UH Chemical Engineering Professor Kishore Mohanty has been selected as the 2004 recipient of the Sigma Xi Faculty Research Award "for distinguished contributions to scientific knowledge and its applications." The award, given by the Houston chapter of the organization, includes a $2,000 prize.
Mohanty will also give the Sigma Xi lecture to the University community this fall.
Mohanty's research focuses on transport of simple and complex fluids in complex microstructured materials for applications in energy, environment and biotechnology. Many naturally occurring materials such as sandstones, carbonates, aquifers, human bones and tissues are microstructured. Many fluids used in these systems are nanostructured. This research is aimed at imaging these structures, understanding the physics of transport, relating the microstructures to transport coefficients and developing new materials for enhanced targeted transport.
He received a bachelor's degree in chemical engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, and a Ph.D. in chemical engineering from the University of Minnesota.
Sigma Xi, The Scientific Research Society, is the global honor society of scientists and engineers that promotes scientific achievement. Sigma Xi has chapters in every college and university in the U.S., and some 180 Sigma Xi members are Nobel laureates and many more have been elected to the National Academies of Science and Engineering.
The UH Chapter of Sigma Xi promotes research at UH by awarding research excellence prizes to faculty and graduate students, and by organizing the annual graduate and undergraduate student research poster competition and the Sigma Xi Faculty Research Award lecture and reception.
Sigma Xi also presented awards to the following engineering students:
GRADUATE STUDENT RESEARCH AWARDS
Madhuchhanda (Madhu) Bhattacharya, Chemical Engineering
Advisors: Drs. Michael Harold & Vemuri Balakotaiah
Jose Canelon, Electrical & Computer Engineering
Advisor: Dr. Leang Shieh
GRADUATE STUDENT POSTER AWARDS
"Transverse Non-Uniform States in Packed Bed Reactors"
by Ganesh A Viswanathan, Chemical Engineering
Advisor: Dr. Dan Luss
UNDERGRADUATE STUDENT POSTER AWARDS
"Smart Vibration Platform"
by Claudio Olmi, Kristin Moorman, Treston Davis & Ayokunle Osho, Mechanical Engineering
Advisor: Dr. Gangbing Song