intern with ohIo’s Department of Safety during their first year, participate in plant tours, attend local and national conferences, and then complete an industry internship. Last summer, students interned at the ohio Bureau of Workers Compensation and at the Fairfield medical Center. The program’s first cohort graduates in may.
08 09
Ingenuity | 2014
RESEARCHSpoTLIgHT
a fresh look at DIrty WorkThe Center for Advanced Materials Processing’s Timothy J. Cyders, assistant professor of
mechanical engineering, is getting down to the nitty-gritty. Thanks to the donation of a $70,000
pump test rig by Seepex, Inc., Cyders is running destructive wear tests to compare machine
lifetimes between two kinds of progressive cavity pumps moving an extremely abrasive fluid.
Operating with a unique screw design, the pump is especially useful for moving viscous fluids and
slurries, like those encountered in the oil and gas industry. Cyders hopes to use the rig to test and
validate a new pump design he’s creating that will improve the efficiency and overall performance
of traditional pumping systems.
keepInG an ear to the GrounDTime to hit the road! When the $160 million Nelsonville bypass opened in October 2013, the hilltop
highway project had decades of investment in research and planning by Russ College faculty, staff, and
students. Led by Russ Professor Shad Sargand, also associate director of the Ohio Research Institute for
Transportation and the Environment, a group of faculty, staff, and 12 undergraduate students supported
the Ohio Department of Transportation by designing the 8.5-mile stretch to include underground
sensors that detect ground movement 100 feet below as a result of abandoned mines. Other sensors can
detect movement in slopes and embankments, ground water levels, or slope changes. About 80 percent
of the construction engineers working on the project were OHIO civil engineering alumni, who with
faculty, staff, and students have saved ODOT more than $22 million in past projects.
$1.729 million from the research partnership to secure energy for america
to develop, demonstrate, and
commercialize an innovative flowback/
produced-water management process.
Institute for Sustainable Energy and the Environment
“Cost-Effective Treatment of Flowback and Produced Waters via an Integrated Precipitative Supercritical (IPSC) Process”
almost
in research and sponsored programs
$708,134 from the ohio Dept. of transportation(ODOT) to determine the effectiveness of
ODOT’s current methodology for estimating
service life of culverts and storm sewer
conduits; determine alternative metrics, as
necessary, to ensure accurate and reliable
service life predictions for newer materials;
develop service life estimates using
degradation models developed through
research on various materials and protective
coatings currently used by ODOT; and
recommend changes to the second volume
of the Location and Design Manual.
Ohio Research Institute for Transportation and the Environment
“Assessment of ODOT’s Conduit Service Life Prediction Methodology”
$400,000 from a consortium of leading oil and gas companies worldwideto confidently ensure that any given transport
pipeline (either already existing or in the
design phase) won’t suffer from top-of-
the-line corrosion by developing a two-fold
approach centered on field experience.
Institute for Corrosion and Multiphase Technology
“Top of the Line Corrosion Mitigation JIP”
$89,912 from advanced micron Devices, Inc. to design, evaluate, and test node,
network interface, and router architecture
of the exascale system at Advanced Micron
Devices in Austin, Texas.
Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
“Network and Router Architecture for Exascale Computing Systems”
$1.47 million from petronasto identify and quantify the key issues affecting
the corrosion of materials specifically relating
to the integrity of structures for the high
pCO2 (partial pressure of carbon dioxide)
environments.
Institute for Corrosion and Multiphase Technology
“Corrosion Prediction and Prevention for Pipeline Materials in High pCO2 Environments”
$697,975 from ohio state university
to conduct research to aid the development
of technology for geospatial location and
navigation in underground environments
using “signals of opportunity.”
Avionics Engineering Center
“CONRAD: Collaboration Research and Development Effort on Precision GPS/EO Nav/ Navigation Fusion”
$374,990 from nasa’s langley research Centerto design, develop, verify, and validate a
performance-based cockpit information
management system with the aim of
improving hazard and state awareness while
simultaneously monitoring the accuracy,
integrity availability, and continuity of source
information used by pilots.
Avionics Engineering Center
“A Performance-Based Flight Deck Information Management System for Improved Hazard Awareness and Source Data Integrity”
$79,547 from the national science foundation to develop novel resettable stiffness
systems that are capable of achieving a
similar control performance to the RSASD,
but with fewer feedback components.
Civil Engineering
“Novel Resettable Stiffness Systems for Response Mitigation of Civil Infrastructure”
$1.283 million from the national science foundationto assess the potential for holistic waste stream
management featuring algal cultivation and
processing to manage liquid and solid waste
from a house or residential community, and
recycle the carbon stream into energy of
sufficient quality to power the dwelling in a
sustainable manner.
Institute for Sustainable Energy and the Environment
“SEP: Sustainable Housing through Holistic Waste Stream Management and Algal Cultivation”
$640,510 from a consortium of leading oil and gas companies worldwide
to contribute to the technology base
consisting of data, theories, and computer
software in the field of naphthenic acid
corrosion, to provide an opportunity for
industry to cosponsor research in this field and
to contribute to the solution and prevention
of corrosion arising from naphthenic acid.
Institute for Corrosion and Multiphase Technology
“Naphthenic Acid Corrosion JIP”
$327,547 from the national science foundation
to establish a collaborative relationship
with Hohai University in Nanjing,
China, to conduct research on reservoir
sedimentation and soil erosion, functions
of tainter gates for river navigation and
hydraulic structures, and regional curve
development and bankfull channel analysis.
Ohio Research Institute for Transportation and the Environment
“International Supplemental Request for the Books in Classroom”
$70,375 from the u.s. army Corp of engineersto simulate the performance of the
integrated anaerobic membrane
bioreactors, clinoptilolite ion exchange,
and GreenBox ammonia electrolysis
technologies; provide design variables and
optimization of the system for the scale
up of the GreenBox into the system; and
validate the simulation of the integrated
wastewater treatment system.
Center for Electrochemical Engineering Research
“Simulation and Analysis of Novel Anaerobic Wastewater Treatment System for Energy Generation at Contingency Operating Locations”
$330,000 from engility Corporation to supply flight tests services to the Federal
Aviation Administration for engineering
evaluation and testing of ADS-B/Wide Area
Multilateration Service Volumes in Colorado
and other areas, enabling enhanced FAA ATC
aircraft tracking in key mountainous areas that
present challenges for radar.
Avionics Engineering Center
“ADS-B Flight Test Support and Data Collection”
$630,000 from General electric Corporation
to continue the improvement in
cost-estimation accuracy and expanding
the functionality of COMPEAT$, software
developed by Russ College researchers to
enable GE engineers to estimate the costs
of manufacturing a new product, while it’s
being designed.
Center for Advanced Systems and Transportation Logistics Engineering
“COMPEAT$ Cost Model Development for 2013”
$99,940 from syngenta
to develop a state-of-the-art
modeling platform as a predictive tool
in a risk assessment system for pesticide
applications.
Center for Air Quality
“Modeling Atmospheric Pesticide Aerosolization and Volatilization to Predict Environmental and Human Exposure”
$33,000 from Copper Development associationto perform blind tests on copper tubes
of various sizes from six different
manufacturers, and to evaluate and
compare the mechanical behavior and
burst pressures in light of recent work to
optimize design criteria.
Center for Advanced Materials Processing
“An Assessment of Mechanical Behavior of Copper Tube for Performance-Based Design Criterion”
10 11
Ingenuity | 2014
RESEARCHAWARDS
+ one award from each additional research unit or department
top ten
Ingenuity | 2014
12 13
111000101010001010010101 01010101000111000101010001010010101010101010001110001010100010100101010101010100011100010101000101001010101010101000111000101010001010010101010101010001110001010100010100101010101010100011100010101000101001010101010101000010001110001010100010100101010101010100011100010101000101001010101010101000111000101010001010010101010101010000100011010000100011000101010001010010101010101010001110001010100010100101001001000101010001001000101010001001000101010001001000101010001001000101010001001000101010001010010101010101010001110001010100010100101010101010101010101010101010101010101010101010101010101010101010101010101010101010101010101000010001110001010100010100101010101010100011100010101000101001010010001010100010010011
ALUMNIpRoFILE
Since their first memorable meeting at the russ College in 2007, Sadie and Daniel had been long been helping each other—and others—as student leaders in the college, members of Campus Crusade, and fellow students.
By the time Daniel proposed, both of them had also found ways to improve society with their engineering degrees—his in computer science, hers in industrial and systems engineering.
They met during one of their many experiences helping others, when Sadie served as a judge for the Stocker Scholarship, awarded to a deserving incoming freshman.
As a candidate, Daniel was fielding questions under the spotlights with fellow competitors at the front of robe Auditorium from a panel of engineering Ambassadors and faculty.
he remembers how the judges loomed in the back of the room, a clump of dark figures who’d collectively decide his fate. What he didn’t know was that he’d end up marrying one of them.
“They were all very nervous,” Sadie, a senior industrial and systems engineering (ISe) major at the time, recalls with a chuckle of empathy. “each of the judges was asking difficult questions.”
So, Sadie threw them a curveball. “What’s your favorite food?” she tossed out.Sadie’s opening line had stuck with Daniel, and
they’d reconnect at the end of fall quarter when the freshman Stocker Scholars were paired with mentors who were senior engineering Ambassadors, which Sadie led as president.
The rest is russ College history. But rather than the college’s unique collaborative community connecting students and faculty and the impact of their work on the outside world, Sadie and Daniel’s chance meetings as students also led them to connect with their future spouse:
Between mentoring meetings, hang-outs between classes, and Campus Crusade events, their friendship flourished.
“We realized we had much more in common than engineering,” Sadie says.
he eventually joined the Ambassadors as well, continuing his undergraduate studies as Sadie started the ISe master’s program the next fall.
They glance and grin at each other as they recall their first date, a low-key night of Connect Four and coffee at Donkey Coffee uptown that they kept a secret from their group of friends at the end of fall quarter. But they returned from winter break as an official couple.
Soon after, Daniel—who graduated in three years, thanks to several Advanced Placement credits and strategic scheduling—was a master’s student himself. Both also took on research assistantships.
“Sometimes I’d be up late working, and she’d bring me doughnuts,” he remembers, shooting a grateful smile at Sadie.
Their support of each other during the very busy years of graduate school wasn’t surprising given their shared interest in helping improve society with their technical skills.
For her thesis, Sadie developed a model to help the university predict which students would leave their undergraduate studies—and when—based solely on their demographic information. Working with the office of Institutional research and her adviser, Associate Professor David Koonce, she determined a number of predictive factors to help ohIo target resources toward those most at-risk for leaving. other graduate students since have built on this work and her startup data to refine the model’s accuracy and effectiveness.
Now a management engineer at Children’s hospital in Akron, ohio, she analyzes data and processes to improve decision-making at the facility so patients and medical staff have a better experience.
Daniel looks admiringly at Sadie as he jokes, “Sadie saves patient’s lives every day,” but in a sense, both are improving outcomes for people in critical facets of their everyday lives.
After wrapping up his own thesis project—a program in which algorithms are applied to genetic data to identify where in the genome a difference would translate to a mental disability or disease—Daniel became a developer of educational software for teachers and schools, at Software Answers outside of Akron. A few months later, he bought the condo where he’d eventually pop the question.
They fondly remember that it all started on West Green. Today, Sadie loves the fact that she can improve the patients’ experience in the emergency room by analyzing intake and staffing data. The hospital can schedule the optimal number of staff for consistently busy—and consistently slow—periods, which can give a patient more time with their caregivers in an emergency.
on the other side—working from the back end—Daniel’s software helps educators and schools be more efficient and focus on learning, giving the students more time with their teachers in the classroom.
Shop talk at the dinner table is helped by a dose of understanding and respect for the details that are each other’s expertise. With nearly a decade of memories together supporting each other, creating for good, and maneuvering through dinner prep each night in their kitchen, their shared experience helps them answer how these two russ College grads relate to each other under one roof.
“We can kind of each understand what the other is doing,” Sadie says, looking across the kitchen at Daniel. “Well, sometimes.”
To learn more about how Engineering
Ambassadors become engineering leaders,
please turn the page.
“ WE REALIzED WE HAD MUCH MoRE IN CoMMoN THAN ENgINEERINg.”
— saDIe evans, bsIse ’06, ms ’08
Few things say romance quite like installing hardwood floors. But in 2012, for the fifth anniversary of their first date, sadie evans, BSIS ’06, MS ’08, found herself doing just that. But daniel evans, BSCS ’09, MS ’11, managed to top it the following weekend—with a well-planned marriage proposal.
JoIneD for GooDBy Adrienne Cornwall
ChanGInG the ImaGe of the Internet
Today’s social media image nexus is Imgur, the image-hosting site that Alan Schaaf, BSCS
’10, created as a “gift to Reddit” during his junior year at Ohio University in 2009. User-driven
discussion board heavyweight Reddit has taken hold of 6 percent of all Internet users since
its founding in 2005, but image-sharing was a big weakness. Imgur has filled the void and
then some, surpassing Reddit’s site traffic with 4.5 billion monthly page views by 130 million
unique visitors. And Schaaf isn’t stopping there: His 12-person show run out of San Francisco—
employing five OHIO grads, including fellow alum sister Sarah, BSC ’08—is developing the next
level of curated image-viewing for on-demand entertainment.
puTTing your inTernal radio on The road
Blast your Internet radio tunes on the road thanks to Livio Radio founder and CEO Jake Sigal, BSISE ’03, MSISE ’05, who sold the company to Ford Motor Co. in June for nearly $10 million. Since founding Livio Radio in his parents’ basement in Ferndale, Mich., Sigal has been wowing Silicon Valley with technology that marries his love of music and his technical know-how.
revving The engine of innovaTion and enTrepreneurship
Start-up counseling and funding revved up three fledgling businesses founded by Russ College students and alumni at the Innovation Engine Accelerator program this summer at Ohio University’s Innovation Center. AccessAble Travel, Razor Dynamics, and Atlas Language Innovations each received mentoring in entrepreneurship, business plan development coaching, and up to $20,000 in start-up funding over 12 weeks before pitching their products to potential investors at the Innovation Engine Showcase. From a website to help ease burdens for disabled travelers to language-learning virtual games to augmented-reality friend-finding apps, this year’s crop of inventive engineering student companies not only represent half of the six businesses selected for this elite regional program, but also how Russ College students create for good—and how they don’t waste any time getting started.
Building for The fuTure on a solid repuTaTion
Raymon Fogg, Sr., BSCE ’53, knows something about building solid things. Since 1959, he’s been innovating design-build construction services in the Cleveland area, and making sure our construction engineering students are prepared when they graduate, through his service on the Civil Engineering and Construction Engineering Management advisory boards for the Russ College. Ohio University will honor Fogg’s longstanding service as a humanitarian and to the University, both at the college level and as an emeritus trustee of the Ohio University Foundation Board, with an Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters at commencement in May. Tales of Fogg’s reconstruction efforts in Guatemala, Honduras, and Somalia and as a volunteer pilot for medical patients are legendary, as is the legacy of service he’s built in his 60 years as an engineer.
opening a new ChapTer wiTh verse
Although he spent his Russ College career juggling an athletics schedule as an OHIO tailback with his engineering courses, Jesse Owens II, BSIT ’89, returned to campus this year after publishing his first book of poetry. Chronicles of a Different State of Mind explores shapes, experiences, and themes—such as seasons—from Owens’s perspective, and he drew dozens of supporters to his book signing at the Little Professor Bookstore on Court Street in October.
14 15
makInG the teChnICal personal
Ingenuity | 2014… Continued from Alumni Profile
Sadie and Daniel evans displayed budding leadership skills early on in their russ College careers, so they were natural contenders for becoming engineering Ambassadors.
Another former ambassador, Bryon Iacianci, BSISe ’10, credits the program and the russ College with his happiness as an engineer and his success at Parker hannifin Corporation, where he received an endorsement from Board of Visitors member Jack myslenski, BSIT ’73.
“The ambassador program allowed us to take a step back from our usual development of technical abilities and made it possible for us to fine-tune our ‘soft skills’ during all of our interactions,” Iacianci said. “As an engineer in a manufacturing setting, the relationships and communication with our folks on the floor can make or break the ability of the team to achieve their goals.”
Whether perfecting first impressions with influential alumni at college events or fielding questions about the russ College’s rigorous academics during prospective student tours, engineering Ambassadors quickly learn how to be nimble in interpersonal situations and get exposure to communicating with a range of personalities.
“As ambassadors, the students interact with a wide variety of people,” said Dale masel, associate professor of industrial and systems engineering and the group’s adviser. “They get a lot of experience talking about themselves and what they’ve done at the russ College, so they’re prepared, even when they’re meeting people outside of their ambassador role.”
When Sadie evans served as president of the group her senior year, it was her first opportunity to develop her own leadership style. For current Ambassador Talli Topp, a mechanical engineering senior, leadership also includes thinking on her feet.
“one of the skills I’ve found most useful is being able to handle the unexpected,” Topp said. “You never know what questions someone is going to ask on a tour, and as an engineer, you’ll have unexpected things happen all of the time. Being an Ambassador has given me tools to handle those situations.”
Leadership, confidence, and communication are so important to success as future engineers and technologists that alumnus Karol A. ondick, BSee ’55, and his wife, JoAnn, decided to endow the program’s operating expenses with a charitable gift of more than $200,000 in 2012.
“I’ve had firsthand experience of the value of the engineering Ambassador program through the years,” said Dayton native ondick, now an emeritus board member of both the russ College Board of Visitors and ohio University Foundation Board. “The program goes beyond the classroom. It gives them greater exposure and an outlook on things in a different way, such as what it’s like to be a member of the team and how they can contribute to the college. This helps them later in life.”
ALUMNIACHIEvEMENTS
The Karol A. and JoAnn Ondick
Engineering Ambassadors represent
the college to prospective students,
alumni, and the OHIO community,
developing networking and
communication skills, and building
confidence in nontechnical
environments.
Rachel Fryan, BSCS ’15, BSVC ’15
Photograph by Peter Earl McCollough, BSVC ’08
By Adrienne Cornwall
16
Ingenuity | 2014
vIne vIsIonary soars to starDomSocial media is a fickle thing, but in his first year at OHIO, freshman Logan paul’s popularity has
vaulted—much like he did over Tau Beta Pi’s The Bent statue in front of Stocker Center—to more
than 3 million followers on Vine, a new app featuring six-second videos in a Twitter-like news feed.
He celebrated his million-follower milestone in September by releasing Vine videos featuring more than
40 participants and Rufus, OHIO’s beloved mascot. Then in December, as a guest on the Today Show,
he shot Vines with anchor and OHIO alum Matt Lauer, BSC ’97, and actor Terry Crews (a.k.a. “the
Old Spice guy”) in his signature hilarious style before Pepsi chose him to work the company's “Pepsi
Halftime Supervine” event at Superbowl XLVIII.
oURCULTURE
students school senator in innovation Russ College computer science student Taffie Coler got a surprise visitor this January at her
start-up company’s Innovation Center work
space—a real, live, U.S. senator. Rob portman
was in town to hear about entrepreneurship
and visit the Institute for Corrosion and
Multiphase Technology, but got a bonus lesson
in LiveInteractive’s social media marketing app,
which aims to get people out of their seats and
into the streets. “LiveIn,” which lets you post,
share, and view local events, will be available
as a beta launch this spring.
new engineering degrees come onlineVirtual-learning opportunities at the Russ College and OHIO’s
leadership in online higher education for engineers expanded
in 2013 with the launch of two new online master’s degree
programs in engineering. With specialization tracks offered
online in both the M.S. in Electrical Engineering and M.S. in Civil
Engineering, these new offerings join the successful online Master
of Engineering Management degree program launched in 2011,
providing advanced curricula to help experienced engineers
develop deeper technical expertise. Learn more about our online
programs at ohio.edu/engineering/academics/online.cfm/.
be an ambassador for goodKnow a high school student you’d like to steer our way? Share
our newly developed online viewbook component. Designed as
a companion to the print book we send to recruit prospective
undergraduates, it highlights eight current Russ College students.
Share this link to help us get the word out about the Russ College,
what life is really like at OHIO, and how this group of students
plans to create for good. Or take a look yourself for a little
inspiration: ohio.edu/engineering/joinus/.
17
russ prize goes to laser surgery pioneersWhen Fritz J. and Dolores H. Russ invested
in their belief in the ability of engineering
to improve the human condition by
establishing the Russ Prize in 1999, more
than 25 million people had undergone
one of the life-changing vision correction
surgeries known as LASIK and PRK. The three
visionaries who developed the laser ablative
photodecomposition behind these surgeries,
Dr. Rangaswamy Srinivasan, Dr. James J. Wynne, and the late Dr. Samuel E. blum,
were awarded the 2013 Russ Prize for their
contributions to this technology, which
has improved vision, increased personal
productivity and provided greater economic
opportunity worldwide. Both Srinivasan and
Wynne visited OHIO to deliver public lectures
and meet with Russ College students.
18 19
Ingenuity | 2014our CulTure
hunDreDs Get theIr taG onHow do you create for good? We asked hundreds of students, faculty, staff, alumni, and
prospective students how they want to make a lasting mark on the world with their work in
engineering and technology. They wrote it down on vintage-style tags, and we displayed their
inspiring words for the world to see. What began as a Russ College event in the Academic &
Research Center in January 2013 grew to include recruitment events, our annual Homecoming
Tailgate, and advisory board gatherings throughout the year—and it now plays a key role in our
undergraduate viewbook, received by thousands of prospective students. Through fun portraits,
an art installation, social media, and our everyday interactions, the Russ College community has
come together to “tag” themselves and their contributions to improving the human condition.
russ award endowment lifts hopesContinuing our college’s legacy of investment in future generations of engineers, Professor emeritus of Civil engineering ed russ and his wife, edith, endowed an award in fall 2013 for an undergraduate civil engineering student. The russ ross Award Fund in Civil engineering—named in honor of the couple’s parents—will first honor an undergraduate in fall 2015. Just as their parents helped them, the russes hope the award will help students who may face a financial burden to continue their studies.
airline partnership cleared for takeoffThe Department of Aviation is doing much more than providing pilot certification to help our students’ aviation careers take off. This fall, the russ College signed a bridge agreement with PSA Airlines, a regional subsidiary of US Airways, to create a recruiting pipeline that helps student pilots get more flight time in commercial aircraft and interview spots for their pilot training program. PSA Vice President of Safety randy Fusi said the partnership with ohIo was an easy decision: “ohIo aviation graduates have had great success in our training program, better than any other university grads.” We couldn’t agree more.
20 21
Almost two years ago, more than 20 russ College faculty leaders gathered at a retreat to learn about hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling, and to decide how the russ College would respond to the shale oil and gas phenomenon in ohio—in teaching, applied research, and service to the state. The following statement drew the college’s particular line in the sand:
“The russ College recognizes the significance that ohio shale plays as a means to transition to a sustainable energy future, and is committed to studying, understanding, and providing solutions regarding the
effects of hydraulic fracturing on ohio’s environment, its infrastructure, its economy, and the health and safety of its people. The russ College’s expertise is uniquely suited to these tasks.”
But a position statement is empty without action. Since that retreat, the russ College has embarked on comprehensive studies of this technology. We are innovating improvements, mitigating environmental effects, and understanding the inevitable ripples into the health and financial life of the region.
Can fracking fulfill its promise?
Ingenuity | 2014
How Russ College teams are creating new technologies to make the process clean, safe, and cost effective
FEATURESToRY
By Colleen Carow
Russ College students and researchers at the Institute of Sustainable Energy and the Environment analyze "flowback" water generated from an oil well located in the Bakken shale formation.
22 23
“If we can do it economically, it only makes sense to reuse water, instead of pulling fresh water from the watershed and hauling it throughout shale regions,” Trembly says.
The design begins with ultraviolet (UV) and water-softening technologies that remediate bacteria in the water and remove hard-water ions and naturally occurring radioactive materials (Norm). Assistant Professor of environmental Studies Natalie Kruse Daniels, BSCe ’04, Professor of Civil engineering Ben Stuart, and their colleagues in the ohio Coal research Center and the Institute for Corrosion and multiphase Technology are running experiments with known processes—like those used in municipal water treatment—that can selectively remove the Norm and dissolved solids from water, to see how those methods work with flowback, which has high ionic strength.
In the next step, the water is pumped into a reactor, which is powered by gas from the well, and transformed into a supercritical state. At very high pressures and temperatures, the water takes on properties of both a liquid and a gas. Salt and hydrocarbon byproducts then precipitate out as solids or gasify into hydrogen and carbon dioxide, leaving only clean water that can be reused in place of fresh groundwater for future operations. The salt can be used for a variety of applications including road de-icing, and the hydrogen can be used to heat the reactor.
“This would be a huge increase in process sustainability,” says Kruse, an Athens-born environmentalist who has worked on stream reclamation since age 10. “If you can safely dispose of Norm and produce clean salts, then they could be reused in another industry.”
hess Corporation, a leader in the development of unconventional shale resources, is providing
resources from supplier to customer—for the oil and gas industry in eastern ohio.
“When I look this industry, I see valves, pumps, nuts, and bolts,” miller says, pointing to a photo of a rig on his computer screen. “These are all things ohioans make. There’s a huge supply chain behind a drill rig and all of its parts.”
The inventory, capabilities assessment, and mapping system developed by the school are helping manufacturers, suppliers, and other businesses source ohio goods and services, shorten their supply chains, and reduce the risk of supply disruptions.
“our intention is to identify new policies and practices that will leverage this finite opportunity into something that builds Appalachia ohio’s social and economic infrastructure into a sustainable and resilient regional economy,” says miller. “Very few states and regions have done this right.”
Clean Livinghydraulic fracturing has created another area of
concern, particularly for the public: the potential impact on groundwater resources.
Through funding from the Voinovich School, the Sugarbush Foundation, and the russ College’s Institute for Sustainable energy and the environment, Kruse and a team of researchers have taken water samples from about 40 wells, springs, and mine discharges in the region, mainly in Athens and Belmont Counties. Sampling water from private landowners and municipal supplies, the team developed a baseline study of the area’s drinking water before any drilling or injection well activity started.
well operation and engineering insight to support process design and costing activities. Aquionics, an industry leader in UV wastewater treatment, is providing a pilot-scale reactor to determine dosing requirements to remediate bacteria in flowback water, and will develop a commercial-scale UV-reactor design based upon this data. meanwhile, the ohio Gas Association is promoting communication with oil and gas producers who are interested as end-users.
The data from the team’s research, which will be conducted over the course of about two years, will be used to provide more accurate cost estimates and develop a commercial-scale unit.
million in externally funded research in sustainable energy technologies.
“It is ideal for a small startup,” Bayless says. “The company developing this as a commercial venture could independently deploy the units, removing risk of water management from the well owner. This has the potential to employ a lot of people in good-paying jobs.”
Future TenseAccording to the ohio Department of Natural
resources, the number of issued well permits in the state increased from 24 in September 2011 to more than 1,000 in September 2013.
No other energy resource has made such a dramatic production increase at a revolutionary speed, according to the handbook of Alternative Fuel Technologies, authored by russ-ohio research Scholar in Syngas Utilization Sunggyu K.B. Lee.
Shale gas is considered one of the viable solutions toward energy independence, said Lee, considered a foremost expert in shale oil technology as a patent-holder in shale oil extraction technology and author of three other books, an encyclopedia chapter, and 10 refereed publications on the topic.
more wells mean more rigs, more trucks and more workers. ohIo’s Consortium for energy, economics and environment (Ce3) is stepping in to help understand the effects.
As director of Ce3, a partnership among the russ College, College of Arts and Sciences, and Voinovich School for Leadership and Public Affairs, Scott miller coordinates the work of about 40 researchers across the university.
“Part of the full conversation of shale involves capturing the social, economic, and environmental dimensions, in addition to the technology,” miller says. “The economic and environmental implications of the shale boom in this region are massive.”
For example, each wellhead represents an investment of $6-10 million for a development company. The Voinovich School is currently investigating the supply chain – the flow of
Water Wise To horizontally fracture just one shale gas well
requires four to six million gallons of water—that is, water, proppants (usually sand or man-made ceramic materials), and a cocktail of additives.
Some of this mixture will return to the surface as “flowback,” along with a host of contaminants. And it has to go somewhere. It’s trucked miles away to a location with the geology to support storing it underground in an injection well.
Transporting water to and from wells is one of the biggest costs in the industry, says Assistant Professor of mechanical engineering Jason Trembly, BSChe
’03, mS ’05, PhD ’07. So what if the flowback could be treated and reused? Trembly, also associate director of the ohio Coal research Center, is the architect of a novel process that could prove to be a significant game-changer in the quest to extract oil and gas resources from the nation’s shale formations with fewer environmental concerns.
Supported by the russ College and ohio University office of Technology Transfer, Trembly and his team were awarded nearly $2 million in federal and state grants from the research Partnership to Secure energy for America (rPSeA) and the ohio Third Frontier, for the project “Cost-effective Treatment of Flowback and Produced Water via an Integrated Precipitative Supercritical (IPSC) Process.” Their goal: to construct and operate a fully integrated prototype capable of treating a barrel per day of flowback water.
The process would address the single largest issue facing the industry—the vast amounts of water that are required to fracture the shale deep underneath the earth. once used, the vast majority of flowback is injected into a disposal well, while some very limited re-use does occur.
Trembly estimates that treating wastewater on site instead of paying to haul it to an injection well would reduce fresh water needs at fracturing operations by about 30 percent, on top of the transportation cost savings and reduced potential damage to rural roads not designed for such heavy loads.
feaTure sTory Ingenuity | 2014
If we can do it economically, it only makes sense to reuse water, instead of pulling fresh water from the watershed.—Jason Trembly, Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering
The economic and environmental implications of the shale boom in this region are massive.—Scott Miller, Director of CE3
russ College Dean Dennis Irwin says the project is an example of how the college has staked out ground as a major resource for studying the effects of horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing.
“This is a great example of socially responsible engineering with long-term impact for our region and far beyond,” says Irwin.
Corrosion Controlresearchers at the Institute for Corrosion and
multiphase Technology are addressing the challenge of building Trembly’s prototype, which requires carefully chosen materials because flowback is a high-salinity brine that can corrode the steel components used to construct the treatment system at the wellhead.
They’ve performed research for leading oil and gas companies around the globe for more than two decades, simulating and modeling corrosion phenomena encountered during hydrocarbon production and processing—from downhole to the refinery. Now, they can transfer their knowledge to the hydraulic fracturing industry, which faces aggressive environmental hazards including Co2, a main driver of corrosion.
“Tubular steels have to withstand high pressures and elevated temperatures, while being exposed to corrodents in injected and produced fluids,” says David Young, assistant director of the institute, who is studying a range of alloys for Trembly’s reactor.
“We can advise what types of engineering materials and inhibition strategies can be used to mitigate these corrosion processes.”
Road WorthyBeyond the wellhead, heavy trucking to and
from remote injection well sites taxes local roads not designed to carry their weight.
“our roads grew up from deer paths to wagon paths,” says Bill Lozier, Licking County engineer and associate director of the russ College’s robe Leadership Institute.
Civil engineers in the ohio research Institute for Transportation and the environment have worked for 30 years to test, understand, and model the effects of traffic loads and environmental effects on pavement performance. Their mobile labs offer unique capabilities to monitor road conditions.
“our challenge is to not harm the industry while still protecting the public investment in our road system. Academia and science need to take over, to evaluate the existing road structure—to determine what is needed in terms of less expensive maintenance, or for rehabilitation,” Lozier explains.
A successful commercial-scale design of Trembly’s system could spawn a completely new industry for transporting the reactor on flatbed trucks, vastly reducing the loads traveling these back roads, says Loehr Professor of mechanical engineering David Bayless, principal investigator on more than $18
The samples, tested at three separate labs, showed almost no hits for organic chemicals.
“It’s fun to find stuff, but then you sit back and realize, ‘oh wait, this is a good thing,’” Kruse says with a laugh. “our groundwater resources are pretty good.”
Future groundwater testing that reveals the presence of pervasive organic constituents after the start of any hydraulic fracturing activity, noted Kruse, could be a red flag.
Clearing the AirGroundwater isn’t the only environmental
concern. According to Professor of Chemical engineering Kevin Crist, director of the russ College’s Center of Air Quality, the only air quality monitoring facility in the region, greenhouse gas emissions in central ohio are down about 27 percent in the last two years.
New mercury emission rules and the abundance of natural gas—methane—resulting from hydraulic fracturing have led to closings of older, less efficient coal-fired power plants. American electric Power reported in october 2013 that in ohio alone, it would retire about 7,000 megawatts of coal-fired, electric generation capacity by early 2016. This leaves energy companies to consider other fuel sources like natural gas, which thanks to hydraulic fracturing is cheap and abundant, and creates about half the greenhouse gas emissions of coal.
“This is good news, especially for ohio,” notes Crist. “ohio is a major emitter of carbon dioxide and other pollutants associated with electric power production.”
Frack ForwardAs one of the country’s rapidly developing
domestic energy resources, the shale oil and gas industry and its long-range benefits and downsides remain unknown. In response, the russ College’s ongoing work includes yet additional studies on eliminating the use of water almost entirely, developing new types of proppants that keep problematic contaminants within the shale seam, finding technologies that enable economically viable Co2 sequestration for enhanced oil recovery, and developing new cost-effective gas separation technologies.
» adrienne Cornwall and arian smedley contributed to this story.
Our ultimate aim is to address the needs of the public and industry alike, to help create a more sustainable energy future.—Dennis Irwin, Russ College Dean
Pictured left to right: Graduate students Caleb Hawkins; Taylor Macy, BS ‘14; and Assistant Professor of Environmental Studies Natalie Kruse Daniels, BSCE ‘04.
Pictured left to right: Mechanical engineering master's student Mark Hritz, BS ‘12, and Sak Dassard, MS ‘07, PHD ‘13.
24 25
savas kaya, professor of electrical engineering, may work in the realm of the tiny, but his visions are larger than life.
By Colleen Carow
In an effort to bridge the gap between
nanotechnology and undergraduate education,
Savas Kaya is building an immersive,
interdisciplinary, educational platform called
the nanOstUdio. Supported by almost $200,000
from the National Science Foundation and
matching funds from OHIO’s Nanoscale
Quantum Phenomena Institute and the 1804
Fund, the studio will feature interactive
learning exhibits about some of the smallest
building blocks in our techno-world—
nanomaterials and nano-scale devices.
Kaya was researching ways to better
integrate science with education, but found
that the majority of nanotech-related
undergraduate projects consisted of new
certificate programs or new courses, and he
wasn’t satisfied.
“I didn’t find that creative enough,” Kaya
says. “One of the reasons why students may
be escaping studying courses and degree
programs related to nanotechnology may be
because it’s too restrictive or too focused and
away from day-to-day lives.”
Housed in a corner of the Academic &
Research Center’s large project hangar, the
studio will feature a media island so users can
virtually explore molecular and nanostructures
via computer visualization, play with interactive
computer interfaces and games, and watch in-
depth videos about nanotech developments.
lee fInDs fame In enGIneerInG anD sCIenCe
Don’t let his modesty fool you: Sunggyu “K.b.” Lee is hall-of-fame caliber in many
respects. Globally acclaimed for his research
on advanced materials and alternative
fuels, as well as his development of clean
coal technology, Lee is also well-known for
his dedication to undergraduate teaching
and for establishing a family dynamic
among researchers in his lab. The Engineers
Club of Dayton made it formal when they
inducted Lee, Russ-Ohio Eminent Scholar in
Syngas Utilization and professor of chemical
and biomolecular engineering, into the
Engineering and Science Hall of Fame in
November 2013.
burDICk brInGs the fIGht to CanCer
Having lost three family members to cancer,
Monica burdick has made fighting the disease
her life’s work. The assistant professor of
chemical and biomolecular engineering and
her interdisciplinary research teams study how
cancer stem cells work in hopes of figuring out
a way to fight them. This new insight is at the
forefront of modern cancer research, particularly
in late-stage disease treatments, and two of her
grant-funded projects will help identify cancer
stem cells and a novel in situ diagnostic process.
Their significant initial findings from the first
year—supported by the work of several graduate
and undergraduate student researchers—were
published in 2012 in Frontiers in Oncology. The
team will continue its work to move these new
diagnostic and treatment technologies from the
lab to a clinical setting.
rIefler makes mark WIth pollutIon-to-paInt
Environmental engineering is turning pollution
into art in the lab of Associate Professor of
Civil Engineering guy Riefler. In collaboration
with Associate Professor of Painting and
Drawing John Sabraw, Riefler and a team
of graduate and undergraduate researchers
are collecting acidic runoff from abandoned
coal mines throughout southeast Ohio and
developing a process to turn the sludge’s iron
precipitates into pigment for professional-
quality paints. Sabraw has developed an entire
series of artwork, dubbed Chroma, inspired
by the environment and incorporating these
paints, which the duo hope to eventually
develop on a commercial scale.
bAYLESS bALANCES ENERgY AND ENvIRoNMENT
A sought-after expert in clean coal technology, Loehr Professor of mechanical engineering David Bayless was named a fellow of the National Academy of Inventors for his development of engineering technologies that seek to address the nation’s energy and environmental problems. he is best known for his work in combining algal biomass and coal in combustion for electricity-generating applications, an approach that could cut Co2 emissions in half.
WALSH pRAISED FoR STUDENT-FACULTY bRIDgE-bUILDINg
While Assistant Professor of Civil engineering Ken Walsh has been protecting buildings and bridges from earthquakes most of his career, this year he was recognized for building a great rapport with students as well. The University Professor Award, which Walsh was honored with in April 2013, recognizes outstanding teaching at the university—and is the only honor decided entirely by the University student body.
boTTE FLIpS SWITCHES WITH pEE-To-poWER
The GreenBox, developed by russ Professor and “pee-to-power” pioneer Gerardine Botte, converts ammonia from wastewater into energy and clean water through her patented electrochemical process. The industry has taken notice: The venture capitalist showcase Startup Silicon Valley awarded e3Clean Technologies, the company she founded to commercialize the GreenBox, its “most Likely to Succeed” honor this summer. Also named a fellow of the National Academy of Inventors, Botte heads the Center for electrochemical engineering research, which recently moved into an expanded lab facility on mill Street in Athens to make room for the next phase of technological breakthroughs.
DreamInG bIG at atomIC sCale
Ingenuity | 2014
Visitors can get hands-on at a demonstration
station, testing nanomaterials as compared to
conventional ones to understand the different
properties of both. The station also offers the
inside scoop on advanced microscopes.
Kaya ultimately aims to show guests how
we interact with these nanostructures and
molecular materials every day and spark
interest in learning more about them. Russ
College students, as well as the larger university
and surrounding communities, including area
schools, will be welcome.
To develop the studio, Kaya drew inspiration
from his two children, ages eight and six. At
visits to Columbus's Center of Science and
Innovation, he has watched them interact with
scientific concepts in a fun and engaging way.
“Why can’t we do that in the same spirit?’”
Kaya asks. “A studio is a comfortable and
accessible environment.”
The studio is already equipped with a
tabletop electron microscope, an atomic-force
microscope, a scanning tunneling microscope,
the interactive media and science station,
two large flat-screen monitors, and two
work stations.
The state-of-the-art equipment is capable
of showing things on the atomic level, but
it’s simple to use. That was strategic, Kaya
explains, because he wants the space to
be inviting for those new to the nanotech
world. The tools are small, compact, and
to some extent portable, in order to share
the experience with visitors outside the
engineering and technology community.
Because the National Science Foundation
also wants to better understand what drives
undergraduates to the industry, Kaya will work
with professors and graduate students from
OHIO’s Gladys W. and David H. Patton College
of Education to observe and collect statistics
on how undergraduates interact with the
technology and what motivates them.
“We may have hit a gold mine,” Kaya says.
“This is a perfect example of how science and
education can meet without getting in the way
of one another.”
In addition to creating the space for others to
experience the world on an atomic scale, Kaya
will hire about a dozen students each year to
work as researchers during the summer and as
studio demonstrators during the year.
One of these students, junior computer
engineering major Gregory Pugar, says his
nanOstUdio work sparked his interest in
nanoscale biomedical engineering. As he
considers whether to study it in graduate
school, he’s looking forward to sharing his
enthusiasm with the community, especially
high school students.
“The hope is to spark interest in kids who
might not have ever heard of this,” Pugar says.
FACULTYpRoFILE
FACULTYNEWS
» arian smedley contributed to this story.
26 27
mIChael beDnarIk BSCHE ’84
is the Asia-Pacific technical advisor for Exxon
Mobil in Shanghai, China.
John brenner BSCHE ’75
retired from Dow Chemical almost 10 years ago
and has moved back to “the land of milk and
honey,” in part to cheer on today’s Bobcats.
raymonD brushart BSISE ’90
is program manager for the Ohio Department
of Transportation’s Ohio Local Technical
Assistance Program Center.
Charles Canty BSEE ’61
retired from AT&T in 1989. He recently moved
from New Jersey to North Carolina.
russ College alumni carry their passions forward and change the world for the better.
Ingenuity | 2014
thIerry lanGloIs D’estaIntot MSEE ‘84
recently retired from the European
Commission as Directorate-General for
Research and Innovation.
kyle felts BSME ’03
is associate manager of production for Tesla
Motors, where he and a team are producing a
zero tailpipe-emissions car.
buCk fetters BSIT ’66
retired several years ago from Monsanto
Company as director, and continues to consult
for various companies and organizations. He
and his wife, Sue, whom he met at OHIO, are
approaching their 50th anniversary. They have
two grown children.
GreG harvey BSME ’08
is an account manager for the Timken
Company. He will be relocating from Chicago
to Detroit after completing his MBA at
Northwestern University in June 2014.
“I design, engineer, market, research, and develop for the field of aviation.”
—ConnIe tobIas, aas ’77, bGs ’78
“I help advance technology in space exploration and natural gas development.”
—Jonathan WIlkof, bsIt ’05
“I help develop and engineer faster and more efficient tooling for corrugated packaging, reducing the amount of paper pulp, and ultimately, trees that are used.”
—WIllIam farber, bsIt ’85
sCott abramson BSA ’07
marketing manager for Rapid Displays
in Chicago, proposed to his girlfriend,
Brittany Wasserman, at the Russ
College Homecoming tailgate party in
October 2013. She said yes.
bryan DavIs BSCE ’13
is a project manager at McDaniels
Construction Company in Columbus,
Ohio (pictured here with Nichole
Lowe, BSCHE ’14).
John hattersley BSEE ’73
is president of InData Systems, a
specialty bar code systems supplier
that has patented scanning systems for
“invisible” covert bar code applications.
Jose rIvera BSIT ’73
is founder and director of a Honduran
food service business that provides
technical service in Honduras and
abroad. He served in the U.S. Air Force
after graduation.
ConnIe tobIas AAS ‘77, BGS ‘78
a captain with U.S. Airways, has
completed more than 21,000 flight
hours in 68 different aircraft. She
was selected to escort the WASP float
at the 2014 Rose Bowl Parade, and
accompanied 17 of the remaining
WASPs, ranging in age from 89 to 94.
frank poChIro BSIT ‘97
a senior process planner at BMW, has
held two international assignments
in Germany, worked in Mexico, and
owned his own business. He and his
wife, Kara Leavitt Pochiro, BSED ’99,
have two sons, Angelo, 9, and Rocco,
6. They live in South Carolina.
JustIn hollIs BSETM ’13
is a manufacturing engineer at KTH Parts
Industries, a tier-one Honda supplier that makes
structural components for most Honda and
Acura models produced in the U.S. He recently
acquired his Six Sigma Green Belt certification
from the Institute of Industrial Engineers.
r. Jason hoopes BSETM ’10
is a product engineer for HFI, LLC.
ChaD InGle BSCE ’99
manages roadway projects as project engineer
for the City of Kettering, Ohio.
Joe JaChInoWskI BSEE ’79
is CEO of Mevion Medical Systems, Inc. The
company received FDA approval for an
advanced radiation therapy system used to
treat cancer, and recently treated its first
patient in St. Louis.
mattheW Johnson BSCE ’94, MSCE ’96
is principal for Simpson Gumpertz & Heger, and
was recently named new design practice leader.
mohammeD karIm MS ’94
is president of his own company.
rICharD kehl BSME ’58
is retired.
ChrIs koenInG BSIT ’80
is a senior design engineer for Eaton.
aDam lytton BSCE ’10
is a project engineer for District 11 of the Ohio
Department of Transportation.
alIsha mIlbry BSIT ’04, MS ’11
was the Central Ohio National Society of Black
Engineers Professionals Chapter Member
of the Year for 2012–2013. She is a plant
engineering supervisor for UPS.
eDWIn murray BSME ’53
is retired.
James nICkum BSEE ’78
is retired and returning to the workforce as an
aviation consultant. Jonathan WIlkof BSIT ’05
is a manufacturing engineer and an owner of
Stark Industrial LLC, a contract manufacturer
of precision metal parts and assemblies located
in North Canton, Ohio. He and his wife have a
daughter and are expecting their second child
in June.
JIm WyllIe BSCS ’05, MSCS ’08
is a performance engineering manager at
Akamai Technologies. In 2013, he bought a
condo, completed a century ride, and lost
30 pounds.
franCIs raber BSEE ’62
is retired.
shaDI ramahI BSEE ’94
is Midwest regional sales manager for Metso.
He created the LocationOffers.com app,
which allows businesses to target local users,
and earned an MBA in 2012 from Oakland
City University.
robb roby BSME ’94
was recognized in 2013 for his outstanding
intellectual property legal work in Managing
Intellectual Property magazine’s “IP Stars”
Guide. A partner at Knobbe, Martens, Olson &
Bear, an intellectual property law firm, he has
been counseling clients with respect to patent,
trademark, and copyright law issues since 1997.
KoussAy “Gus” shAAr BSEE ’00
is plant manager at Siemens Renewable
Energy, Wind Power Nacelle Manufacturing
Plant, where he manages manufacturing
projects and business ventures. He completed
a master’s in mechanical engineering with a
focus in manufacturing systems management
from Southern Methodist University.
get in touch. let us know what’s new with
you by visiting www.ohio.edu/engineering/
alumni/update.cfm
CLASSNoTES
riChArd “diCK” diCKerson BSCE ’80
is CEO of Utility Technologies International
Corp. He has run 65 marathons and climbed
multiple peaks, including Mt. McKinley, Mt.
Kilimanjaro, and Mt. Everest.
keIth elsass BSEE ’02
is owner of Convomonics.
WIllIam farber BSIT ’85
is vice president of the southeast region of
Container Graphics Corporation. His oldest son,
Nathan, is a sophomore at Ohio University.
a front roW seat for DIsaster relIef
Last summer, engineering Technology and management senior molly slattery was one of the two first-ever U.S. Army Defense Coordinating elements (DCe) interns, along with a student from the University of Nevada.
As part of her role at the Region IV office
in Atlanta, she observed a ten-member DCE
team collaborate with organizations like the
Federal Emergency Management Agency
(FEMA) and the Red Cross in the discipline
of emergency management.
“I learned that it takes an entire town
to manage disaster relief,” says Slattery,
also a cadet in OHIO’s Army ROTC program.
“There is so much coordination that goes
into disaster prevention and recovery. It’s
amazing how many people work together
to get things like that accomplished.”
Slattery became Incident Command
System (ICS) certified and interviewed
everyone in the FEMA region IV office as a
means of learning more about emergency
management. “I met high-ranking military
leaders and civilians who make the decisions
about how to use civilian and military assets
to recover from natural disasters, as well as
overseas devastation,” she notes.
Slattery will commission as a second
lieutenant when she graduates. She then
hopes to use her skills to improve disaster
prevention and relief by developing safer and
lighter military equipment, and developing
protocols to cut reaction time, and reduce
life-threatening injuries and casualties.
For information about how to connect
your company or organization with the
Russ College internship and cooperative
education program, contact Director of
Professional Experiences Dean Pidcock at
740.593.0894 or pidcockd@ohio.edu.
28 29
HoW WILL YoU SUppoRT oUR RUSS CoLLEgE FACULTY SUpERHERoES? We invite you to drop us a line at ingenuity@ohio.edu and let us know. You can also recognize them with a charitable gift that honors the ability to leap tall buildings in a single bound, brandish the Lasso of Truth, or otherwise make a lasting impact on generations of russ College students. For more info., contact Senior Director of Development Scott Gluck at glucks@ohio.edu or 740.593.2533 or visit ohio.edu/engineering/giving/.
Who Was your superhero?
For many chemical engineering majors from the late ‘60s to ‘90s, it was
Nick Dinos, now professor emeritus. So much so that more than 80 of them
came together to create the Nicholas Dinos Professorship in his honor. Russ
College Board of Visitors members Jim Edwards, BSCH ’70, and Debbie Burke,
BSCHE ’85, and alum John Baginski, BSCHE ’70, established the professorship
with help from another board member, Hank Waters, BSCH ’83.
Edwards says he had some interesting professors, but that none of
them impacted his life like Dinos—whom students chose for the University
Professor Award not once but three times: in 1975, 1992, and 1997.
”Nick made chemical engineering come to life. Who else could combine
Shakespeare with Henry’s Law and come out with something that made
sense? He was a professor, but somehow he was one of us,” he says.
Associate professor of Chemical Engineering Darin Ridgway,
who first joined the Russ College on a visiting professorship appointment,
has been named the first Nicholas Dinos Professor for his work inspiring
generations of chemical engineers. Professorships enable OHIO to recognize,
and often to attract and retain, faculty who seem to have superpowers.
Ridgway, the perennial selection by seniors for the department teaching
award—as in, 12 times—believes we’re shaped by everyone we deal with,
and that we take little things, good and bad, from all those experiences.
“I’m just a guy trying to do a good job every day,” he says.
Ingenuity | Spring 2014
Co-oppRoFILE
CREATE FoRTHE FUTURE
By Kaitor Kposowa By Colleen Carow
vISIT:oHIo.EDU/ENgINEERINg
russ College of engineeringand Technology
Stocker Center1 Ohio UniversityAthens OH 45701.2979
Non-Profit Org. U.S. Postage
PAID Athens, OH Permit #100
PRSRT. STD. U.S. Postage
PAID Athens, OH Permit #100
First Class U.S. Postage
PAID Athens, OH Permit #100
Use unless otherwise told