Grad students win top awards at 2023 AIChE Annual Conference
Not one, but two graduate students from the William G. Lowrie Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering distinguished themselves at last week's American Institute for Chemical Engineers (AIChE) 2023 Annual Conference held in Orlando, Florida: Curtis Moore and Ashin Sunny.
Ashin Sunny, a doctoral student and member of L.-S. Fan's laboratory, won Best Poster in the Particle Technology Forum (PTF) division poster competition.
Sunny's poster described his research on exploring the possibility of using magnetically stabilized fluidized bed reactors for enhanced point source carbon dioxide capture using alkali metal carbonate-based solid sorbents.
This is not the first time that Sunny's work has been recognized. In December 2020 as a member of the Fan Group, he won first prize in the Indian Institute of Chemical Engineers' (IIChE) competition, "Best Research Paper Published in a High-Impact Factor International Journal by an Undergraduate Chemical Engineering Student" for a paper he had written as an undergraduate. In September 2022, Ashin also received the Phi Kappa Phi Love of Learning Award in recognition of his superior academic record and life/career ambitions.
Sunny's ultimate goal is to establish a presence in the research community through innovations that would benefit industry and society, solving problems related to energy and sustainability. He is passionate about tackling climate change via decarbonization.
Curtis Moore, a doctoral student in the S.T. Yang Group, was one of six Oral Competition winners (out of 64 competitors) in the AIChE Division 15 Oral Competition in the category of Biorenewable resource engineering for food, health and environmental applications. In Moore's notification letter, Assistant Professor Whitney Stoppel noted that the competition was "very tight" and that Moore's work "definitely stood out at the top." One of the judges commented, "Clear presentation with great pacing, the hypothesis was well formulated and explained- Great job!" Moore received a $600 prize.
