Dionysios Aliprantis took up an imaginary hammer and chisel and pounded away at the air. “Think of the ancient Greeks and their sculptures,” said the Iowa State University assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering. Now apply the idea of a sculptor precisely chipping away at stone to the electric motors that run our machines and …Continue reading “Aliprantis wants to ‘sculpt’ more powerful electric motors and generators”
When you sit down with the Iowa State faculty members who have gathered under the College of Engineering’s Wind Energy Initiative (WEI), you soon realize the group has developed a multifaceted, yet well constructed, plan to contribute to expanding the viability of wind energy in the US energy portfolio. As they talk about their role …Continue reading “An end-to-end approach to advancing wind energy”
Iowa State University will soon become the first institution to award students PhD degrees in Wind Energy Science, Engineering, and Policy (WESEP) thanks to a $3.1 million, five-year grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) Integrative Graduate Education and Research Traineeship (IGERT) program. James McCalley, Murray J. and Ruth M. Harpole Professor in Electrical Engineering, …Continue reading “Iowa State receives multi-million dollar grant to develop new PhD program in Wind Energy Science, Engineering, and Policy”
Bernardo del Campo is a PhD candidate at the Bioeconomy Institute at Iowa State who helps lead an organization called the Next Generation Scientists for Biodiesel. Del Campo is helping answer the call for Iowa State to become an alternative fuels leader and he wrote the following editorial piece: Just like the national debt, our …Continue reading “PhD candidate featured in Biodiesel Magazine”
The U.S. Department of Energy’s Ames Laboratory and Iowa Powder Atomization Technologies have joined forces in DOE’s America’s Next Top Energy Innovator challenge to create jobs in Iowa. The program gives start-up companies the opportunity to sign an option to license technologies created by national laboratories at reduced costs. On June 30, IPAT signed an …Continue reading “Ames Laboratory participates in Department of Energy innovator challenge”
An engineering professor’s plan to introduce ferroelectrics into the organic layers used to fabricate polymer solar cells may be the ingredient that could make the technology available to consumers in the very near future. Assistant Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering Sumit Chaudhary says ferroelectric materials, which act like dipoles with a positive and negative …Continue reading “Chaudhary’s quest to improve organic solar cell efficiency gains traction with new approach and funding”
Some Iowa State University students are serious about getting their campus community “on the bus” when it comes to green living. And they hope to pick up some other Ames residents along the way. That’s at least the plan, according to David Correll, a Ph.D. student in Iowa State’s College of Business and co-founder and …Continue reading “Students to process waste vegetable oil from ISU Dining to fuel CyRide bus”
Soldiers carrying sophisticated communication and navigation devices into the field have the same battery headaches as civilians working their smart phones at the airport. One way to assure that soldiers have an adequate power supply for their electronic tools has been to strap extra batteries to their backs. But Ayman Fayed, an Iowa State assistant …Continue reading “Iowa State engineer developing technology to enhance battery life in portable devices”
Two themes that I’ve emphasized as dean are collaboration and sustainability. While it’s not difficult to imagine that those two concepts are closely related, to see them resonate well in a single project is truly gratifying. The project, in this case, is a $2 million renovation of research labs in the 1964 wing of Sweeney …Continue reading “More than lab work”
A new cooling technology — cleaner, more efficient, and with the potential to have broad-ranging effects on global warming — is just around the corner, according to Karl A. Gschneidner Jr., Anson Marston Distinguished Professor in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, and senior scientist at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Ames Laboratory. After …Continue reading “Magnetic refrigeration cleaner and more efficient”
Associate Professor of Materials Science and Engineering Xiaoli Tan’s research to examine a phase boundary between antiferroelectric and ferroelectric ceramics was recently published in Physical Review Letters (PRL). The paper “Can an electric field induce an antiferroelectric phase out of a ferroelectric phase?” was included in the December 17 issue of PRL, which is the …Continue reading “Tan’s phase transition discovery published in Physical Review Letters”
Researchers from Iowa State University and the Ames Laboratory have developed a process capable of producing a thin and uniform light-absorbing layer on textured substrates that improves the efficiency of polymer solar cells by increasing light absorption. “Our technology efficiently utilizes the light trapping scheme,” said Sumit Chaudhary, an Iowa State assistant professor of electrical …Continue reading “Chaudhary fabricates more efficient polymer solar cells”
In the past few months, College of Engineering researchers on three projects—one on novel nanovaccines, one on new wind turbine structures, and another on energy and transportation infrastructure planning—have reached key milestones in their research. Here are some highlights: Making one-dose, needle-free nanovaccines for infectious diseases Can you imagine a world where diseases such as …Continue reading “Research updates”
The earlier students can begin learning about energy, the better off society will be—that’s the philosophy of a group of Iowa State University engineering faculty working to develop sustainable educational programs in the area of energy and energy systems. Ted Heindel, interim chair of mechanical engineering, Tom Brumm, professor in-charge of online learning, and Ron Cox, associate dean of extension, received a $500,000 grant from the Iowa Office of Energy Independence that was matched by Iowa State to launch these programs by March 2012.
More than 260 attendees from academia, government, and industry met April 6 at the Iowa State Center’s Scheman Building for the 2010 Conference of the Iowa Alliance for Wind Innovation and Novel Design, or IAWIND. The event was at once a celebration of Iowa’s national leadership in wind power, a challenge to do even more …Continue reading “Culver, energy experts tout advances, challenges at IAWIND conference at Iowa State”
