Events

"Adhesion, Friction & Lubrication of Surfaces & Liquid Films and their Relation to Diverse Phenomena Such as how Geckos Climb on Walls and Ceilings, Surface Damage, and Sensing" by Professor Jacob Isrealachvili, Chemical Engineering, University of California Santa Barbara, United States

An invitation to all grad students, visitors, staff and faculty in Chemical Engineering (and their families).

It would be appreciated if you could bring a salad or dessert to the barbeque.

Please RSVP here.

ABSTRACT: In this work, the issue of stability for two-phase incompressible flow in homogeneous porous media out of the Darcy regime (i.e. when inertia must be taken into account) is considered. The development is based on a macroscopic model derived by upscaling the pore-scale Navier-Stokes equations, assuming that the inertial correction is quadratic in the filtration velocity, as widely admitted with the classical Darcy-Forchheimer model. 

ABSTRACT:  Microalgae have received a great deal of attention as a platform for biofuel production due to their photosynthetic nature. However, the over emphasis on the production of lipids for biodiesel synthesis can limit the productivity of algae cultures and undervalues the potential applications for the significant quantities of protein and carbohydrate fractions present in this biomass. Currently, the commercial prospects for microalgae biofuels are primarily inhibited by their low cell densities and the high cost of current lipid extraction processes.

The transportation system is a major source of emissions of carbon dioxide.  Fuel cell vehicles operating on renewable generated hydrogen is one of ways to remove carbon from the transportation system.  The main barriers for adoption of this technology is cost and hydrogen infrastructure.  The life cost of fuel-cell systems can be addressed by making the fuel cell more durable.  Specific challenges for fuel cell development are examined.

ABSTRACT:  Human civilization has been driven by harvest and utilization of solar energy.  Developing better technologies leading to more effective energy harvest and utilization is being emerged as one of the most essential research themes.  In this presentation, two topics, energy storage and protein therapeutics, will be covered.  The first topic will focus on design and fabrication of electrochemical devices such as supercapacitors, batteries, and fuel cells.  Recognize that living organisms are made from basic elements (e.g., C, O, H, N and P), consume energy and repro