Engineering
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Mizzou Engineering digging further into earthquakes
May 12, 2008
posted by Vicki Hodder, CoE senior information specialist at
12:35 PM
Mizzou Engineering Assistant Professor William J. Likos adjusts a new device that allows researchers to analyze how deep-sea forces help produce earthquakes while, at left, Jeffrey Mues, a Burns & McDonnell Inc. senior civil engineer and MU engineering alumnus, looks over the equipment. Burns & McDonnell joined forces with two MU departments to buy the $16,800 device. Photo by Vicki Hodder
Mizzou Engineering researchers have begun digging more deeply into what triggers earthquakes, thanks to a powerful new device that simulates the enormous forces bearing down on rocks about a kilometer below the ocean floor.
Engineering’s geotechnical group in mid-April installed a $16,800 high-pressure soil compression test device, jointly financed by a $4,000 donation from Kansas City, Mo.-based Burns & McDonnell Inc. and MU’s civil and environmental engineering and geological sciences departments. The new device can place as much as 10,000 pounds of force on a rock sample, compared to the 2,000-pound capacity of the group’s other devices, said William J. Likos, a civil and environmental engineering assistant professor who worked to obtain the equipment.
“That’s sufficient to simulate the pressures associated with about one kilometer below the sea floor,” Likos said.
Those types of enormous pressures shaped the samples Mizzou researchers collected last year during a research drilling expedition organized by the Integrated Ocean Drilling Program (IODP), a marine research organization including the United States, Japan, Europe, China and South Korea.
Likos and MU geology Professor Michael Underwood were among eight American scientists who joined the IODP’s November 2007 expedition #315 to drill into and sample the ocean floor in a well-known fault system in the Nankai Trough, off Japan’s coastline. The fault system periodically produces devastating earthquakes and tsunamis, most recently during the 1940s.
With the high-pressure soil compression test device, MU engineers and geologists can analyze how deep-sea stresses and changes in sediment and rock properties help produce earthquakes.
“It’s a very complex system, and if we can understand the stresses in this complex system, then we can develop a better understanding of earthquakes,” Likos said.
That understanding of deep material properties along active faults may well help geologists figure out earthquakes closer to home, such as the quake that shook Illinois and its neighboring states on May 1, Underwood said.
Mizzou Engineering researcher studying environmental impact of popular nanotechnology
May 5, 2008
posted by Vicki Hodder, CoE senior information specialist at
11:36 AM
The microscopic image above shows silver nanoparticles attaching themselves to bacteria used across the country to remove ammonia from the wastewater treatment system. Chemicals released by the nanosilver probably inhibit the bacteria’s growth.
Image courtesy of Zhiqiang Hu
A University of Missouri researcher has found an increasingly popular nanomaterial kills bacteria used to clean the nation’s wastewater, and is launching a follow-up study to determine the levels at which it becomes toxic.
Zhiqiang Hu, an MU civil and environmental engineering assistant professor, found in a National Science Foundation-sponsored study that silver nanoparticles destroy benign bacteria employed across the country to remove ammonia from the wastewater treatment system. Several products containing silver nanoparticles already are on the market, including nanosilver socks designed to inhibit odor-causing bacteria and wash machines that disinfect clothes with the tiny particles.
“We found that silver nanoparticles are extremely toxic,” Hu said.
Hu said nanosilver particles generate more unique chemicals—known as highly reactive oxygen species—than do larger forms of silver. Those chemicals likely inhibit bacterial growth, he said.
The Water Environment Research Foundation recently awarded Hu $150,000 to determine more precisely when silver nanoparticles start to impair wastewater treatment. Work on the follow-up research is slated to start May 1 and be completed by 2010, Hu said.
In that project, Hu will determine how silver nanoparticles affect representative wastewater treatment processes by gradually releasing as well as injecting a shock load of the nanomaterial into wastewater and sludge. Measuring subsequent microbial growth will allow MU researchers to determine the nanosilver levels that will harm wastewater treatment and sludge digestion, Hu said.
With that knowledge, nanoparticles in wastewater can be better managed and regulated, he said.
Hu’s silver nanoparticle research has been published in Water Research and Environmental Science & Technology.
Mizzou team steering towards the “hydrogen highway”
May 4, 2008
posted by Vicki Hodder, CoE senior information specialist at
12:16 PM
Chemical engineering students Michael Gordon, left, and Matthias Young insert a 70-pound hydrogen fuel tank into the frame of Mizzou's first hydrogen fuel car. The car will travel 600 miles on a full tank of hydrogen, team members said.
Photo by Vicki Hodder
The University of Missouri’s alternative energy team has undergone a transformation that may prove prophetic.
After 15 years of building a solar car for competition, the team decided in late 2005 to steer instead towards the “hydrogen highway” by constructing a fuel cell car. It’s a course with few maps but great potential to revolutionize the way the nation travels, team leaders believe.
“This is a definite possibility for the future,” said team Secretary Caitlin Garing, a journalism senior. “That’s really amazing, to be a part of the future.”
About 30 undergraduate students from myriad disciplines—primarily within Mizzou Engineering, but also including journalism, chemistry and business—comprise the team, which last competed with a solar car in the 2005 North American Solar Challenge (NASC).
The Mizzou Hydrogen Car Team, officially dubbed The Society for the Development of Alternative Energy Team, will showcase its car in the upcoming NASC demonstration category. Team members will drive their hydrogen-powered car about 2,300 miles between July 13 and July 22, traveling from Plano, Texas to Calgary, Alberta in the international event.
MU’s hydrogen fuel cell car shares a vision of renewable fuel technology with solar cars, and so warrants a spot in the NASC event, said Dan Eberle, the competition’s director. Indeed, a hydrogen car can be considered a solar car one step removed, since hydrogen can be created using solar cells, Eberle said.
Mizzou’s car is one of three fuel cell cars that may participate in NASC’s demonstration category, he said.
Mizzou team President Chris Millner said his group’s car carries about 1.6 kilograms of hydrogen in a lightweight carbon fiber tank in the car’s back end. An on-board feeder draws hydrogen from the tank to fuel two cells, which combine the hydrogen with oxygen to power the car’s electric motor, said Millner, an industrial engineering junior.
Team members estimate that a single tank of hydrogen will drive the car about 600 miles, bolstered by electric batteries within the car to even out the power flow.
While acknowledging hydrogen fuel’s challenges, Millner said he hopes Mizzou’s efforts will help generate enthusiasm for the new technology in teams across the country. Many U.S. corporations and government agencies already share Millner’s zest for hydrogen technology, promoting its potential to revolutionize transportation through such publicly-supported efforts as California’s hydrogen highway and the U.S. Department of Energy’s FreedomCAR research program.
“I think we should be able to build on (hydrogen’s potential), get people behind it,” Millner said.
Mizzou Engineering student team designs better septic tank
May 3, 2008
posted by Vicki Hodder, CoE senior information specialist at
2:01 PM
P3 team members Andrew McCulloch, left, and Huy Nguyen describe the group’s experimental septic tank system during an Environmental Protection Agency competition.
Photo by Jamie Cole
A Mizzou Engineering student team is devising a new type of septic tank that would better protect the environment.
About 25 percent of the U.S. population—and 40 percent of new developments—use septic systems, according to U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Web site statistics. But wastewater treated and released by many septic systems still contains nutrients, primarily nitrogen and phosphorus, that stimulate the growth of oxygen-hoarding algae, experts say.
“The aim of this technology is to improve contaminant removal from household wastewater and return cleaner water to the environment,” said Jamie Cole, a biological engineering senior serving as co-leader for the Mizzou team.
The MU People, Prosperity and the Planet (P3) student design team started work last January on their septic tank prototype in order to participate in the EPA’s P3 Award competition, held from April 20 to April 22 in Washington, D.C. The team—comprising Cole, civil engineering graduate students Huy Nguyen and Zhihua Liang and civil engineering junior Andrew McCulloch—brought home an honorable mention and encouragement to build a full-scale model of their prototype.
Mizzou’s septic tank uses a gas-permeable membrane to diffuse oxygen into the system, increasing the amount of oxygen in the tank. That allows nutrient-removing bacteria to work more effectively, said civil and environmental engineering Assistant Professor Zhiqiang Hu, the team’s faculty advisor.
Nguyen said the team plans to build a full-scale model of its septic tank and test it at an EPA-approved center. Ultimately, team members hope to bring the new septic design to market, Nguyen said.
“We think this is a good way to update septic systems using low-cost and efficient technologies so that they’ll remove more nutrients,” Hu said.
Mizzou Engineering geotechnical team reinforces success
May 2, 2008
posted by Vicki Hodder, CoE senior information specialist at
1:12 PM
Geotechnical team leader Daniel Huaco cuts strips of paper to reinforce Mizzou Engineering’s winning retaining wall during a regional competition.
Having taken top honors in another civil engineering competition, the Mizzou Engineering geotechnical team plans to apply this year to become an official university organization.
“We’ve been competing—and winning—regularly for three years, and we’d like to get the university’s official backing for our group,” said team leader Daniel Huaco, a civil engineering graduate student.
Huaco and civil engineering students Wyatt Jenkins, a sophomore, and Sarah Grant, a junior, joined forces as an informal team last January to compete in retaining wall-building competitions. Competing geotechnical teams strive to build the strongest wall—with the least amount of reinforcement—out of poster board and paper.
Mizzou’s team won the American Society of Civil Engineers regional geotechnical competition held April 18 at the University of Arkansas, adding to Mizzou’s handful of victories over the last three years.
Team members described the contest as among the most challenging they have encountered, citing limited tools and a short time frame. They credited their win to extensive training.
“It was a great feeling, because some of the best engineering schools in the area were in attendance,” Jenkins said.
The team will seek to transform their informal group into an official MU student organization over the summer. Official status will help generate interest in the team, as well as provide funding for equipment and materials, Grant said.
“The more students, knowledge and ideas on the team, the better,” she said.
New Mizzou Engineering student organization on tap
May 1, 2008
posted by Vicki Hodder, CoE senior information specialist at
2:30 PM
Water quality will be the focus of a new Mizzou student organization now in the works.
Prompted by requests from environmental engineers throughout Missouri, MU’s College of Engineering is laying the foundation for a student chapter of the Water Environment Federation (WEF). Only two other Missouri universities—the Missouri University of Science and Technology and Washington University in St. Louis—sponsor student chapters of the Washington, D.C.-based international organization, which is dedicated to preserving and improving global water quality.
“We would like to get more students involved in this organization,” said MU environmental engineering Assistant Professor Enos Inniss, who is helping organize and likely will serve as faculty advisor for the new student group. “We want MU students to learn more about what it’s like to work in water qualityrelated jobs and also have a forum in which to meet with practicing professionals.”
Inniss said representatives of the City of Columbia and companies such as Kansas City-based Black & Veatch Corp. and Columbia-based MEC Water Resources have expressed interest in helping establish a student WEF chapter. The student group likely would appeal to biological, civil and chemical engineering undergraduate and graduate students, he said.
Those who do join will benefit from the professional access WEF provides as well as from the student design and employment guidance the group can offer, said Tom Ratzki, a Black & Veatch civil engineer serving as student activities chair for WEF’s statewide organization.
Mizzou probably will launch its student chapter next fall, Inniss said.
Contact Enos Inniss at (573) 882-2041 for more information