Events for March
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Astani Civil and Environmental Engineering Seminar
Thu, Mar 03, 2022 @ 12:30 PM - 01:30 PM
Sonny Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Dr. Joshua Jack, Postdoctoral Research Scholar, Princeton University
Talk Title: Engineering a New Circular Economy: Waste CO2 valorization and resource recovery towards an improved water-energy-climate nexus
Abstract: Understanding and advancing the water-energy-climate nexus is key to mitigating the immense threats of climate change and solving many of the related environmental issues we face today. Due to the rapid decrease in the cost of renewable energy, it is now practical to design devices that use renewable electrons to drive the transformation of CO2 and other waste feedstock (wastewater, food waste, biomass) into high-value products while also recovering important resources such as water, nutrients, and energy. Overall, these new sustainable technologies can help us decarbonize various sectors and enable a new circular economy. This presentation will discuss opportunities to leverage cutting-edge hybrid electrochemical-biological technologies in diverse environmental applications including wastewater reclamation, water reuse, remediation, desalination, and CO2 capture and conversion. Current lab scale experiments have demonstrated excellent production rates, titer,and energy efficiencies. Efforts towards improving scalability, expanding the portfolio of products, and implementing new types of waste streams are on going.
Biography: Joshua Jack is a postdoctoral research scholar in the Andlinger Center for Energy and Environment and the Civil and Environmental Engineering department at Princeton University. Jack previously earned a bachelor degree in Civil and Environmental Engineering from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst and holds a doctoral degree in Environmental Engineering from the University of Colorado, Boulder. During his graduate studies, Jack obtained extensive interdisciplinary research experience at both the DOE-National Renewable Energy Laboratory and NASA Langley Research Center, and has received numerous awards including a NASA Outstanding Research Award and NSF Fellowship. Jack current research focuses on energy and resource recovery as part of a sustainable water-energy-climate nexus with a special focus on process design of bioelectrochemical technologies toward scalable CO2 valorization and water treatment. Jack collaborates with many researchers from the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering as well as various DOE laboratories and private companies such as Shell Energy. Jack has recently published in many highly cited journals including Applied Energy and Green Chemistry and plans to begin a tenure-track academic position in the near future.
Host: D. Amy Childress
Webcast: https://usc.zoom.us/j/91873923659 Meeting ID: 918 7392 3659 Passcode: 975701Location: Ronald Tutor Hall of Engineering (RTH) - 526
WebCast Link: https://usc.zoom.us/j/91873923659 Meeting ID: 918 7392 3659 Passcode: 975701
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Evangeline Reyes
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Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Seminar
Thu, Mar 10, 2022 @ 01:30 PM - 01:30 PM
Sonny Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Michael Gomez, Ph.D., University of Washington
Talk Title: Bio-cementation Soil Improvement for the Mitigation of Earthquake-induced Soil Liquefaction
Abstract: Recent advances in bio-mediated soil improvement technologies have highlighted the potential of natural biological-chemical reactions in the soil subsurface to enable mitigation of infrastructure damage resulting from natural hazards such as earthquakes. Bio-mediated geotechnical solutions leverage the capabilities of microorganisms already existing in the geotechnical subsurface to generate a diverse range of products, which can dramatically improve the engineering behavior of soils. One such technology, Microbially Induced Calcite Precipitation (MICP), is an environmentally conscious soil improvement technique that can improve the geotechnical properties of granular soils through the precipitation of calcite. The biogeochemical process offers an environmentally-conscious alternative to traditional brute-force mechanical and Portland cement based ground improvement methods, by utilizing natural microbial enzymatic activity to induce calcite precipitation on soil particle surfaces and at particle contacts. The resulting bio-cementation affords improvements in soil shear strength, initial shear stiffness, and liquefaction resistance, while reducing soil hydraulic conductivity and porosity. Although MICP has been demonstrated extensively at the laboratory scale, critical gaps remain in our understanding of this technology with respect to up-scaling the process to field-scale, understanding the engineering behavior of (bio-)cemented geomaterials, and evaluating material permanence. This presentation will provide a brief introduction to MICP and highlight results from several recent experiments completed at centimeter- and meter- scales aimed at: (1) developing the MICP process for field-scale deployment including techniques for the stimulation of indigenous microorganisms, management of ammonium by-products, and improvement of cementation spatial uniformity and extent, (2) characterizing the liquefaction resistance of bio-cemented geomaterials including triggering and post-triggering responses, and (3) systematically exploring the effect of treatment conditions and environmental factors on resulting material mineralogy and long-term
Biography: Mike Gomez is an Assistant Professor in the department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Washington. Mike joined UW in March 2017 after completing his Ph.D. at the University of California, Davis. His research focuses on leveraging natural chemical and biological processes in soils to develop sustainable bio-mediated geotechnical ground improvement technologies. In particular, Mike research has focused on the strengthening of loose and weak granular soils through a bio-mediated calcite precipitation process known as Microbially Induced Calcite Precipitation (MICP). Mike additional research interests include advanced laboratory and in-situ testing, naturally cemented and aged geomaterials, reactive transport modeling, clay surface chemistry, and non-destructive measurements for site characterization and subsurface reaction monitoring, among other topics.
Host: Dr. Chukwuebuka Nweke
Webcast: https://usc.zoom.us/j/91873923659 Meeting ID: 918 7392 3659 Pass: 975701Location: ZOOM MEETING
WebCast Link: https://usc.zoom.us/j/91873923659 Meeting ID: 918 7392 3659 Pass: 975701
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Evangeline Reyes
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Astani Civil and Environmental Engineering Seminar
Fri, Mar 25, 2022 @ 12:30 PM - 01:30 PM
Sonny Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Dr. Kristopher McNeill, Department of Environmental Systems Science, ETH Zurich
Talk Title: An Environmental Chemist View of Biodegradable Plastics
Abstract: Contamination of the environment with plastic is a long-recognized problem, but in recent years, there has been a remarkable increase in public attention and outcry regarding plastic pollution. The low cost and durability of plastic materials, which make them desirable for many applications, are the same factors that contribute to their accumulation. The low cost lowers the barrier to short- term and single use applications and the durability means that, once in the environment, these materials are highly persistent. On this latter point, there is a growing interest and market for non- persistent, biodegradable plastic materials, which could help the problem of accumulation of plastic in the environment. This presentation will focus on several key questions about these alternative biodegradable materials: How do we know that a material is really biodegrading instead of just breaking down into microplastic? How does the receiving environment affect biodegradability? Are there applications where biodegradable plastics are viable alternatives to conventional plastics? What are the challenges that we face from an environmental chemistry perspective?
Biography: Prof. Kris McNeill received his B.A. in Chemistry from Reed College (Portland, Oregon) in 1992 and his Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of California, Berkeley in 1997. At Berkeley, he was co-advised by Professors Robert Bergman and Richard Andersen. Following his PhD, he switched his research focus from organometallic chemistry to environmental chemistry. He was a postdoctoral researcher at MIT from 1997 to 1999 with Prof. Philip Gschwend in the department of Civil and Environmental Engineering. McNeill began his independent career as a faculty member at the University of Minnesota in the Department of Chemistry, holding ranks of Assistant Professor (2000-2006) and Associate Professor (2007-2009). In 2009, Kris McNeill joined the faculty of ETH Zurich, where he continues to apply physical organic chemistry to the study of environmental processes.
Host: Dr. Daniel McCurry
More Info: https://usc.zoom.us/j/93390473354 Meeting ID: 933 9047 3354 Passcode: 527888
Location: Ray R. Irani Hall (RRI) - 421
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Evangeline Reyes
Event Link: https://usc.zoom.us/j/93390473354 Meeting ID: 933 9047 3354 Passcode: 527888
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Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Ph.D. Dissertation
Mon, Mar 28, 2022 @ 02:00 PM - 04:00 PM
Sonny Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Maria Morvillo, Ph.D. Candidate, Viterbi School of Engineering- Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Talk Title: Reproducible and Rapid Computational Approaches for Assessing Contamination in Natural Aquifers
Abstract: The ubiquitous presence of multi-scale heterogeneity in hydrological properties is the cause of complex subsurface flow patterns that impact the transport behavior of a solute plume. Fluctuations in the velocity field lead to increased solute spreading which enhances mass transfer mechanisms and impact solute arrival times. This thesis proposes a series of methods which accounts for the effects of aquifer heterogeneity on transport observables which are essential for risk analysis, performance assessment of waste disposal facilities and the selection of optimal remediation cleanup strategies. The approaches proposed in this dissertation are computationally rapid and reproducible. The first contribution of this thesis consists of the development of a novel aquifer connectivity-ranked Monte Carlo method that accelerates the statistical convergence of the statistics of the first arrival times of a solute body in an environmentally sensitive location. Secondly, I propose an innovative kernel-based reactive random walk particle tracking method to improve the computational efficiency associated with reactive transport in spatially variable groundwater flows. Finally, we present a computational package that links the various components relevant for the estimation of the concentration of a pollutant at an environmentally sensitive target and its uncertainty to support decision making in risk analysis.
Host: Advisor, Dr. Felipe de Barros
More Info: https://usc.zoom.us/j/96445541938
Location: Zoom Meeting
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Evangeline Reyes
Event Link: https://usc.zoom.us/j/96445541938
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Astani Civil and Environmental Engineering Seminar
Thu, Mar 31, 2022 @ 12:30 PM - 01:30 PM
Sonny Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Dr. Michael Shields, John Hopkins University
Talk Title: Manifold Learning for High Dimensional Uncertainty Quantification
Abstract:
Uncertainty Quantification (UQ), the systematic and rigorous accounting of uncertainties, has become widely accepted as an essential component of any proper scientific investigation -“ whether computational, experimental, or otherwise. In computational science and engineering, as well as in experimental investigations, we often encounter problems that are parameterized by very high-dimensional quantities and/or result in very high-dimensional quantities of interest. Thanks to the curse of dimensionality, the challenge of solving these problems grows exponentially with the problem dimensions. This explosive growth in complexity has been widely known for decades and may never be truly resolved. However, all hope is not lost. In this presentation, we offer some strategies for addressing high dimensional UQ problems whose uncertainties can be expressed in lower-dimensional latent spaces or on manifolds whose geometry is not necessarily Euclidean. We begin by introducing some concepts in Reimannian geometry and nonlinear dimension reduction, specifically reviewing Grassmann manifolds and diffusion maps, and show how UQ problems with high dimensional solutions can be solved by projecting solution snapshots onto the Grassmann manifold, performing diffusion maps on the manifold, and constructing surrogate models on the resulting low-dimensional space using standard machine learning methods such as Gaussian process regression, polynomial chaos expansions (PCE), or deep neural networks. Next, we consider problems with very high dimensional inputs and present a survey of 13 different unsupervised learning methods for dimension reduction, which are used to identify low-dimensional latent spaces on which PCE surrogates are constructed. Some takeaways from this general approach, termed manifold-PCE, are presented. Finally, we bring the two components together to propose a general framework for UQ in high dimensions that is widely applicable and very flexible.
Biography: Michael D. Shields is an Associate Professor in the Dept. of Civil & Systems Engineering at Johns Hopkins University and holds a secondary appointment in the Dept. of Materials Science and Engineering. Prof. Shields conducts methodological research in uncertainty quantification and stochastic simulation for problems in mechanics, materials science, and physics with applications ranging from multi-scale material modeling to assessing the reliability and safety of large-scale structures. He received his Ph.D. in Civil Engineering and Engineering Mechanics from Columbia University in 2010, after which he was employed as a Research Engineer in applied computational mechanics at Weidlinger Associates, Inc. He joined the faculty at Johns Hopkins in 2013. For his work in UQ, Prof. Shields has been awarded the ONR Young Investigator Award, the NSF CAREER Award, the DOE Early Career Award, and the Johns Hopkins University Catalyst Award. Prof. Shields and his group also develop the open-source UQpy (Uncertainty Quantification with Python) software, which is a general toolbox for UQ in computational, mathematical, and physical systems.
Host: Dr. Roger Ghanem
Webcast: https://usc.zoom.us/j/91873923659 Meeting ID: 918 7392 3659 Pass: 975701Location: Ronald Tutor Hall of Engineering (RTH) - 526
WebCast Link: https://usc.zoom.us/j/91873923659 Meeting ID: 918 7392 3659 Pass: 975701
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Evangeline Reyes
