James Gilchrist, a professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering, and his research group have embarked upon three new and exciting projects fueled by two recent grants from the National Science Foundation and one supported by the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratories.
In a project entitled "GOALI: Collaborative Research: Non-invasive measurement of kinematics and rheology in a non-equilibrium drying complex fluid," funded by NSF's Fluid Dynamics program, is a $537,000 collaboration between Lehigh, Case Western Reserve University, and PPG on developing characterization techniques for drying paints. Over 60% of energy used during automotive assembly is spent on correcting defects in paint. This academic-industrial collaboration will look at flow instabilities and the evolution of the complex rheology of paint while it dries.
In a second project, entitled "EAGER: Microscale Fingering Instabilities in Drying Colloid and Polymer Films" and funded by NSF's Particle and Multiphase Processes program, Gilchrist and his student Thitiporn Kaewpetch will investigate a new found viscous fingering instability in drying films.
The third project initiated this summer is a collaboration with the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratories, entitled "Custom Particle Development," focusing on fundamental research.
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