Students enrolled in the Spring 2023 course Emerging Technology in Forest Bioproducts (offered by the College of Engineering – ChBE and ME 4730/8803) visited the Valmet Automation Center in Norcross, GA in April. With faculty members Carson Meredith and Chris Luettgen, who teach the course, the visiting group consisted of both undergraduate and graduate students from the School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering and the School of Material Science and Engineering at Georgia Tech.

The students got an opportunity to see Valmet’s vision for the Factory of the Future through automation and predictive control – Industry 4.0 in some vernacular, and were given an introduction to Valmet as a company and the multitude of career pathways available at the company. Valmet is headquartered in Espoo Finland and develops and supplies process technologies, automation, and services for the pulp, paper, and energy industries. The automation systems and flow control solutions offered by the company serve a wide base of process industries and was the focus area of the field trip.

The Emerging Technologies for Forest Bioproducts course is a required course for RBI Fellowship students and part of the Georgia Tech Pulp & Paper Foundation & Certificate Program. The course focuses on the future of the bioproducts industries so that students may see where the bioeconomy is headed. Case studies on the use of biomass in production of value-added products, including fluff pulp and dissolving pulps, alternative fibers, specialty papers, packaging and printed electronics, biorefining technologies, nanocellulose and bio composites, and renewable polymers are covered in the course.

A highlight of the Renewable Bioproducts Institute (RBI) workshops is the student poster session that provides industry interaction for Paper Science and Engineering (PSE) Fellows and an opportunity to communicate the breadth of research supported by RBI to the workshop participants. The session also provides a chance for new students to share their project scope, goals and receive useful feedback. This is the first of a series of Q&As from PSE students who share their experience at the 2023 RBI Spring Workshop on Packaging Innovation and the Circular Economy Elyssa Ferguson, a Mechanical Engineering graduate student shares her experience below.

Tell us about yourself

My name is Elyssa Ferguson. I earned my B.S. in mechanical engineering at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC). I am pursuing my M.S. in mechanical engineering at Georgia Tech. I am an RBI Fellow, GEM Fellow, and Women of Woodruff (WoW) Fellow, and I work in the Water-Energy Research (WERL) Lab, under the direction of Akanksha K. Menon, assistant professor in the School of Mechanical Engineering. My research focuses on developing sustainably sourced natural fibers for thermal insulation in buildings. My project is a part of the Carbon-Negative Building Materials based on Engineered Wood for Structural and Thermal Insulation Applications project. Menon and I collaborate with Kyriaki Kalaitzidou, Rae S. and Frank H. Neely Professor in the School of Mechanical Engineering and Joe F. Bozeman III, assistant professor in the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Public Policy. I also work with graduate students, Elnaz Jamshidi from the School of Materials Science and Engineering and Arjun Thangaraj Ramshankar from the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering on this project. 

How was your experience at the RBI workshop? 

Attending the RBI workshop was a valuable learning experience. I learned about the variety of exciting work in the renewable packaging realm that is going on at Georgia Tech and other organizations. This work is driving sustainable innovation, yet there are challenges. The discussions regarding the barriers to innovation and areas for growth were very thought-provoking and motivating. 

What was your main takeaway from the poster session? 

During the poster session, I shared information about my research and had the privilege to talk to many people in the industry. There is much interest in thermally insulating natural fibers for building applications and for other applications like cold-chain packaging and textiles. Speaking with the workshop participants during the poster session broadened my mind to the potential myriad of applications for natural-fiber-based thermal insulation on a global scale. I also learned more about the existing challenges researchers and industrial peers are facing – one being the lack of standardization of nomenclature and methodology. Receiving positive feedback on the design of my poster was also helpful. I deliberately designed a poster that incorporated aesthetics to convey my ongoing research. I plan to apply the helpful information and feedback that I received during the RBI workshop to my future work. 

What more would you like to see in future events at the Renewable Bioproducts Institute?

I am very interested in seeing more seminars related to sustainable building materials, especially insulating materials, and textiles, as these topics are closely related to my research project. Fascinating work is happening at other universities and at companies in Georgia and around the world. It would be great if there is a seminar series including these organizations. 

 

Read Part 2 - Tanner Hickman

Carson Meredith, executive director of the Renewable Bioproducts Institute and professor in the School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering (ChBE), has been elected to the 2023-2024 class of American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE) fellows.

The Fellow status is AIChE's highest grade of membership and is achieved through election by the AIChE Board of Directors upon recommendation of the AIChE Admissions Committee.

Meredith is recognized for sustained contributions to the chemical engineering profession through research, education and service. For example, his research has made significant contributions to the field of sustainable materials for packaging and plastic alternatives.

In service, Meredith has contributed actively to planning AIChE and Materials Research Society meetings. He now serves on the executive leadership board of the Forest and Plant Bioproducts Division of AIChE.

Meredith has been a ChBE faculty member for 23 years.

Carsten Sievers, a professor in Georgia Tech's School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, was selected as part of the 2023 class of Fellows of the American Chemical Society (ACS).

This honor is reserved for roughly 1% of the membership of the society based on scientific contributions and service to the ACS community. Sievers is recognized for:

• Contributions introducing new catalytic pathways and concepts of energy input for converting renewable carbon resources guided by spectroscopic catalyst and process characterization.
• Establishing the technical program of the Catalysis Science and Technology Division as its first program chair and contributing to the growth of the division by mentoring his successors.

He will formally receive the recognition at the upcoming ACS meeting in San Francisco (August 13-17.

The Fellows program began in 2009 as a way to recognize and honor ACS members for outstanding achievements in and contributions to science, the profession, and ACS.

The full list of 2023 Fellows is available here, while additional information about the program, including a list of Fellows named in prior years, is available at www.acs.org/fellows.

Christopher Luettgen, professor of the practice at the School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering and associate director of the Renewable Bioproducts Institute (RBI) has been named as the new Executive Director of the Alliance for Pulp & Paper Technology Innovation (APPTI), effective April 1, 2023. 

Luettgen has over 25 years of industry experience, with Scott Paper and Kimberly-Clark Corp., where he most recently served as senior research and engineering manager for the Kimberly-Clark Professional business sector. He has held positions in product development and innovation as well as in capital project management and manufacturing facility leadership.

For several years, Luettgen has served on the RBI Industry Board of Advisors, and he is the current Chairman of the Board of the Technical Association of the Pulp & Paper Industry. He earned his bachelor's degree in Paper Engineering at Western Michigan University (’85), his master’s degree at the Institute of Paper Chemistry, Appleton, WI (’87), and his Ph.D. at the Institute of Paper Science and Technology - now the Renewable Bioproducts Institute at Georgia Tech (’91).

He rejoined Georgia Tech in November 2014 as a Professor of the Practice in the School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, and Associate Director of Pulp and Paper at RBI. He also serves as Director of Industry Strategic Partnerships in the Georgia Tech Professional Education Division.

His areas of interest include: Recycled fiber, renewable cellulosic feedstocks, tissue manufacturing and converting and manufacturing leadership / operations excellence.

This is part two of the student experiences series. Tanner Hickman, fourth-year Ph.D. candidate in chemical and biomolecular engineering shares his experience from the 2023 RBI Spring Workshop on "Innovations in Packaging and Circular Economy."

Tell us about yourself.

I am Tanner Hickman and I completed my bachelor’s degree in chemical and biomolecular engineering at the University of South Alabama. Here at Georgia Tech, I am a fourth-year Ph.D. candidate in chemical and biomolecular engineering, advised by Carson Meredith and Natalie Stingelin. My research focuses on exploring different ways to control the properties of natural polymers to make them useful for new applications.

How was your experience at the RBI workshop?

The RBI workshop provided incredibly valuable insights. I gained a comprehensive understanding of the persistent challenges within sustainable packaging, as well as the ongoing research endeavors aimed at tackling them. A key lesson I extracted from the workshop underscores the imperative of a circular economy within the packaging sector. However, it's crucial to note that our focus shouldn't solely revolve around product research; we must also direct attention toward addressing social concerns and broader issues.

What was your main takeaway from the poster session?

One of the best parts of RBI workshops is the opportunities to talk with people from different technical backgrounds, and poster sessions are one of the best ways to get the exchange of ideas flowing. I talked with several people from industry, who all had valuable advice on what it takes to bring benchtop research to application on a larger scale. At the same time, discussions with other researchers in academia are vital for brainstorming new projects, forming collaborations, etc.

What more would you like to see in future events at the Renewable Bioproducts Institute?

I would like to see a workshop that incorporates more interactive elements (in addition to the poster session) to engage participants. For instance, roundtable discussions or panel sessions where experts and attendees can openly exchange ideas and insights could enhance the learning experience.

Who We Are and the Paper Museum

The Robert C. Williams Museum of Papermaking houses hand papermaking artifacts from around the world. Dard Hunter, a renowned paper historian and founder of the museum, collected many of these objects throughout the early 1900s as he sought to gain more knowledge about this craft. Nearly 100 years later, the museum continues its mission to collect, preserve, increase, and disseminate knowledge about papermaking to the general public. By collaborating with Georgia Tech researchers, and the larger Atlanta community, by using scientific tools, we can unlock hidden information held within the objects, both from a historical and scientific perspective. Recently, two Georgia Tech Postdoctoral Fellows, Nasreen Khan (Paper Museum/RBI) and Daniel Vallejo (School of Chemistry and Biochemistry) sought to uncover more about a loom in the museum’s collection, connected with the history of the Indian subcontinent and Gandhi.

Dard Hunter and Background of the Loom

In the 1930s, Dard Hunter traveled to Asia and the Indian subcontinent (I.e., India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Kashmir) to document hand papermaking techniques and collect tools and paper samples. At that time many people, including Mahatma Gandhi, aimed to revitalize the Indian hand papermaking tradition by supporting and creating schools to teach the craft [1-3]. Dard Hunter visited several papermaking villages and schools, including those helped founded by Gandhi. Hunter brought a loom back to America that was used to weave a chapri (paper-mold cover or screen), but the information of the specific origins of this loom was lost.

What’s Missing?

While Hunter and other researchers documented and studied hand papermaking tools and materials of this region and time, it was primarily from a historical and cultural perspective [1-5]. Much of their focus has been on the plant materials used to make the paper and molds [1-5]. However, some parts of the handmade molds in Asia were known to also use biological materials sourced from animals, such as silk and animal hair [1-4]. Since the exact origin of the loom and the fibers used to construct the paper mold was not known, the museum was interested in learning more about this object.

With scientific tools, the study aimed to understand more about the fibers commonly used in traditional handmade paper-mold covers in the 1930s Indian subcontinent by using scientific tools. With the availability of high-resolution microscopy technologies and historical documentation at Georgia Tech and the Museum, researchers aimed to either prove or disprove whether the origin of preserved fibers on the loom was from an animal and determine with historical context where the loom was acquired.

What we did and what we discovered

Are the Fibers Really Horsehair?

In forensic analysis, typically the first step to identify unknown fiber or hair samples is to conduct microscopy. Microscopy, or the science of using microscopes to view samples & objects that cannot be seen with the naked eye, is the gold standard for analyzing and identifying unknown fibers by comparison to a library of known reference materials. This is possible because hair from different sources or animals have different “morphologies”, or physical features, that help identify their origin. Thanks to the Materials Innovation and Learning Laboratory (MILL), a hub of scientific equipment for hands-on scientific training of undergraduates at Georgia Tech, the researchers were able to use two different microscope techniques: Light microscopy and Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM). Thanks to Little Creek Farm Conservancy in Decatur and Kristine Parson, the researchers were able to obtain reference materials for tail and mane horsehair from two horses: Angus and Lightening.

Click the link below to continue reading the story.

Akanksha Menon, assistant professor in the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering, has been selected to receive the 2023 American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) Pi Tau Sigma Gold Medal. The award is presented for demonstrating outstanding achievement in the field of mechanical engineering, within ten years following graduation with a bachelor’s degree.

“I am very grateful to be selected for this award,” said Menon. “As an undergrad just over a decade ago, I served as the President of both the ASME and Pi Tau Sigma student chapters; to now receive this prestigious medal for contributions to the field of mechanical engineering is truly humbling – the journey has come full circle!”

Menon directs the Water–Energy Research Lab (WERL) at Georgia Tech, which focuses on applying thermal science and functional materials to develop sustainable and efficient energy and water technologies. Her research aims to unlock critical fundamental knowledge pertaining to thermally responsive materials with interactions across multiple length and time scales and to engineer them for applications ranging from desalination to thermal energy storage.

The full story is available on the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering News Page