Keynote speakers
Darrell Pepper, University of Nevada - Las Vegas
Professor of Mechanical Engineering
Benchmarking COMSOL - Part 2: CFD ProblemsDarrell Pepper is presently Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Director of the Nevada Center for Advanced Computational Methods (NCACM) at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV). In 2004 he was appointed an ASME Congressional Fellow and handled science and engineering issues. Dr. Pepper is also Executive Vice President of Nevada Energy and Environmental Systems. He has published over 200 technical papers on fluid dynamics, heat transfer, and environmental transport topics, and co-authored five textbooks on the finite element method, boundary element method, and indoor air quality.
Edwin Ethridge, NASA Marshall Space Flight Center
Senior Materials Scientist
Using Microwaves for Extracting Water From the MoonDr. Edwin Ethridge is a senior materials scientist in the Materials & Processes Laboratory at the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, AL. For many years he has had interest in the utilization of extraterrestrial materials for utilization in the development of space systems. Currently Dr. Ethridge has a NASA-HQ LASER grant to investigate the use of microwaves for the extraction of volatiles from lunar soil including water cryotrapped at the poles.
Marc K. Smith, Georgia Institute of Technology
Professor of Mechanical Engineering
The Use of CFD Simulations in Learning Fluid Mechanics at the Undergraduate Level
Marc K. Smith is a Professor of Mechanical Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology. He received his Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics from Northwestern University in 1982. His research interests include interfacial fluid mechanics, boiling flows, and hydrodynamic stability, with particular emphasis on surface tension effects and surface-tension-driven flows. His teaching interests are fluid mechanics, computational fluid mechanics, thermodynamics, and numerical methods at the undergraduate level, using modern software and teaching tools.
Michael A. Vallance, GE Global Research
Team Leader
Rechargeable Battery for Hybrid Diesel-Electric LocomotiveMichael earned his doctorate in Chemical Engineering for his investigation of nanostructure in segmented co-polymers. Professionally he has focused on materials and energy research at ExxonMobil, Novartis, Honeywell, Plug Power and GE. At GE Global Research, he is developing a high-energy sodium battery for use on a hybrid diesel-electric locomotive. He leads a team investigating electrode microstructure and chemistry. To link structure to performance, Michael started a modeling initiative in 2007.
Svante Littmarck, COMSOL
President and CEO
COMSOL Multiphysics Version 4Svante Littmarck is the President and CEO of COMSOL. He co-founded the company in 1986. In 2004, Littmarck received an honorary doctoral degree from the Royal Institute of Technology for the development and international reach of high quality software for scientific computations through his company, COMSOL.
