OSU Student Research

 

Faculty are involved in research and scholarship activities in all fields, and they offer diverse opportunities for Oregon State undergraduates and graduates.

Teaming Up for Green Solutions	Singing in the Rain
Of URISCs and Honors	The Job Market
Investigating Summer	More Hands-On Opportunities

URISC - Undergraduate Research, Innovation, Scholarship, and Creativity

 

Teaming Up for Green Solutions

A team of undergraduate engineering students at Oregon State University has discovered that blending byproducts from biodiesel production and winemaking produces an environmentally friendly polymer that could one day replace polystyrene foam meat trays in supermarkets. It may also be valuable in the manufacture of furniture, particle board, fire logs, insulation and even hair gel.
	photo by Cory Reed, The Daily Barometer

The process is so unique and potentially marketable that the students have applied for a patent to protect their intellectual property, said David Hackleman, the Linus Pauling Chair at the OSU College of Engineering.

“I’m delighted, but not totally surprised, that they can now add to their report the words ‘patent application pending,’” Hackleman said.

Christen Glarborg, Patrick O’Connor, Heather Paris and Alana Warner-Tuhy – all seniors studying chemical engineering – delved into combining glycerin, a byproduct of biodiesel production, and tartaric acid, a byproduct of wine production.

“When put together, those ingredients can make a hard, bubbly polymer,” Paris said.

In the 1880s, the same material was used in the making of varnishes and paints.

“It biodegrades in water,” said O’Connor. “Dr. Hackleman suggested we try to mold it into a tray, like to replace the foam trays under meat in the supermarket.”

But their first experiments resulted in a rock-hard mess: Think of cooking taffy too long, so that it sticks so hard, you have to throw the pot away. The young researchers persevered until they produced a more manageable glue, which they decided to try mixing with other byproducts such as sawdust and woodchips.

Voila! A material that was moldable, though somewhat tacky. So they popped it into an oven to see if it would firm up. It seemed they were possibly onto a particleboard for “green” building.

“Then we found that at 600 degrees, our polymer vaporized,” Paris said. “So we thought, how about ash-free logs or pellets for heating?”

While the students continued exploring possibilities, Hackleman knew enough about entrepreneurship to realize they should begin the process of protecting their intellectual property. He steered them to OSU’s Office of Technology Transfer, where their invention disclosure was brought to the stage of “patent pending.”

The students are now focused on testing and refining the polymer for strength and biodegradability. While it is not yet clear whether or not the technology will make it to commercialization, “it’s certainly a boost for the students,” Hackleman said.

The team won “Best Chemical Engineering Project” and was runner-up for “People’s Choice Award” at OSU’s eighth annual Engineering Expo in May. The team members displayed their research among more than 100 student design projects and product prototypes.

“Producing biodiesel produces a lot of glycerin,” Hackleman said. "Now it seems that even the waste from green industries can be put to another good use – one that can help in the solution to a global problem.”

Press release June, 2007, by Jana Zvibleman
See also: Science Daily,    and article in the OSU student newspaper

 

 

• Studying bluebird populations
• Chemistry
• Business
• Engineering: the Industrial Assessment Center
• Fisheries and Wildlife , and article about it
• Sociology
• for graduate students interested in combining the disciplines of Engineering, Oceanography, Microbiology, Chemistry, Geology and Agriculture
• OSU Career Services

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The Job Market and Internships

excerpted from OSU Press Release by David Stauth

College students who are graduating will enter a competitive and challenging job markets. The ones with the most success will be those who have already made contacts and gained work experience through internships.

Career services experts at Oregon State University say a relevant degree, good interview, solid resume and persistent effort are still necessary for most successful applications, they say, but internships and real world experience are now more important than ever.

OSU in recent years has promoted the internship concept for all its students, officials say.

Tom Munnerlyn, director of career services at OSU, says,"We're finding that the one thing that gives a student the best edge is a successful internship. Fortunately, that's an idea to which the university is already committed. We're seeing some success stories as a result."

The value of internships is so powerful that many students are now taking these positions after graduation, if they haven't already done one or more during their college years.

One example is Gabriel Rike, a computer science major at OSU. Rike has held a variety of positions at the university during his undergraduate education, including work with the Business Solutions Group in the College of Business, for which he received an "outstanding student award." Upon graduation, he was only midway through a two-year internship program with NTI. The company planned to hire him full time following completion of that program.

One of the most sophisticated of OSU's internship programs is over 2 years old - the Multiple Engineering Cooperative, or MECOP program, and its partner, the Civil and Environmental Engineering Cooperative. Participation in this innovative program actually requires students to spend an additional year getting their degree, while they also pursue two six-month internships at separate companies.

But the traditional success rate is phenomenal for these engineering graduates who are ready to hit the ground running in their new careers.

It's more valuable than ever for a company to have the opportunity to get to know a student, observe their work and understand the type of person they are getting before they have to commit to a permanent hire. And there are other benefits for the student.

"I'm going to be starting a new job soon with Consolidated Metco in Portland, which was not actually one of the companies I did an internship with," said Aaron Holmes, 26, of Ashland, a MECOP participant before his graduation with a master's degree in industrial and manufacturing engineering.

"My internships were quite successful, and some of the things I learned helped me relate to people in private industry, understand what companies are actually looking for," Holmes said. "You learn how to solve real problems using your engineering skills. The whole process was extremely helpful and helped me in getting my new job."

Erica Hanson, 23, a senior in merchandising management, before graduation already had secured a job as a buyer with Macy's West in San Francisco, which included some additional training.

"One of my professors at OSU helped several of us line up internships with Macy's, in which we spent five weeks in the store line and five weeks in the buying office," Hanson said. "It gave us a chance to see how the store functions and where we would fit best, and there's no doubt it was important to my getting a job there."

According to Munnerlyn, part of the challenge is to help students avoid panic, polish their job-hunting skills and encourage them to be persistent in finding the type of position they want.

"People are still being hired and graduates are finding jobs," Munnerlyn said. "It's just more difficult than it used to be, so you have to work at it, start early, and get that work experience and internships that will give you a real chance for success."

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• More student Research in Terra http://oregonstate.edu/terra/departments/student-research/

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real world applications - Health and Human Sciences

http://www.hhs.oregonstate.edu/about/Synergies/S07/10Learn.pdf