On September 12, UMBC’s Upal Ghosh, from the Department of Chemical, Biochemical, and Environmental Engineering, was sworn in as a member of the Washington, D.C., mayor’s Leadership Council for a Cleaner Anacostia River (LCCAR). The council consists of 25 high-level government officials, community leaders, and environmental experts who support the vision of a swimmable and fishable Anacostia River. The members meet quarterly to advise the D.C. government on ongoing restoration projects.
The Anacostia River, which runs from Prince George’s County in Maryland into Washington, D.C., before joining the Potomac River and ultimately flowing into the Chesapeake Bay, has historically suffered from high levels of industrial pollution and contamination from sewage overflow. In recent years, government officials have been making concerted efforts to clean up the river. UMBC was invited to sit on the council, with Ghosh as the representative, based on the university’s key contributions to these clean-up efforts.
On Sept. 12, Upal Ghosh (top left) and other members of the LCCAR were sworn in during a virtual meeting of the council. (Image courtesy of Ghosh)
Since 2016, Ghosh and his UMBC colleagues and students have developed innovative methods of measuring contaminants in the river and created models to elucidate where the contaminants come from and how they travel through and accumulate in the water, sediment, and aquatic life, such as fish. Nathalie Lombard, a research assistant professor at UMBC who has played a significant role in the projects, will serve as the alternate representative on the LLCAR when Ghosh cannot attend.
In addition to his work on the Anacostia, Ghosh and his students have studied and contributed to the cleanup of the waterways throughout Maryland, Delaware, and across the country. “Students learn a lot from being out in the field,” Ghosh says. “They learn how the science and engineering we do helps guide major decisions. Our ultimate goal is making a positive difference in the health of the river, lake, or bay. That gives me a lot of excitement, and it really motivates the students too.”
Professor Lee Blaney, in the Department of Chemical, Biochemical, and Environmental Engineering, formally assumed the role of president of the Association of Environmental Engineering and Science Professors (AEESP) at a board of directors meeting in early September.
Lee Blaney (Marlayna Demond ’11/UMBC)
AEESP is a nonprofit organization founded in 1963 to foster inclusive connections between environmental engineering and science researchers and educators. It provides programs for members to develop the academic networks and career skills needed for professional success, increase equitable societal impact of environmental engineering and science scholarship and creative expression, and reimagine the skills necessary for environmental engineers and scientists to provide solutions that benefit regional, national, and global communities.
The association currently has more than 1000 members from universities around the world. AEESP assists its members in improving education and research programs, encourages graduate education, and provides information to government agencies and the public. The biennial AEESP Research and Education Conference brings the field together to share research, teaching, and outreach outcomes. Blaney’s term as president will include the next conference, which is scheduled to occur in May 2025 at Duke University.
“We’re excited about Dr. Blaney’s new role as president of AEESP,” says Mark Marten, the chair of the Department of Chemical, Biochemical, and Environmental Engineering. “His deep involvement with this organization not only makes a positive impact in our discipline, but also raises awareness of our department and UMBC in this influential community.”
Blaney and his research group study environmental contaminants of emerging concern, such as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, which are sometimes called “forever chemicals” because of the way they persist in the environment. They also research how to recover vital resources, such as nitrogen and phosphorus, from waste streams to improve water quality and ensure sustainable development. Blaney was a winner of the 2021 James J. Morgan Early Career Award from the American Chemical Society, and has also been recognized for the quality of his teaching and mentorship.
Lee Blaney (center) in his UMBC lab in 2019. (Marlayna Demond ’11/UMBC)
In 2021, Blaney was elected to the AEESP board of directors. Since that time, he has led a number of initiatives aimed at improving inclusion. During his one-year term as president, he will lead the board and executive committee, provide new charges to standing committees, correspond with members, represent AEESP at conferences and meetings, and drive new initiatives to grow the organization and support its members.
Lee Blaney (left) and his group members (left to right), Hui Chen (completed postdoc in 2024, now assistant professor at James Madison University), Jahir Batista Andrade, Ph.D. ’23, (now postdoc at University of Minnesota), and Marylia Duarte Batista (current Ph.D. student), at the 2023 AEESP Research and Education Conference in Boston. (Photo courtesy of Blaney)
In his first presidential address to AEESP, given in June, Blaney told members of how he found direction as an undergraduate student after attending a talk by environmental engineer Arup SenGupta, who spoke of efforts to remove arsenic from contaminated groundwater in rural villages in India.
“His passion and dedication to helping those without other resources inspired me, set me on the path to becoming an environmental engineer, and helped me to become a better person,” Blaney said. He hopes to bring these same values to AEESP and its members.
As president of AEESP, Blaney plans to develop an “AEESP Experts” program, which will connect environmental experts with reporters, and also an “AEESP Communities of Practice” initiative, which will gather small groups of AEESP members to develop new resources, such as new course material on climate change or best practices for graduate student recruitment, which can be shared with the whole community.
A few weeks into her summer internship with pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca, rising senior Ortisemoyowa “Moyo” Ikomi, chemical engineering, attended an event celebrating a milestone in the company’s construction of a new drug manufacturing plant in Rockville, Maryland. During the event, the organizers played a video featuring a young girl whose seemingly terminal cancer was cured with immunotherapy drugs—the same type of drugs that would be manufactured in the new facility.
“This girl was in hospice care, at home with her family who thought they might just have to wait for her life to end, and this drug gave her a new lease on life. It drove home for me how important this work is, and how I would love to keep working in the pharmaceutical industry,” says Ikomi.
A group selfie of AstraZeneca’s summer 2024 interns. Ikomi is middle center. Photo courtesy of Mark Benesch ’08, AstraZeneca’s Americas capital portfolio director.
Ikomi landed her internship with AstraZeneca after talking with a company representative at the UMBC Career Fair. She worked on the company’s management of the planned Rockville plant, investigating a software tool that could track construction progress.
“It’s not traditional chemical engineering, more within the realm of project management of large-scale engineering projects. I’m definitely enjoying it,” Ikomi says. “I’ve learned so much during the internship. The experience has made me think I’d like to continue working in the engineering project management sphere.”
Ikomi credits the UMBC Career Center with supporting her throughout her internship application process—consulting with her on application timelines, uncovering resources for finding job openings, and offering tips for honing her resume and interviewing skills. “They offer an invaluable service,” she says. “Even more students could benefit from using them.”
Ikomi, who came to UMBC from Lagos, Nigeria, says she arrived thinking she wanted to be a scientific researcher. When she realized basic research wasn’t the best fit for her, faculty and fellow students listened as she talked through her dilemma and offered advice on other options. She found that her true passions lay in shepherding discoveries from the lab to the wider world, where they could directly impact people’s lives.
Since that celebration event at AstraZeneca, Ikomi says she often thinks back to the video of the young girl who was cured of cancer. “When I think of this internship as a whole, my mind always goes to that experience. That moment crystallized that this type of work is what I want to dedicate my career to.”
NASA holds a special place in the public’s imagination. The federal space agency has delivered astronauts to the moon, collected breathtaking images of the cosmos with space telescopes, explored Mars with robotic rovers, and sent satellites into orbit to keep watchful eyes on our own life-supporting planet.
Leah Narat (Image courtesy of Narat)
Leah Narat ’24, business technology administration, shares in the awe. She knew that getting an internship at NASA was highly competitive—around 5 percent of those who apply get offered positions—but she didn’t let the high bar dissuade her from trying.
“Honestly, being at NASA was something that I never thought I would achieve, but I put my application out there, and here I am,” says Narat, who worked as a business intelligence intern at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, this summer. “It’s been wonderful.”
During the internship, Narat worked on computer systems that help keep NASA missions safe and its employees engaged. In one project, she created and updated databases to track awards given to NASA employees. The agency will use the information to maximize employees’ recognition and success and guide them toward career paths that best take advantage of their strengths.
“It’s been great to have this real world experience, where I can get my hands dirty and decide: Is this the type of work I want to do?” Narat says. “It’s also great that I can receive upper-level credit hours for the internship.”
In another project, Narat sorted information from meetings during which teams debriefed after they completed projects. She identified insights, recommendations, and lessons learned—valuable information that NASA can use to better manage projects in the future.
“Safety is a big priority for NASA, so they have requirements to make sure that each project is scrutinized and every possible improvement is considered,” Narat says.
Narat says her experience working at NASA helped solidify her interests in data analytics and database management. She credits Handshake, UMBC’s job and internship search platform, with helping her find and apply for the position.
Interns from the Flight Projects Directorate at NASA Goddard, including Narat, tour the Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia. (Images courtesy of Narat)
“The best part of the experience has been meeting people, networking, and making connections,” says Narat. She was also thrilled when the interns got to visit NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Wallops Island, Virginia, from which the agency launches a variety of space and high-altitude missions.
“I got to actually stand on the launch pad where rockets blast off,” says Narat. “It was just wild.”
An international team of scientists, including two researchers who now work in the Center for Advanced Sensor Technology (CAST) at UMBC, has shown that twisted carbon nanotubes can store three times more energy per unit mass than advanced lithium-ion batteries. The finding may advance carbon nanotubes as a promising solution for storing energy in devices that need to be lightweight, compact, and safe, such as medical implants and sensors. The research was published recently in the journal Nature Nanotechnology.
Sanjeev Kumar Ujjain, from CAST, was a lead researcher on the work. He started the project while at Shinshu University, in Nagano, Japan, and continued after arriving at UMBC in 2022. Preety Ahuja, from CAST, also contributed to the material characterization aspects of the research.
Sanjeev Kumar Ujjain (left) and Preety Ahuja (right). (Images courtesy of Kumar Ujjain and Ahuja)
Straws of 1-atom-thick carbon
The researchers studied single-walled carbon nanotubes, which are like straws made from pure carbon sheets only 1-atom thick. Carbon nanotubes are lightweight, relatively easy to manufacture, and about 100 times stronger than steel. Their amazing properties have led scientists to explore their potential use in a wide range of futuristic-sounding technology, including space elevators.
To investigate carbon nanotubes’ potential for storing energy, the UMBC researchers and their colleagues manufactured carbon nanotube “ropes” from bundles of commercially available nanotubes. After pulling and twisting the tubes into a single thread, the researchers then coated them with different substances intended to increase the ropes’ strength and flexibility.
The team tested how much energy the ropes could store by twisting them up and measuring the energy that was released as the ropes unwound. They found that the best-performing ropes could store 15,000 times more energy per unit mass than steel springs, and about three times more energy than lithium-ion batteries. The stored energy remains consistent and accessible at temperatures ranging from -76 to +212 °F (-60 to +100 °C). The materials in the carbon nanotube ropes are also safer for the human body than those used in batteries.
The researchers envision that twisted carbon nanotube ropes may one day power a range of devices, including wearable health sensors and medical implants that could harvest energy from the body’s movements. (Graphic “NanoRope Mobility” created by Sanjeev Kumar Ujjain using Copilot AI.)
“Humans have long stored energy in mechanical coil springs to power devices such as watches and toys,” Kumar Ujjain says. “This research shows twisted carbon nanotubes have great potential for mechanical energy storage, and we are excited to share the news with the world.” He says the CAST team is already working to incorporate twisted carbon nanotubes as an energy source for a prototype sensor they are developing.
UMBC is strengthening the university’s research connection with the energy company Constellation, expanding on a partnership of more than 20 years with the Baltimore-based business. Constellation, the nation’s largest producer of carbon-free energy, funds scholarships and has endowed a professorship in mechanical engineering at UMBC, regularly recruits students for internships and jobs, and hosts its annual Youth Energy Summit on the UMBC campus.
In March, UMBC and Constellation signed a Master Research Agreement, which will facilitate greater research collaboration between the two organizations. In April, Constellation sent representatives to the College of Engineering and Information Technology’s (COEIT’s) inaugural Research Day to connect with UMBC faculty and students. And in June, research leaders from both organizations met to discuss potential areas of joint work, including carbon-free energy generation, environmental protection and pollution remediation, and efforts to make the power grid more resilient and secure.
“The best research will happen as we grow this partnership organically,” says Anupam Joshi, acting dean of COEIT. “We are proud to be a Tier 1 university partner of Constellation Energy. The interactions of our faculty and students with Constellation’s representatives during Research Day have already led to initial ideas where we can work together. We are also actively pursuing collaborations in other areas of mutual interest and environmental importance.”
“As part of our efforts to accelerate the nation’s clean energy future, it’s vital that we enhance our understanding of the emerging technologies being developed today,” said Uuganbayar “Ugi” Otgonbaatar, Constellation’s director of Technology Strategy, Grants, and Partnerships. “We are grateful for our longstanding partnership with a leading local institution in UMBC and look forward to continuing to explore its research portfolio as part of our broader collaboration.”
When Karen Chen’s now teenage son was in third grade, he would complain that math homework was “boring.” Chen wanted to change his perspective. She presented him with extracurricular math problems and coached him through the most challenging ones. Being a data scientist, she also recorded the sessions and rigorously analyzed the video and audio for insights about his learning experience. One of her key takeaways: Her son rode an emotional roller coaster as he worked through difficult problems. Her attentive tutoring helped him through the confusion and frustration to reach the joy at the end.
Since the project with her son eight years ago, Chen, an assistant professor in the Department of Information Systems at UMBC, has made learning analytics a pillar of her research. The field seeks to collect and analyze data about students and their environment with the goal of improving learning outcomes. Chen recently won a National Science Foundation (NSF) CAREER award to advance this research with a new project that puts students at the center of learning analytics—not just as subjects who supply data, but also as the designers of analytical tools and users of the insights they provide.
Chen’s CAREER award marks the 50th time a UMBC faculty member has received the prestigious grant, which the NSF established to support early-career faculty who have the potential to serve as leaders in integrating research and education.
“I’m really excited about this project,” Chen says. “I love teaching and interdisciplinary research and this is an excellent opportunity to combine them.”
Learning analytics, “for students, by students”
Karen Chen (Marlayna Demond ’11/UMBC)
Chen’s Lab for Informatics for Human Flourishing at UMBC is dedicated to using data to improve people’s lives. “I like to center all my research on promoting human flourishing, meaning people are not just surviving, but thriving. I use this concept as a North Star,” explains Chen.
Education is a key pathway to advance human flourishing, Chen says, and she looks forward to improving student learning experiences and outcomes through her CAREER award project.
The project will start by engaging students enrolled in Foundations of Data Science (IS 296), a relatively new undergraduate course at UMBC, introduced by Vandana Janeja, information systems. IS 296 recently became a general education program course at UMBC, open to all majors with no prerequisites.
Under Chen’s guidance, students in the class will collect data about their lives—how much sleep and exercise they get, how much time they spend talking to friends and family, how stressed they are feeling, and more. They’ll also gather information related to their classes, such as already available data about how often they log into and use the university’s learning management system, Blackboard, and track how much time they spend focusing on classwork (versus, say, becoming distracted by other open tabs on their computers.) The data will be available only to individual students and those they designate as trusted collaborators.
Students will then work through data science activities, analyzing the information they gathered and seeing if they can gain insights to improve their well-being and academic success. At the same time, they will build a critical competency called self-regulated learning, says Chen.
Based on feedback from the class, Chen will then work with students to design and develop an online platform, called “Live Data Lab,” where a broader student community can find tools to track and analyze their own well-being while learning basic data science concepts and techniques. This platform will also provide opportunities for students to explore creative expression of data through mediums such as digital data stories, data art, data comics, or data memes.
Left: Jennifer Posada Granados ’21, an incoming Ph.D. student in the human-centered computing program, and Karen Chen look at printed visualizations of data gathered from UMBC students. Right: Chen talks with students, from left to right, Yetunde Okueso, Kara Nguyen, Joy Ware, and Kavin Manivannan. (Marlayna Demond ’11/UMBC)
Chen will test-run the platform with around 500 students, including first-year UMBC students enrolled in a new seminar course offered by Academic Engagement and Transition Programs, as well as students enrolled in UMBC’s Department of Education pre-service teacher preparation programs. The project will also engage students from community college partners such as Montgomery College.
Empowering students for success
UMBC is an excellent place to conduct the project, Chen says, because it has a culture of promoting student success in its diverse community by empowering students with support and tools. UMBC has also been a leader in learning analytics, already gathering data about how students use its learning management systems to improve students’ learning outcomes, and protecting that data’s privacy, Chen adds.
“This project would not be possible without the support of the Division of Information Technology, in particular John Fritz and his team, who created the Check-My-Activity tool, a student-facing learning analytics tool that has been in operation in UMBC for more than a decade,” Chen says. The project will also be supported by information systems faculty Andrea Kleinsmith, an expert in human-centered design,andZhiyuan Chen, an expert in data privacy, Chen adds.
“The question driving the work is: How can we best center students’ voices and empower them in the data-driven decision-making process?” Chen says. “This project will provide many opportunities for undergraduates and graduate students at UMBC to get involved. Not only will they contribute to the research, but I hope they will also become deeply engaged with their learning and empowered to become better versions of themselves through data, scientific evidence, and reasoning.”
Time—We buy it and spend it, save it and waste it; it seems to race by as we watch our children grow or drag on in the last hour of a Friday work day. Shakespeare marked “time’s thievish progress” in wrinkles like “mouthed graves.” But for a more objective accounting, humans have turned to physics, measuring days, hours, minutes, and seconds using rhythmic natural phenomena such as the Earth’s rotation, the swing of a pendulum, the vibration of quartz crystals, and, most recently, the oscillation of light waves.
“I have been fascinated by time and how we tell it for as long as I can remember,” says Curtis Menyuk, a professor in the Department of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering, who for the past 20 years has applied his expertise in optics to a host of questions at the frontiers of time-keeping science.
Defining time
We measure time in chunks—the international standard unit for a chunk being the second. For centuries, the second was understood as a fraction of an Earth day, but because the Earth’s rotational speed varies slightly, a second defined in this way is not constant. The invention of atomic clocks in the middle of the 20th century allowed scientists to redefine the second based on the (as far as we know) unchanging properties of atoms. Today, one second is the time it takes the electric field of microwaves that are absorbed and emitted by cesium atoms at a specific frequency to cycle up and down 9,192,631,770 times.
But it’s likely the second will soon be redefined again. Newer versions of atomic clocks, called optical clocks, measure time’s passage with visible light instead of microwaves. Visible light waves oscillate much faster than microwaves—and faster oscillations in principle mean better time-keeping. Many optical clocks keep time so well that if they could have started running when the universe began and kept going until today, they still would not have lost or gained a single second.
A artistic rendering of a microresonator frequency comb. (Image credit: NIST)
Shortly after the first all-optical atomic clocks were developed in the early 2000s, Menyuk began collaborating with scientists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) to study a key component of the clocks called a frequency comb. Frequency combs provide the bridge between high-frequency light, which forms the heart of optical clocks, and modern electronics, which can only process lower-frequency signals. The combs are made from extremely short light pulses, called solitons, that travel without dispersing, similar to how tsunami waves traverse the ocean. And it just so happens that Menyuk is an expert on solitons, having become captivated by the “almost magical balance” of forces that keep the waves from being torn apart ever since he first learned about the phenomenon at the age of 27.
Shrinking the world’s most precise clocks
In 2013, Menyuk collaborated with a colleague to derive the basic equations describing how solitons are created when light travels in a circle around a small crystalline disk called a microresonator. Microresonators offer a compact alternative to the bulky lasers originally required to make frequency combs, and Menyuk and some of his NIST colleagues recently published a paper in the prestigious scientific journal Nature that reports a new approach to simplifying the use and improving the performance of microresonator-based combs.
Shrinking the components of optical clocks is a key step toward taking full advantage of their powers. Their potential extends beyond the possibility of one day setting the time for your computer. Atomic clocks are a critical component of today’s GPS system, which helps billions of people find their way around each day. Compact optical clocks might improve GPS accuracy to within a few centimeters. Optical time-keeping can also serve as a back-up to GPS, which is vulnerable to disruptions and attacks. Menyuk is tackling this very issue with the recent launch of the Center for Navigation, Timing, and Frequency Research at UMBC, which he directs in collaboration with the Army Research Laboratory and other partners.
Menyuk (left) discusses research with (from left to right) graduate student Logan Courtright, Professor Gary Carter, and graduate student Pradyoth Shandilya. (Marlayna Demond ’11/UMBC)
New clocks may even make possible groundbreaking discoveries about the fabric of the universe, helping scientists search for dark matter and test whether the laws of physics change over time.
For Menyuk, passing time has not noticeably dimmed his prolific research output (of which clocks are just a portion). And while the years add age, they also add perspective. “Curtis is a leading theorist with decades of experience,” says Kartik Srinivasan, one of the NIST scientists who collaborated with Menyuk on the recent Nature paper. Srinivasan noted that some of the equations he learned in grad school for predicting light’s behavior in optical fibers were developed by Menyuk in the 1980s. “Curtis’ reservoir of historical knowledge is not something you can easily find.” Even with the use of an atomic clock.
Molly Mollica, an assistant professor in mechanical engineering who joined UMBC in August 2023, has been selected for an American Heart Association (AHA) Career Development Award, which will provide more than $200,000 to fund her research for the next three years.
Mollica studies the biomechanics of blood platelets, which play an essential role in healthy blood clotting, but can also contribute to the formation of blood clots that cause heart attacks and strokes. Bleeding and clotting have been shown to vary between males and females, but the reasons are not well understood. In her AHA-funded research, Mollica will investigate how platelets from males versus females, and from donors with varying hormone levels, respond to and generate mechanical forces. She hopes the information she uncovers will help doctors better understand healthy platelet function, design more inclusive health research, and develop better treatments.
“I’m honored to receive this award,” said Mollica. “We look forward to better understanding sex and hormone differences in platelet function. This research is important in providing tools to develop new preventative and curative therapeutics.”
On the first weekend of April, hundreds of chemical engineering students from across the Mid-Atlantic converged on the UMBC campus for two days of learning, networking, and friendly competition. They heard talks from academic and industry leaders, attended workshops and a career fair, competed in rounds of ChemE Jeopardy, mixed chemicals to power small cars along a track in the ChemE Car competition, and mingled over catered lunches, dinners, and cups of evening hot cocoa.
The activities were all part of the 2024 Mid-Atlantic Student Regional Conference of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE)—hosted by the UMBC student chapter of the national group. Around 400 people attended the event, an increase from last year’s conference at Virginia Tech. Organizing the logistics, recruiting speakers and sponsors, securing rooms, and ordering thousands of plates worth of food presented a formidable challenge—one that the UMBC students tackled with aplomb.
Managing check-in. (Photo by Danielle Clark)Welcoming attendees. (Photo by Danielle Clark)Delivering pizza. (Photo by Julianna Falconer)
“I am feeling fantastic after the conference,” says Pavan Umashankar ’25, chemical engineering and biochemistry and molecular biology, who served as the chair of the conference organizing committee. “I am super proud of everyone’s commitment and dedication to make it a resounding success.”
“Truly, I could gush about the UMBC conference planning team all day,” says Alyssa Block, the membership associate of ChemE student programs for AIChE. “These students really are the future leaders of their profession and of AIChE: engaged, excited, collaborative, supportive of each other, and willing to lend a hand.”
A club on the upswing
Hosting an AIChE regional conference for the first time at UMBC marked a milestone for a student club that has seen increasing levels of engagement and success in recent years. While many college clubs across the country are in decline post-Covid, UMBC’s AIChE student chapter is on a clear upward trajectory. The club sent its first team to compete in ChemE Jeopardy at the spring 2019 AIChE regional meeting. Just three years later, the UMBC team won the national ChemE Jeopardy competition.
Neha Raikar, a senior lecturer in the Department of Chemical, Biochemical, and Environmental Engineering (CBEE) and one of the advisors to the student AIChE chapter, remembers attending the 2019 meeting: “Back then, we wondered if we would ever be able to host a regional conference at UMBC,” she says. “We’ve achieved that goal.”
It was especially remarkable, she adds, to see some members of UMBC’s first ChemE Jeopardy and ChemE car teams return to this year’s conference as industry representatives.
The UMBC #1 Jeopardy team during a preliminary round. (Photo by Patch Hatley)The UMBC ChemE Car team celebrates a good run. (Photo by Patch Hatley)
“Planning for the conference was already a significant undertaking, and on top of that, many of our students participated, and excelled, in the competitions,” says Raikar. “Their achievements not only showcased their individual capabilities but also the strength of our club as a whole, which is growing and thriving.”
A winning formula
AIChE chapter members and their advisors ascribe the club’s success to the hard work and dedication of the students coupled with the support of the CBEE department, college, and university. Thirteen CBEE students formed the conference planning committee, which met regularly to ensure all conference planning efforts were on track. An additional 37 students and 14 faculty and staff also volunteered their time—as check-in staff, poster and presentation judges, and more. About 10 UMBC alumni actively participated in the conference, and others contributed to fundraising efforts, helping the organizing committee secure sponsorships from notable companies such as AstraZeneca, ExxonMobil, Advanced Thermal Batteries, and Astek Diagnostics and from the chemical engineering department of Columbia University.
An Dang ’24, chemical engineering, led the fundraising efforts. She gamely approached industry representatives at the UMBC career fair and made the pitch. “I’m not an extrovert, and being in these roles forced me to go out of my comfort zone,” she says.
“Securing sponsorships was vital for making the conference possible, and An did a remarkable job” says Mariajosé Castellanos, another CBEE faculty who advises the AIChE chapter. Castellanos also praised the management skills of conference planning committee chair Umashankar. “Despite his modesty, Pavan is a true mastermind in everything he does,” she says.
For their part, the students applauded the support of the CBEE department, especially the work of their two advisors, Raikar and Castellanos, and the event planning support of Andrea Miller, the CBEE graduate program coordinator.
UMBC AIChE chapter students and faculty advisors pose for a group photo after a successful conference. (Photo courtesy of Mariajosé Castellanos.)
The conference was both a marker of the club’s success and an opportunity for individual students to grow their skill sets.
“I have developed leadership and project management skills, which will be incredibly useful throughout my professional career,” says Umashankar.
Ben Welling ’25, chemical engineering, the leader of the UMBC ChemE car team, believes his experience with the competition helped him land internships. “I talked about it extensively with employers. They like leadership experience and it shows you are willing to do more than is required.”
Raikar sees a bright future for the student stars of this year’s conference and for the club as a whole. “I hope the conference will boost the club membership and participation of students in other AIChE activities,” she says. And, she adds, the conference shows that with support, “UMBC students can accomplish any task.”
An Dang ’24, chemical engineering, an international student from Vietnam, arrived at UMBC in 2021 as a transfer student from Montgomery College. When switching colleges, she also switched majors: from biology to chemical engineering. She quickly became involved in activities in the Department of Chemical, Biochemical, and Environmental Engineering and this year helped the student chapter of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE) pull together a major student conference for the first time.
Q: What drew you to UMBC?
A: I talked toMark Marten, the chair of the Department of Chemical, Biochemical, and Environmental Engineering (CBEE), and I got the sense that the department is small and they really support their students. That caring environment is what I wanted. It’s also, honestly, an affordable option.
Q: Who were some of your mentors?
A: I’m working in the lab ofLee Blaney, one of the environmental engineering professors. He’s my research advisor and really helped me navigate the process of applying to grad school. In the fall, I’m going to the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor to pursue my Ph.D. AndNeha Raikar, a senior lecturer in the department, devotes so much of her time to making sure students are supported. She’s like a motherly figure for a lot of us.
An Dang (seated second from left) and other UMBC AIChE student chapter members with advisor Neha Raikar at the AIChE Annual Meeting in Orlando in November. (Photo courtesy of An Dang.)
Q:What clubs and activities were you involved in?
A: I was a CBEE student ambassador. We went to high schools and community colleges to advertise the department and answer student questions. I’m also involved in the AIChE student chapter. At first I was the service chair and I mostly helped with planning K-12 outreach events. This year, we hosted the AIChE Mid-Atlantic Regional Conference and I was on the planning committee. I was in charge of corporate and university relations—I helped secure sponsors for the conference, and made sure we had funding.
Q: What were some of the skills you developed serving in these roles?
A: I’m not an extrovert, and being in these roles forced me to go out of my comfort zone. I learned how to speak professionally with people in higher positions, so they take me seriously, and maybe even want to give us money. The other big thing I realized is that no matter how well I prepare, sometimes things will go wrong, and that’s okay. We all need to give ourselves grace.
Q: How did it feel to host a big conference?
A: It was a lot of hard work! The student organizers spent a lot of time together, and we really got to know each other well and develop close relationships. There are only 28 people from the department in my graduating class, and many of them are in AIChE. When the conference went well, it felt great!
Volunteers, including An Dang (second from right) gather for a photo after the successful hosting of the AIChE Mid-Atlantic Student Regional Conference at UMBC. (Photo courtesy of An Dang)
Q: What other places did you find community at UMBC?
A: I am an international student, and I worked for International Student and Scholar Services (ISSS). I got to know some of the staff in the office really well. One problem that I ran into while I was here is that I lost my social security card. I had a lot of challenges getting a new one because there was a mix-up in the social security office with my middle and first name. ISSS helped me write a very good letter to justify my case, and I finally got my card. I’m very grateful that I got that help from them because it’s an important piece of documentation.
Q: What are your plans for the future?
A: I’m continuing in chemical engineering and plan to go to grad school to study catalysis engineering, which is studying how to speed up chemical reactions. I’d like to work in industry, particularly in the field of renewable energy. Anything that helps with the environment—that’s what I want to focus on.
Professor Lee Blaney, in the Department of Chemical, Biochemical, and Environmental Engineering, received $750,000 in funding from the Department of Defense’s Strategic Environmental Research and Development Program (SERDP) to develop new ways to remove substances dubbed “forever chemicals” from water.
Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, are used in products ranging from cleaning products and clothing to fire-fighting foam. They earned the nickname “forever chemicals” because of the way they persist in the environment. PFAS have been linked to decreased fertility in women, developmental effects in children, reduced immune function, and increased risk of cancer and obesity. The Environmental Protection Agency recently announced limitations on the amount of certain PFAS in drinking water.
Current technology such as activated carbon and anion-exchange resins can effectively remove the most common PFAS found in water, but do not perform well at removing short- and ultrashort-chain PFAS (which have fewer than eight carbon atoms in their chemical structure.)
The award from SERDP will fund Blaney’s work to develop materials called adsorbents specifically designed for treatment of these short-chain PFAS. Blaney’s colleagues on the project include Ke He, Ph.D. ’17, chemical and biochemical engineering, an assistant research scientist at UMBC, Wenqing Xu, an associate professor in civil and environmental engineering at Villanova University, and Jessica Ray, an assistant professor in civil and environmental engineering at the University of Washington.
