Graduate students in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering have been recognized with top honors in recent poster contests held by the Catalysis Society of Metropolitan New York and the Catalysis Club of Philadelphia.
The Catalysis Society of Metropolitan New York held its 2021 Annual Symposium virtually on Tuesday, March 30, 2021. A total of 31 graduate student posters were presented from universities in the Northeast (Lehigh, Villanova, Princeton, Rutgers, Stevens Institute of Technology, New Jersey Institute of Technology, State University of New Jersey, City College of the City University of New York, State University of New York-Stony Brook, and State University of New York-Buffalo).
Christopher Rzepa received the first place poster award for his presentation "A Density Functional Theory study of shape selective xylene production from H-ZSM-5 catalyzed Diels-Alder reactions." Chris is mentored by Prof.
Srinivas Rangarajan and Prof.
Jeetain Mittal.
Eli Ream received honorable mention for her presentation " Direct Conversion of Ethylene to Propylene Through Simultaneous Ethylene Dimerization and Olefin Metathesis with 8%NiSO4/8%ReO4/γ-Al2O3 Catalyst." Eli is mentored by Prof.
Israel E. Wachs.
The Catalysis Society of Metropolitan New York (
NYCS) is a non-profit organization founded in 1958. Through monthly meetings and yearly symposiums the society brings together professionals and academics to promote the growth and development of catalysis science in the Metropolitan New York areas.
The 2021 Annual Catalysis Club of Philadelphia Student Poster Session was held virtually on Thursday, February 4, 2021. Bin Zhang (working with Prof. Wachs) was the overall winner for the Best Poster for "Tuning the Surface Active Sites by Surface Modification of Supported ReOx/(SiO2-Al2O3) Catalysts for Olefin Metathesis." Rzepa was the runner up with his poster "Towards Data-Driven Structure-Property Relations for Predicting Adsorption Entropy in Siliceous Zeolites."
The 25 poster presentations were given by grad students from U. Delaware, U. Pennsylvania, Penn State, Lehigh University, U. MD, U. MASS, and U. Minnesota. In addition to the academic attendees, many industrial researchers also participated from DuPont, Johnson Matthey, W.R. Grace, DOW, Air Products, Arkema, Alloy Surfaces, Evonik, Zeolyst International, PQ Corporation, Gore, Cristal Global, Surface Measurement Systems, and The Catalyst Group.
The Catalysis Club of Philadelphia (CCP) was founded in 1949 for catalysis researchers to discuss the latest developments in the field of catalysis and holds regular monthly meetings. The CCP strives to foster interactions within the technical community and expose local researchers to cutting edge developments in the field of catalysis. It also holds an annual graduate student poster competition.
The graduate students and faculty are all members of the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at Lehigh University.
