houck2040/tees huggingface dataset:
the texas a&m university system and two of its state engineering agencies the texas a&m engineering experiment station (tees) and the texas a&m engineering extension service (teex) today announced a new initiative to invigorate an important rio grande valley industry sector advanced manufacturing with workforce development programs that will prepare people for high-need jobs the texas a&m rgv advanced manufacturing/training innovation now (train) program gathers community input creates collaborations and develops training courses that meet the needs of current and future employers at the port of brownsville in two years train will award 10 000 certificates through online and on-site classes tees and teex two state agencies renowned for their workforce training and professional development will offer these courses in english and spanish there is no cost to participants thanks to $10 million in funding secured by state senator eddie lucio jr from the texas legislature i am proud to be part of this innovative initiative that will provide robust training opportunities to the people of south texas said john sharp chancellor of the texas a&m system with the new train initiative the texas a&m system continues its mission of education and service by partnering with our colleagues in the rio grande valley to provide no-cost training to community members interested in being part of the rapidly expanding advanced manufacturing workforce we owe a special thanks to senator eddie lucio and texas a&m system regent mike hernandez for helping make this possible tees and teex are uniquely positioned to offer expertise in workforce training in the much sought-after area of manufacturing said dr john e hurtado interim vice chancellor for engineering and interim director of tees by providing training to the people of the rio grande valley at no cost thanks to the texas legislature we have the opportunity to help people improve not only their employment options but also their lives courses will begin in october visit the train website for training and to learn more
synthetic biology is an interdisciplinary field of study that applies engineering principles to biology and enables the engineering of microorganisms to have new functions and produce new materials through this researchers can solve real problems faced by society including those in the areas of medicine agriculture and national defense to name a few but this technique has only been applied to a very limited number of well-known laboratory microorganisms until now dr arum han presidential impact fellow and professor in the department of electrical and computer engineering at texas a&m university and dr jose wippold and dr bryn adams with the us army combat capabilities development command (devcom) army research laboratory (arl) collaborated to develop a device that accomplishes a task never done before the automation of dna transfer into a broad range of synthetic biology host cells or chassis using high-throughput microfluidics allowing for a large number of experiments to be conducted in a very short time their technology the dna enhanced transfer platform (dna entrap) is a microfluidic device that leverages a cell-to-cell dna transfer tool xport previously developed through a collaboration between the massachusetts institute of technology and arl texas a&m and arl then took the strategy and designed developed and tested a microfluidic device able to automate the steps needed to achieve xport dna transfer the device can enhance and screen for efficient dna transfer between cells ultimately making high-throughput genetic modification possible in a variety of organisms outside of the usual laboratory strains
the texas a&m engineering experiment station (tees) announced the creation of the new center for advanced small modular and micro nuclear reactors (casmr) which will focus on enabling the worlds transition to clean energy while protecting the environment renowned nuclear engineering researcher dr yassin hassan will lead the center hassan is a member of the national academy of engineering a regents professor and the holder of the peterson chair in the texas a&m university college of engineering the massive winter storm that hit texas in february 2021 challenged the states energy infrastructure millions lost electricity and heat which left many in dire situations and without basic needs to help prevent a repeat of these scenarios casmr researchers will focus their efforts on developing and demonstrating technologies that deliver affordable reliable resilient secure flexible and sustainable energy with unparalleled safety and zero carbon emission for clean energy building upon tees already extensive capability in innovation the center supports work across the entire technology development spectrum from basic research to reactor design manufacturing and deployment said dr john e hurtado interim vice chancellor and dean of the college of engineering and interim director of tees tees is well positioned to conduct cutting-edge research that advances the design construction and operation of advanced nuclear reactors the center aims to hasten the development of new and transformative technologies materials and modeling and simulation that will make nuclear fission more affordable and then deploy it rapidly and securely small modular reactors and microreactors can provide electricity and heat as a source of energy under a wide variety of these unique and severe conditions small modular and microreactors provide a combination of benefits as being highly resilient carbon-free flexible and can produce electricity on demand and operate for years without the need to refuel microreactors and small nuclear reactors are ideal for use in remote areas and on microgrids the center will also bring a diverse group of domestic and international industry government agencies laboratories the public and key decision-makers and academia to collaborate on nuclear energy initiatives to rapidly bridge the gaps between basic research engineering development and commercialization
researchers at texas a&m university will lead a hub of five institutions across the country to conduct fundamental research to support holistic decision-making for historically underrepresented communities impacted by coastal hazards the focused coastline and people research hub at texas a&m which will bring together communities stakeholders and researchers has been established thanks to a five-year nearly $42 million grant from the national science foundation along the northern gulf coast communities from texas to florida are particularly at risk for coastal hazards including hurricanes tsunamis coastal storm surges flooding sea-level rise and erosion the national science foundation's (nsf) coastlines and people (cope) program an interdisciplinary research initiative supported by several nsf divisions is aimed to study complex interactions between coastal processes human dynamics and the built environment these studies require a focused investment in novel multidisciplinary science that engages diverse local stakeholders the cope program supports coastal research hubs which aim to accomplish the above objectives by incorporating a convergent science approach the project was also endorsed by the united nations decade of ocean science for sustainable development dr maria koliou assistant professor in the zachry department of civil and environmental engineering at texas a&m will serve as lead principal investigator of the focused coastline and people research hub "through an integrative research approach this focused hub will lead to the development of a framework that will quantify the interdependence between coastal hazards built environment geodemographics and social and cultural factors thus enabling decision making aimed at minimizing the socio-economic impact of coastal hazards to historically underrepresented communities " she said "what sets this focused hub apart is that through fundamental research we will build a community digital twin that will enable decision making for short- and long-term resilience actions through a new holistic perspective on diverse communities based on cultural and social aspects" in addition to researching various tasks koliou will oversee the project schedule community engagement and ensure all milestones and deliverables are met through community events surveys roundtables and discussion forums this project will identify critical community needs priorities and concerns determine critical issues co-collect data and solicit expertise co-develop and refine research and create evaluation metrics "this framework will be validated with data collected from tribal communities in the northern gulf coast and cultural preservation sites through engaged research and experiential drills to understand assess measure and enhance resilience " she said
there will be five other co-principal investigators from texas a&m: dr petros sideris assistant professor in civil and environmental engineering; dr siyu yu assistant professor in landscape architecture and urban planning; dr anand puppala professor in civil and environmental engineering; dr jim kaihatu professor in civil and environmental engineering; and dr michelle meyer associate professor in landscape architecture and urban planning and director of the hazard reduction and recovery center there will also be four co-pis from other institutions: dr jayur madhusudan mehta assistant professor in anthropology at florida state university; dr stuart nolan research assistant/emergency management analyst at the stephenson disaster management institute at louisiana state university; dr haizhong wang associate professor of civil and construction engineering at oregon state university; and dr andres gonzalez assistant professor in the school of industrial and systems engineering at the university of oklahoma "conducting scientific research on community resilience is a complex and multidimensional undertaking that relies on expertise from multiple disciplines including anthropology archeology urban planning and engineering principles via community-engaged research koliou said the team is truly excited to receive a nice comment from the nsf panel that summarized that 'it was so beautifully written such a pleasure to read' all the hard work put in by the team over the past year in collaborating on this proposal has been truly rewarded in a nice way and we all are looking forward to an excellent start" the team will also collaborate closely with the us department of the interior south central climate adaptation science center part of a federal network of nine centers that work with natural and cultural resource managers to gather scientific information and build tools needed to help wildlife and ecosystems adapt to the impacts of climate change as part of the grant an engagement program will also be established to support a pipeline for high school students from these underrepresented communities into and through graduate school
humans and robots may be sharing some of the same goals and manufacturing spaces soon as autonomy and robot technology continue to advance researchers at texas a&m university are analyzing how this dynamic duo can work in unison to allow for one party to step up where the other may temporarily lack sarah hopko lead researcher and doctoral student and dr ranjana mehta associate professor in the wm michael barnes 64 department of industrial and systems engineering and former graduate student riya khurana and dr prabhakar pagilla professor in the j mike walker 66 department of mechanical engineering are researching the correlation between humans and autonomous assistance in manufacturing settings with large amounts of repetitive work to determine how a robot can be programmed to step in during human fatigue in a trustworthy manner humans bring flexibility and a high-level of understanding of a production line at a relatively low cost but because humans have finite physical and cognitive capacities they become tired and make errors with demanding work tasks where humans may lack the capacity to continue robots can aid in overseeing the more repetitive portions of a task lifting heavier objects or exerting force depending on the application more and more people are realizing that human-robot collaboration is a viable solution to automate productions or bring a solution to problems that pose difficult or costly roadblocks hopko said the goal of this research is to understand how specific human factors such as fatigue and trust interact with each other to make sure that the design of a collaborative robot considers the operators behavior and needs so that all bases are covered we dont want the operator to instill a false sense of safety because of their fatigued state and over-rely on the increased assistance of the robot we also dont want the operator to under-use robotic assistance when otherwise appropriate hopko said collaborative robots are to some extent the operators teammate
when collaborating with a teammate at work identifying engagement or levels of fatigue can all be done either through perception or a simple conversation you can then figure out how best to help your teammate based on the information you have gathered hopko says the goal is for human-robot interaction to be the same way the research team conducted a multi-session experiment where men and women performed metal polishing tasks in combination with a universal robot (ur10) collaborative robot using varying levels of robotic assistance under different states of cognitive fatigue participants were fatigued using a challenging visuospatial working memory task for an hour prior to performing the manufacturing tasks each participant was evaluated for fatigue situation awareness and workload through wearable physiological monitoring to determine three task performance metrics: task efficiency accuracy and precision overall the research team found that the operators performance can be improved with increased assistance levels and that increased assistance allows for cognitive fatigue recovery cognitive fatigue and automation levels influence different performance outcomes fatigue impeded the efficiency of the participants although the levels of accuracy and precision were not affected it took them longer to complete the task we also found that the female participants reported greater performance benefits from utilizing high automation while the male participants did not perceive a benefit from the assistance despite demonstrating comparable task performance hopko said this finding is unique and important for robotic technology acceptance with industry 40 advances as more industries are adopting collaborative robots in their work processes while increased performance and fatigue recovery are highlighted benefits of robotic assistance it also showed that higher support reduced the situation awareness of participants by reducing their task engagement and mental stimulation lower situation awareness can result in safety concerns thus higher levels of automation warrant improved adaptivity to operator fatigue states while ensuring human-in-the-loop interactions there was also a strong correlation between situation awareness and automation observed in both heart rate variability signals and subjective measures these findings highlight the potential of wearables to help communicate critical information from the operators to the robots hopko said ultimately greater robotic assistance was able to improve accuracy and efficiency levels but not precision the consideration of the interplay between human factors such as operator sex and their cognitive states and robot factors on collaborative performance can lead to improved human-robot collaborative system designs we hope to have collaboration between the operator and robot to be as robust to perturbing factors by providing this knowledge unobtrusively to robots to aid in the fluent human-robot adaptation process hopko said this work was supported by the national science foundation
in manufacturing work-related lower-back injuries from lifting and handling heavy objects account for approximately $100 billion in medical bills annually in the united states according to data from the bureau of labor statistics although novel ergonomic interventions such as industrial exoskeletons have shown promise in reducing the risk of musculoskeletal injuries new research finds that the cognitive fit (where the wearer has ample mental resources available to accurately operate the exoskeleton while conducting their daily work tasks) of such wearable robotic solutions in the workplace may impose newer risks on workers these findings address some of the critical concerns by the national institute of occupational safety and health (niosh) on occupational robotics researchers at texas a&m university and the ohio state university have determined that increased cognitive demands in the workplace often associated with new technologies or automation can offset the mechanical advantages of wearing a low-back exoskeleton a wearable device that is aimed to reduce or redistribute biomechanical spine loading associated with heavy manual work these findings are published in the latest issue of applied ergonomics the research team includes dr ranjana mehta associate professor in the wm michael barnes 64 department of industrial and systems engineering and director of the neuroergonomics laboratory; yibo zhu graduate student in industrial and systems engineering and member of the neuroergonomics laboratory; eric weston graduate research associate in industrial systems engineering at the ohio state university; and dr william marras professor of integrated systems engineering neurological surgery orthopedics and physical medicine and rehabilitation at the spine research institute at the ohio state university
using sophisticated microscopy and computational analysis texas a&m university researchers have now validated the merit of a water purification technology that uses electricity to remove and inactivate an assortment of waterborne viruses they said that the yet-to-be-implemented water purification strategy would add another level of safety against pathogens that cause gastrointestinal ailments and other infections in humans there is always a need for new techniques that are better cheaper and more effective at safeguarding the public against disease-causing microorganisms said dr shankar chellam professor in the zachry department of civil and environmental engineering the water purification technique investigated in this study is a promising strategy to kill even more viruses at the earliest stages of water purification the researchers have detailed their findings in the journal environmental science & technology before water reaches homes it undergoes multiple purification steps namely coagulation sedimentation filtration and disinfection conventional coagulation methods use chemicals to trigger the clumping of particles and microbes within untreated water these aggregates can then be removed when they settle as sediments while very effective chellam noted that the chemicals used for coagulation could be very acidic making their transport to treatment plants and storage a challenge thus instead of chemicals-based coagulation the researchers investigated if an up-and-coming coagulation method that uses electricity was as effective at removing microbes from water in particular they used a surrogate of a nonenveloped virus called ms2 bacteriophage for their study their choice of microbes was motivated by the fact that ms2 bacteriophage shares structural similarities with many nonenveloped viruses that can persist in the water after treatment and cause disease in humans for their experiments the researchers inserted iron electrodes in a sample of untreated water laden with viruses when they passed electrical currents the anode oxidized releasing iron ions into the solution these ions combine with dissolved oxygen to produce hydroxyl radicals and also iron-rich precipitates in the process they found that as the iron precipitated the virus attached to these clumps to form bigger aggregates which could be easily removed from the water
next they investigated if this process also inactivated the virus but while the iron aggregates helped in capturing the virus they presented a problem to picture inactivation using electron microscopy clumping causes a tremendous challenge because there is no easy way to isolate the virus from the iron-rich aggregates making it difficult to visualize viral damage and analyze if electrocoagulation was the cause of the viral damage or the virus extraction from the iron-rich clumps said dr anindito sen a research scientist at the texas a&m microscopy and imaging center to address this problem chellams graduate student kyungho kim with sens guidance developed a novel computational technique to directly image the viruses aggregated alongside iron put briefly they digitally inflicted damages on 3d images of an intact ms2 bacteriophage then they generated 2d versions of the damaged 3d model last they compared these images with 2d microscopic images of the virus obtained after electrocoagulation the researchers found that the damage in electrocoagulated viruses ranged from 10% to greater than 60% further by following the same analysis with bacteriophages isolated from conventional coagulation they observed that the viruses were not inactivated the traditional multistep process of water purification has been there to ensure that even if one step fails the subsequent ones can bail you out a multiple barrier approach so to speak said chellam what we are proposing with electrocoagulation is process intensification where coagulation and disinfection are combined within a single step before subsequent purification stages to ensure better protection against waterborne pathogens this study is funded by the national science foundation dr jothikumar narayanan from the centers for disease control and prevention also contributed to this research by demonstrating genomic damage in the virus caused by electrocoagulation the microscopy results in the study were confirmed with enumerations of infective viruses by traditional cell culture techniques spectroscopy and genomic analysis
ucah is a collective network of universities partnering with government industry national laboratories federally funded research centers and university-affiliated research centers to serve the us department of defense requirements in hypersonics-related science and technology workforce development and technology transition ucah is a five-year $100-million consortium funded by the joint hypersonics transition office and led by dr rodney bowersox executive director ucah and associate dean for research texas a&m engineering experiment station
dr jodie lutkenhaus professor in the artie mcferrin department of chemical engineering at texas a&m university will be awarded the arthur k doolittle award by the american chemical society's (acs) division of polymetric materials: science and engineering (pmse) "receiving this award is a major highlight for me " said lutkenhaus "i am honored to be considered among the researchers that have accepted this award in the past" lutkenhaus earned this honor for her outstanding talk on flexible mxene coatings at the acs pmse fall symposium mxenes are two-dimensional nanomaterials that are incredibly conductive and used in various applications including electronics energy storage and sensing since they are transition-metal carbides or nitrides they can be layered as well as altered to obtain specific chemical properties by alternating layers of mxenes and polymer a composite mxene film can be created prior to studies conducted by texas a&m researchers mxenes were studied without a polymer additive producing films that easily cracked and flaked away "a mxene film contains many of these two-dimensional nanosheets stacked together like a brick wall " she said "in our work we use a polymer additive as the ‘mortar to hold all of the mxene nanosheets together in a robust film" the polymer acts as a glue adhering to the faces of the mxene sheets furthermore the researcher's processing system organizes all of the mxene sheets into a flat and layered structure this research is a step toward applying mxene films to numerous different surfaces including fabrics plastics or paints she hopes these developments can lead to innovations such as spray-paint batteries supercapacitors within fabrics or painted-on sensors this work is part of a collaborative grant from the national science foundation with dr micah green professor in the chemical engineering department and dr miladin radovic professor in the department of materials science and engineering lutkenhaus will be formally presented the award at the acs spring national meeting
the next time you buy a new couch you may not ever have to leave your old one to get a feel for the texture of the new material dr cynthia hipwell oscar s wyatt jr '45 chair ii professor in the j mike walker '66 department of mechanical engineering at texas a&m university is leading a team working to better define how the finger interacts with a device with the hope of aiding in the further development of technology that goes beyond sensing and reacting to your touch the team's research was recently published and featured on the cover of the journal advanced materials the ultimate goal of furthering this human-machine interface is to give touch devices the ability to provide users with a richer touch-based experience by equipping the technology with the ability to mimic the feeling of physical objects hipwell shared examples of potential implementations ranging from a more immersive virtual reality platform to tactile display interfaces like those in a motor vehicle dashboard and a virtual shopping experience that would let the user feel the texture of materials before purchasing them "this could allow you to actually feel textures buttons slides and knobs on the screen " hipwell said "it can be used for interactive touch screen-based displays but one holy grail would certainly be being able to bring touch into shopping so that you could feel the texture of fabrics and other products while you're shopping online" hipwell explained that at its essence the "touch" in current touch screen technology is more for the screen's benefit than the user with the emergence and refinement of increasingly sophisticated haptic technology that relationship between user and device can grow to be more reciprocal
she added that the addition of touch as a sensory input would ultimately enrich virtual environments and lighten the burden of communication currently carried by audio and visuals "when we look at virtual experiences they're primarily audio and visual right now and we can get audio and visual overload " hipwell said "being able to bring touch into the human-machine interface can bring a lot more capability much more realism and it can reduce that overload haptic effects can be used to draw your attention to make something easier to find or easier to do using a lower cognitive load" hipwell and her team are approaching the research by looking at the multiphysics the coupled processes or systems involving multiple physical fields occurring at the same time of the interface between the user's finger and the device this interface is incredibly complex and changes with different users and environmental conditions "we're looking at electro-wetting effects (the forces that result from an applied electric field) electrostatic effects changes in properties of the finger the material properties and surface geometry of the device the contact mechanics the fluid motion charge transport really everything that's going on in the interface to understand how the device can be designed to be more reliable and higher performing hipwell said ultimately our goal is to create predictive models that enable a designer to create devices with maximum haptic effect and minimum sensitivity to user and environmental variation" as research into and development of the technology continues to progress hipwell said she predicts consumers will begin to see early elements implemented into common devices over the next few years with some early products already in development "i think early elements of it will definitely be within the next five years " hipwell said "then it will just be a matter of maturing the technology and how advanced how realistic and how widespread it becomes"
public temperature checks have become a common practice across the world during the covid-19 pandemic and researchers at texas a&m university are working to make it possible to conduct the test across a large group of people quicker and less expensive than current methods dr choongho yu professor and sallie and don davis 61 faculty fellow ii in the j mike walker 66 department of mechanical engineering is working alongside his students to harness the thermal energy generated by body heat to power a small self-sustaining electronic device capable of detecting fever in its wearer the team's research was recently published in nature communications if successful yu said such a device could benefit a large number of people especially when implemented in a public setting by quickly and efficiently identifying fever the fever detector can be distributed to many unspecified people at public places at a low price and this technique could be helpful in the early and fast detection of fever commonly observed from a viral infection such as covid sars mers and swine flu yu said graduate student yufan zhang who works with yu on the project said that while fever detection can serve as an effective way to minimize viral transmission during a pandemic a cheap visible and self-sustainable technique is needed to accomplish this goal "thermal energy scavenging shows great potential since an output voltage can be obtained by a temperature difference supplied by the fever " said zhang "to visualize the temperature changes an electrochromic fever detector has been fabricated and connected to the thermal energy harvester" using new principles of thermo-hydro-electrochemical energy conversion yu and his team are working to develop an effective method of providing charge to their fever detection device by harnessing the thermal energy typically wasted by its user via the corrosion properties of carbon steel electrodes "our device is based on carbon steel corrosion to generate voltage and current " yu said "the lifetime of our device depends on the speed of the corrosion process" given the typical rate of corrosion for carbon steel yu said the amount utilized by their device could last for more than a decade while the team is still working to improve the power and current of their device the results so far have been promising with the observed thermal-to-energy conversion generating an unprecedented 87 millivolts per degree celsius this has provided a few volts large enough to operate typical wearable electronics by connecting between four to eight devices in a series unlike conventional thermoelectric devices that require at least 1000 devices to get an equivalent voltage
while medical materials have come a long way toward treating conditions in the body sometimes theyre a bit too stiff to be a perfect fit research at texas a&m university aims to engineer new biomaterials that will provide effective treatment while also moving better with the body i think at the biggest picture what gets me excited is to build dynamic responsive materials and use those to make medical devices said dr taylor ware associate professor in the department of biomedical engineering wares lab work ranges from new material development to device engineering one project is finding innovative material solutions to treating urinary incontinence a condition where there is uncontrolled leakage of urine treatment may include a surgical option where a mesh sling is implanted underneath the urethra to provide support this device has to balance between ensuring there is no leaking while the person is doing day-to-day activities but can release when they need to void however current slings are limited because the clinician has to find the perfect balance to make sure the patient doesn't suffer unintended consequences ware's research aims to develop a device similar to human tissue thats adaptive using a type of material called liquid crystal elastomers that react to heat the team's idea is to 3d print a material that would heat slightly and change shape when illuminated with infrared light allowing a person to void their bladder easily when the material cools it returns to its original shape allowing the person to remain continent in wares lab this project is led by doctoral student seelay tasmim the work is collaborative with dr philippe zimmern professor and clinical urologist at the ut southwestern medical center and dr mario romero-ortega at the university of houston the research is funded by the national institute of biomedical imaging and bioengineering at the national institutes of health ware said these types of biomaterials could open the door for a variety of applications these materials are artificial muscles and we see these materials as useful in a variety of biomedical applications that require mechanical motion ware said for example surgical or even wearable robots may benefit from these soft materials that may be able to replace traditional motors and actuators
turbomachinery is a crucial component in many applications requiring high power density equipment such as rockets planes and power plants a critical part of their success is the bearings that help keep their rotors spinning texas a&m university researchers are working to improve this rotation advances in process fluid-lubricated bearings used in turbomachinery technology could lead to direct benefits for the power generation oil and gas and aviation industries dr adolfo delgado associate professor in the j mike walker '66 department of mechanical engineering is working to increase the technology readiness level of these bearings by developing new designs and characterizing their performance particularly those that use gas as the working fluid delgado has published his research on this topic in the american society of mechanical engineering journal of engineering for gas turbines and power "we are currently looking at smart dampers for hybrid bearings and conducting system-level tests using a turboexpander dummy rotor " delgado said "we need to prevent contact between the rotor and the bearing surface while maintaining acceptable vibration levels as the rotor transitions through critical speeds" delgado said that while gas bearings themselves are not a new concept they can be found in many applications including dentist drills gyroscopes small power generation turbines and even air cycle machines in airplanes their use in megawatt-class turbomachinery has not yet come to fruition "gas bearings are currently used in many applications with a direct impact in our lives " delgado said "this technology will enable the development of higher power density turbomachinery able to reach higher speeds with a smaller footprint among other benefits gas bearings will allow us to reduce the weight and footprint of turbomachinery while allowing operation at higher speeds and temperatures in other words gas bearings will enable the development of higher power density turbomachinery" delgado said the goal of preventing contact between the parts could be achieved by applying a damped flexible support alongside the gas film however this is the greatest challenge facing the bearing's progress toward being a viable replacement for oil-lubricated bearings "the most significant challenge that we still need to tackle is damping as difficult as it may seem we can easily levitate a 500 kg rotor with two gas bearings having a gas film of roughly 12 micrometers a width thinner than a human hair " delgado said "that is not the difficult part the actual challenge is to spin that rotor to 20 000 rpm while minimizing vibration levels and keeping the system stable" delgados research is currently supported by the texas a&m turbomachinery research consortium
as part of the energy transition the energy industry is looking toward the oceans for reliable sustainable and renewable energy sources researchers and engineers aim to create technology that can supply cost-competitive ocean renewable power to support coastal communities which comprise half of the us population dr heonyong kang assistant professor in the department of ocean engineering at texas a&m university is stepping up to this challenge with two separate projects focusing on wave energy converters: one for small-scale and the other for utility-scale applications progress with federal support kangs first project initially came from the us department of energys (doe) wave energy prize competition in 2015 the competition showed that a few conceptual floating wave energy converters are promising but their designs tend to result in expensive or uncompetitive capital expenditure (capex) and operational expenditure (opex) to achieve competitive levelized cost of energy (lcoe) below 40 cents per kilowatt-hour kangs doe-funded project involves a team of multidisciplinary researchers seeking to actualize their patented surface riding wave energy converter (sr-wec) as a cost-competitive solution for small- to intermediate-scale power supplies sr-wecs feature a unique adaptive resonance for varying random waves which produce high-capture width ratios and a modular lightweight system that has the generator sealed these properties substantially reduce capex opex and consequently the competitive lcoe
since this project was initially introduced to the department kangs team has developed two optimum prototype designs of sr-wec: a small-scale sr-wec for self-recharging autonomous underwater vehicles and an intermediate-scale sr-wec for kilowatt-scale power supplies for powering the blue economy applications now they are working on crafting scaled prototypes the prototypes will first be tested in a dry testbed and then in the 2d wave-current-wind basin in college station although we have been facing numerous challenges throughout this pioneering research we get more excited and motivated as we discover new knowledge and recognize we are helping the energy transition said kang partnering with industry to commercialize ocean wave energy kang is also working with global perpetual energy (gpe) a texas renewable energy company to create a utility-scale wave energy converter that will be able to produce megawatt-scale power evolving from gpes patented ocean renewable energy platform kang is developing an optimum wave energy converter system that effectively extracts energy from elastic deformation resonance with waves over a large area the system design was inspired by the fact that the wave energy spans the entire length of the wave measuring tens to hundreds of meters the goal of this gpe-sponsored project is to test a prototype offshore in galveston what we are trying to do is find a solution both effective and cost-competitive he said by combining both we can reach a competitive lcoe so that the public can access wave energy that is renewable clean close to half of the us population and consistently available throughout the day and night and in mild to severe sea states
a grant from the us department of education is paving the way to address the country's need for resilient infrastructure while training the next generation of engineers in advanced construction methods and technologies disasters from natural hazards such as hurricanes floods and earthquakes increase the need for rapidly constructible and resilient infrastructure to expedite the recovery of affected areas and minimize socioeconomic impacts while also preventing future disasters the graduate assistantships in areas of national need (gaann) program in infrastructure resilience in the context of advanced construction methods led by project director dr petros sideris will adopt advance and implement novel cutting-edge construction methods such as large-scale 3d printing advanced construction methods offer out-of-the-box design solutions that can achieve decreased construction times through automation lower environmental impacts through reduced materials use and waste and potentially lower construction costs sideris said affordable resilient structures are also key to addressing the housing crisis both nationally and internationally thus contributing to social resilience our gaann program constitutes a unique educational and research approach that will provide engineers with special training to enter academic industrial and government fields and serve the country's needs the gaann program specifically supports diversity in academia and the civil engineering profession as a whole by joining the efforts of texas a&m's louis stokes alliances for minority participation program the texas a&m college of engineering's access and inclusion program and the college of engineering's women in engineering program sideris said they are working to reach a broad and diverse pool of highly qualified applicants especially women and underrepresented minorities the program will offer gaann fellows well-rounded training in research and teaching as well as professional development opportunities and international experiences all gaann fellows will also have access to cutting-edge experimental facilities such as the center for infrastructure renewal (cir) with its advanced equipment including small- and large-scale 3d printers the project team also includes lead co-director dr anand puppala professor and cir interim director; and co-directors dr maria koliou assistant professor; dr luciana barroso associate professor; dr zachary grasley department head and professor; and dr mary beth hueste professor and associate department head for undergraduate programs learn more about the gaann program
millions of barrels of oil are produced daily from us shale reservoirs yet this quantity is small in comparison to the actual amount of oil locked away in these subsurface rocks the oil and gas industry has put fiber-optic sensing cables downhole to better understand hydraulic fracture results and why stimulation and production processes dont free the trapped oil at expected rates unfortunately the streams of information received from these sensors are massive and hard to sort through a multidisciplinary team including researchers at texas a&m university and a faculty member from the colorado school of mines has created an algorithm to clean up the subsurface data from fracturing efforts and offer a clear view of how and where these processes succeeded and failed in shale reservoir rocks our quantitative characterization retrieves more information about fracture geometries within a reservoir than a simple qualitative analysis would said dr kan wu associate professor and chevron corporation faculty fellow in the harold vance department of petroleum engineering weve tested our algorithm and already applied it in the field the results were published on nov 11 2021 in the society of petroleum engineers spe production & operation journal traditional data interpretation methods though incredibly helpful to engineers are based strictly on qualitative information or probabilities based on patterns of information in contrast the algorithm was developed to gather quantitative data thats countable like temperature pressure or rock deformation changes within a reservoir it recognizes the outcomes that occurred to create the changes and accurately models how far and fast the fractures traveled what directions they went and how big they became low-frequency distributed acoustic sensing (das) data gathering has only been around for five years so not all information received from the wells with fiber optics has been fully deciphered also each well has its own range of characteristics due to the enormous variations of subsurface structures this complexity is why wu and her colleagues fellow faculty member dr george moridis professor and robert l whiting chair and dr ge jin assistant professor of geophysics at mines needed a considerable amount of time to meticulously develop their algorithm first the researchers tested the algorithms ability to clean the data and interpret simple streams from known fracture processes that way they could backtrack or reverse the information to find the starting point of a fractures growth as the algorithm was expanded to understand more complex information they improved its ability to think in a forward manner and predict how new and complex fractures initiate and grow
wu is an expert in rock mechanics jin an expert in geophysics and das technology and moridis is an expert in advanced numerical methods and high-performance computing of coupled processes because of the multidisciplinary backgrounds of the project team the algorithm possesses incredible flexibility to grow and adapt to the type of data it receives for instance yongzan liu the graduate student on the project for over two years is now a postdoc researcher using similar methods and modeling on fiber-optic data from hydrate-bearing sediments to monitor natural gas production for the lawrence berkeley national laboratory liu wu moridis and jin are the first to develop this type of algorithm and publish results the goal of their research is to eventually automate the algorithm so that feedback from fracturing events happens in near real time on a drill site this way engineers can quickly tailor fracture design efforts to each wells particular composition the industry needs this type of tool to understand fracture geometry and to monitor fracture propagation said wu the more efficient it becomes the better it will help optimize hydraulic fracture and completion designs and maximize well production
in an effort to continue broadening the understanding of advanced nuclear technology the texas a&m engineering experiment station has installed the nuscale small modular reactor control room simulator at the center for advanced small modular and micro reactors (casmr) the simulator at casmr will provide an authentic feel of being in the control room at a 12-unit small modular reactor plant equipped with features and functionality unique to nuscale technology the simulator is intended to provide an innovative multidisciplinary training and educational environment to undergraduate and graduate students as well as professionals the simulator will help enhance casmrs outreach opportunities and broaden the understanding of the working of state-of-the-art modular nuclear plants among students researchers and operators at off-site locations said dr yassin hassan director of casmr regents professor and holder of the peterson chair in the texas a&m university college of engineering casmrs goal is to hasten the development of new and transformative technologies materials and modeling and simulation that will make nuclear energy more affordable sustainable and rapidly deployable the center also brings together a diverse group of domestic and international partners to collaborate on nuclear energy initiatives to bridge the gaps between basic research engineering development and commercialization the simulator is supported by the us department of energy nuclear energy university program through generic scientific infrastructure grants for multi-universities for small modular reactor simulators at oregon state university the university of idaho at the center for advanced energy studies and texas a&m
dr jeyavijayan "jv" rajendran assistant professor in the department of electrical and computer engineering at texas a&m university was awarded the 2021 institute of electrical and electronics engineers (ieee) ceda kuh early career award for his contributions to secure and trustworthy integrated circuits in the field of electronic design automation the award which is the highest honor for young faculty in the field of electronic design automation was presented at the 2021 international conference on computer-aided design held in munich germany on nov 5 each year the ieee ceda ernest s kuh early career award honors one individual who has made innovative and substantial technical contributions to the area of electronic design automation in the early stages of his or her career (within eight years of getting the highest educational degree) the award is named in honor of the late ernest s kuh who made pioneering contributions to circuit theory electronic design automation and engineering education