Cardinal Applause- Spring 2013

Congratulations to Ph.D. Chemical Engineering students, Jie Fu and QiangXu, who have won the 1st place award in the student paper contest of 2012 CAPA (Chinese American Petroleum Association) Petroleum and Petrochemical Technical Symposium. Graduate students from Chemical and Petroleum Engineering programs of Lamar, UH, Texas A&M, and UT Austin joined the competition. Jie presented his paper titled "Plant-wide Dynamic Modeling and Simulation for an Ethylene Plant".

Congratulations to Dr. Alberto Marquez, assistant professor of industrial engineering; Dr. Wilhang Zhu, associate professor of industrial engineering; and Julia Yoo, assistant professional pedagogy-who have received funding for its project, “Multimedia Learning of Engineering Economics Through Role Play Gaming on a Mobile Platform.” The $200,000 grant from the National Science Foundation Enables them to student the effectiveness of mobile technology in promoting deep and lasting learning.

Electrical Engineering students Phillip Huff, Stanley Richardson-Whyte, Alan Cleveland, and Chase Patten took 2nd placeat the annual IEEE Center for the Commercialization of ElectricTechnologies Student Design Contest. This year’s event dealt with thedesign of an apparatus to automatically remove and install wattmeters in electrical service entry panels in commercial and residential applications to protect service personnel from potential danger from arc flash events.Thus, the teamworked toward asolution of an actual problem faced by electric utilities andgreen technology industries.Theaward carries a $500 prize, a paid trip to the IEEE Region VConference in Boulder, Colorado to be held in April, and atrophy.

Congratulations to Alberto Marquez, Weihang Zhu and Julia Yoo for receiving a National Science Foundation grant, Multimedia Learning of Engineering Economics through Role Play Gaming on a Mobile Platform. The mobile technology allows a ubiquitous learning environment suitable to student lifestyle constraints. This study has application in a number of STEM education areas and therefore will significantly improve STEM education

Congratulations to Dr. Helen Lou, a professor in the Department of Chemical Engineering, who has been selected by Shanxi Province of China as one of the “Top 100 Talents” for the province’s economic growth. As part of this award program to forge international collaboration and stimulate economic growth, Dr. Lou will receive one million RMBs (Chinese Yuan) over three years to develop clean coal related technologies in collaboration with researchers at Shanxi University.

The Texas Society of Professional Engineers (TSPE) Sabine Chapter held its annual Engineer’s Week banquet in February where they named Dr. Joseph Majdalani as 2013 Engineer of The Year. Dr. Joseph Majdalani is an adjunct Professor in the Civil Engineering Department.