Fall 2008 Seminar Series | Monday November 24th, 2008
Multilayered Materials: From Kit-Kat Bars to Nanolayered Materials
Host/Contact: N. Chawla
School of Materials
Fulton School of Engineering
Arizona State University
Time and Place: Harshbarger Bld., Room 205 2PM-2:50PM
Speaker: Nik Chawla is Professor of Materials Engineering in the School of Materials at Arizona State University. He is Director of ASU's interdisciplinary Mechanical Behavior of Materials Facility. Prof. Chawla received his Ph.D. from the University of Michigan in 1997. Prior to joining Arizona State University in 2000 he was a postdoctoral fellow jointly at Ford Motor Company and the University of Michigan, and a senior development engineer at Hoeganaes Corporation. His research interests encompass the mechanical behavior and modeling of advanced materials at bulk and small length scales, and has authored or co-authored over 100 refereed journal publications and 200 presentations in these areas. He is the author of the textbook Metal Matrix Composites (co-authored with K.K. Chawla), published by Springer in 2006.
Prof. Chawla is a fellow of ASM International. He's the recipient of the 2004 Bradley Stoughton Award for Young Teachers, given by ASM International, and the 2006 Young Leaders Tutorial Lecture, given by The Minerals, Metals, and Materials Society (TMS). He's also won the National Science Foundation Early Career Development Award and the Office of Naval Research Young Investigator Award. Prof. Chawla is a member of the TMS Board of Directors and serves on the Editorial Boards of Advanced Engineering Materials, Materials Characterization, and Metallurgical and Materials Transactions. His will be featured on the show Modern Marvels that airs on the History Channel, and has been featured on Fox News, and the Arizona Republic.
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|  | Monday November 17th, 2008
Sunshine to Petrol: Solar Thermal Conversion of Carbon Dioxide to Liquid Fuels
Host/Contact: James E. Miller
Sandia National Laboratories
Time and Place: Harshbarger Bld., Room 205 2PM-2:50PM
Speaker: Jim Miller has been involved in heterogeneous catalysis and chemical processing research at Sandia National Laboratories for over 16 years. His work currently centers on the production of synthetic fuels from carbon dioxide using solar energy (Sunshine to Petrol) and include the development of a new high temperature thermochemical water- and carbon dioxide-splitting reactor and composite oxide materials for that reactor. Other recent activities have included the development and characterization of novel nanostructured Pt materials, catalysts for solid oxide and PEM fuel cells, catalysts for selective hydrocarbon oxidation (to olefins and syngas), catalysts for NOx storage and reduction, and materials and concepts for low-temperature hydrogen combustion. He has also been involved in desalination, developing and characterizing catalysts for upgrading (hydrotreating/hydrocracking) coal and petroleum liquids, characterizing mass transfer in novel 3-dimensional catalytic monoliths, and developing and characterizing processes for lignin depolymerization. Early in his tenure at Sandia, he worked on radioactive waste disposal/treatment technologies including steam reforming and cesium-selective crystalline silicotitanate ion exchangers. Jim holds a BS degree in Chemical Engineering from Texas A&M University and a PhD in Chemical Engineering from the University of Texas at Austin.
Phone/Fax: (505) 272-7626 / (505) 272-7336. | |
| | Thursday November 13th, 2008
Surface Area Effects in Polymer Nanocomposites
Host/Contact: Meisha L. Shofner, Ph.D., P.E.
Time and Place: Harshbarger Bld., Room 205 2PM-2:50PM
Speaker: Dr. Meisha L. Shofner is an Assistant Professor in the School of Polymer, Textile & Fiber Engineering and the School of Materials Science and Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology. She received her B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from The University of Texas at Austin in 1997. She received her Ph.D. in Materials Science and Engineering from Rice University in 2004 and then conducted post-doctoral research at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering. Dr. Shofner's research interests at Georgia Tech concern the processing and physical properties of polymer matrix composite materials with specific emphasis on nanocomposites. Her research group focuses on manipulating the excess interfacial area provided by nanoscale fillers to create composite materials with novel properties. Dr. Shofner was the recipient of the Solvay Advanced Polymers Young Faculty Award in 2006 and the Ralph E. Powe Junior Faculty Enhancement Award from Oak Ridge Associated Universities in 2007. She is a registered Professional Engineer in Georgia.
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| | Monday November 10th, 2008
Processing of bulk nanocrystalline oxide materials for optical and magnetic applications
Host/Contact: Javier E. Garay
Time and Place: Harshbarger Bld., Room 205 2PM-2:50PM
Speaker: Dr. Javier E. Garay, Assistant Professor, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Materials Science and Engineering Program, University of California, Riverside (UCR).
Javier Garay received his B. S. in Mechanical Engineering (1999), M.S. in Materials Science and Engineering (2002) and Ph.D. in Materials Science and Engineering (2004) all from the University of California, Davis. In 2004 he was appointed assistant professor in the Bourns College of Engineering at UCR where his research focuses on advanced material processing and synthesis.
Prof. Garay is the PI of a vibrant experimental laboratory called the Advanced Material Processing and Synthesis (AMPS) Lab. Currently his group's main efforts are in developing materials with improved optical, structural, electrical and magnetic properties using the overarching theme of nanocrystallinity. Example applications of the materials produced are laser materials, impact resistant windows/viewports, magnetic devices and energy scavenging thermoelectric materials.
He is the recipient of two federal Young Investigator Program (YIP) awards: From the Army Research Office (ARO-YIP) in 2005 and from the Air Force Office for Scientific Research (AFOSR-YIP) in 2008.
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| | Monday November 3rd, 2008
Investigations of the Effects of Photocatalysis on the Molecular Assembly Behavior of Titanium Alkoxide Materials
Host/Contact: Dave Musgraves
Time and Place: Harshbarger Bld., Room 205 2PM-2:50PM
Speaker: Dave Musgraves is a PhD candidate in the Materials Science and Engineering Department at the University of Arizona working for Dr. B.G. Potter, Jr. His undergraduate degree was in physics from Pomona College in Claremont, California. | |
| | Monday October 27th, 2008
Design of Illuminants to reduce Photochemical Degradation of Works of Art
Host/Contact: Carl W. Dirk
Time and Place: Harshbarger Bld., Room 205 2PM-2:50PM
Speaker: Carl W. Dirk
Professor
- B.A., Montclair State College, 1977
- Ph.D., Northwestern University, 1982
- Postdoctoral Researcher, Physics,
- University of California at Santa Barbara 1982-1984
- Visiting Scientist, IBM San Jose
- Research 1984-1985
- Member of Technical Staff, AT&T Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill 1985-1990
Phone:(915) 747-7560; cdirk@utep.edu
Dr. Dirk's past research interests and publications include a wide range of activities:
conductive polymers, magnetism, nonlinear optics, polymer physics, dye chemistry,
plastic optical fibers, optical communications, molecular orbital theory calculation of
physical properties, photochemical reaction mechanisms, and excited state theory. Dr.
Dirk has been past acting Director of the NASA Alliance of Nonlinear Optics
consortium, and a participant and past Educational Outreach Co-Director for the
University of Arizona ONR MURI Center for Advanced Multifunctional Nonlinear
Optical Polymers and Molecular Assemblies (CAMP). | |
| | Monday October 20th, 2008
Novel Approaches to Preparing Nanocrystalline Materials Using Thermal Spray Processes
Host/Contact: Aaron C. Hall
Time and Place: Harshbarger Bld., Room 205 2PM-2:50PM
Speaker: Dr. Aaron Hall is a Principal Member of Technical Staff at Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque, NM. He leads Sandia's Thermal Spray Research Laboratory, which is part of Sandia's Materials Science and Engineering Center. Dr. Hall's research is focused on understanding process-microstructure-property relationships in thermal spray coatings. Dr. Hall holds a Ph.D. in Materials Science and Engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Tulsa. | |
| | Monday September 29th, 2008
From Materials Science Fundamentals to Financials
Host/Contact: Joe Cesarano III, Ph.D.
Time and Place: Harshbarger Bld., Room 205 2PM-2:50PM
Speaker: Dr. Cesarano received a BS in Ceramic Engineering from Alfred University in 1983. From the University of Washington he received a MS in Ceramic Engineering in 1985 and PhD in Materials Science in 1989. He has been a Visiting Scientist at Oak Ridge National Labs and the Swedish Ceramic Institute an adjunct professor with the University of New Mexico and New Mexico Tech. From 1989 to 2007 he was a scientist with Sandia National Laboratories until February 2007 when he left for Entrepreneurial Leave and began full-time operational control, as President, of Robocasting Enterprises LLC.
His research has concentrated on colloidal science and manipulation of fine particles for the development of new manufacturing technologies and process improvement. His work on polyelectrolyte stabilization of ceramic particles is used in several Materials Science curriculums and the publications have been cited over 600 times. He is an inventor of the free-form fabrication technology known as robocasting.
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| | Monday September 22nd, 2008
Interfacial Structure and Dynamics in Excitonic Solar Cells
Host/Contact: Oliver L.A. Monti
Time and Place: Harshbarger Bld., Room 205 2PM-2:50PM
Speaker: Dr. Monti’s research focuses on the experimental investigation of electronic structure and charge transport in complex meso- and nanostructured materials with particular emphasis on the interfacial problem in organic and hybrid organic/inorganic solar cells. To this end, his group develops and implements novel microscopic techniques combining spatially resolved photoelectron spectroscopy, ultrafast spectroscopy and single molecule microscopy under well defined conditions.
- Dipl. Chem. ETH Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH), Chemistry
- DPhil Oxon, University of Oxford, UK, Physical Chemistry
- Assistant Professor, Department of Chemistry, University of Arizona, Tucson
- Postdoctoral fellow, JILA (National Institute of Standards and Technology and University of Colorado, Boulder)
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| | Monday September 15th, 2008
The Role of Fuel Cells/Electrolysis Cells in Energy Sustainability
Host/Contact: Dr. Peiwen (Perry) Li
Time and Place: Harshbarger Bld., Room 205 2PM-2:50PM
Speaker: Dr. Li is now an Assistant Professor of the Department of Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering at the University of Arizona. Before he joined here, he was a Research Associate in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Pittsburgh from 2002-2006. His current major research interests are on fuel cells, and renewable and clean energy systems centered by fuel cell and electrolysis cell technologies. He earned his Ph.D. in 1995 from Xi’an Jiaotong University, China. Right after graduation he joined the same university as a lecturer. From June 1997 to March 2000, he had been a senior research scientist in National Mechanical Engineering Laboratory, Tsukuba, Japan. From April 2000 to December 2001, Dr. Li worked as a research scientist in Japan Science and Technology Corporation (JST) in conjunction with Kyoto University, Japan. There he participated in the research and development of Micro Gas Turbine-Solid Oxide Fuel Cell Hybrid Power System. He was awarded JSPS (Japan Society for the Promotion of Science) post-doctoral fellowship in 1996, and NEDO (New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization, Japan) fellowship in 1997. | |
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