A team of undergraduate students from the Departments of Industrial and Systems Engineering and Biosystems Engineering showcased their senior design work — a biofilter media design aimed to improve water treatment systems — during the USA Science and Engineering Festival Expo in Washington, D.C. in April, according to a University release.
The expo provided the seven-member undergraduate team with an opportunity to interact with Environmental Protection Agency administrators, the release states. The work and travel of the student team was funded by a phase 1 award of the EPA’s People, Prosperity and the Planet program, also known as P3. The team competed against 50 universities for a phase 2 award, which will provide for the development to commercialization of the project.
Andres Carrano, Philpott-WestPoint Stevens associate professor in industrial and systems engineering, and David Blersch, assistant professor in biosystems engineering, collaborated on the phase 1 proposal, according to the release.
Carrano and Blersch recruited students from each of their departments and streamlined the deliverables so it could also serve as the students’ senior capstone project.
“The combined senior design group from two engineering departments is a unique model for Auburn, and made for an excellent learning experience for the students, demonstrated by their exemplary performance at the expo,” Blersch said. “The cross-seeding of ideas from their collaboration enriched their educational experience as they developed expertise in another academic field through interactions with their peers.”
The team’s booth featured a display of 3-D printed spherical objects and a large clear glass cylinder filled with bubbling green gooey water, the release states.
“Though they could not compete with the penguins from SeaWorld or the rockets from NASA, their booth was one of the most popular university exhibits,” Carrano said. “I was amazed at the innovation from this undergraduate multidisciplinary student team. Their work has clearly expanded the technical and functional limits of biofiltration.”
The EPA is expected to announce the recipients of the P3 phase two competition in June at which time each award-winning team further develops their design, implements it in the field and moves it to the marketplace.
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