2007 ORAU Annual Report - Oak Ridge Associated Universities

University Professor Helps
Develop Clean Green Battery
Those old household batteries that get tossed into
the trash can, instead of the recycling bin, end up in
landfills where their toxic metals leak into the soil and
water, contaminating the environment and threatening
human health. So scientists, such as Dr. Shahzad
Akbar, are working toward developing a cleaner, more
environmentally friendly technology that might replace
chemical batteries in the future.
A computer engineering professor at Virginia State
University, Akbar joined a team of scientists, led by Dr.
Zhiyu Hu at ORNL, in an ongoing effort to convert
chemical energy into electricity using nanotechnology.
The project aims to generate electricity from renewable
fuel, such as methanol, without using conventional
combustion. Instead, new nano-constructed materials
would be used to react with the methanol and oxygen
to generate heat.
Akbar’s involvement in the project during the summer of
2007 was supported by the HBCU/MEI Faculty Summer
Research Program, which is sponsored jointly by ORNL
and ORAU. The program is administered by ORISE,
ORNL’s partner for science education.
Akbar’s contribution involves developing new nanoconstructed
thin film materials—less than 1 percent of
the width of a human hair—and testing their properties
suitability for the generation of electricity from heat. He
also helps to set up scientific equipment to monitor the
flow of methanol and air mixtures to generate electrical
power and records electrical voltages produced under
varying operating conditions.
“The summer research experience at ORNL has
benefited me not only by providing me the opportunity
to engage in thermoelectric research with facilities and
equipment not available at my university but also by
establishing valuable contacts with world-renowned
researchers in the field,” he said.
Originally from Pakistan, Akbar has lived in many parts
of the United States but now calls Richmond, Va., home,
where he lives with his wife and two young boys. Akbar
obtained his Ph.D. in electrical engineering from Cornell
University, a master’s degree from the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology, and a bachelor’s degree from
Lafayette College. He spent many years working in
industry at IBM and Siemens before joining the academic
community and conducting research at national labs.
Image Information
Dr. Shahzad Akbar uses an electronic beam evaporator to help
generate materials used to convert heat to electricity in a clean,
environmentally friendly way. Akbar was a participant in the
2007 ORAU/ORNL HBCU/MEI Faculty Summer Research Program.
Student Teams Meet for Nano Competition
Universities, entrepreneurs, government, and leaders in the nanotechnology industry came
together in an effort to move nanotechnology out of research laboratories and into the
marketplace. Nano Nexus 2007 was the first event of its kind to bring together all of the
groups who make it happen. ORAU was the one of the sponsors for the event held April
2–4 at ORNL.
The keystone for the conference was the Nano Idea to Product® (I2P®) competition,
which featured teams of students who had developed early-stage technology
commercialization plans for nanotechnology products and concepts researched at their
universities. The University of Texas, Austin, came out on top of the 15 teams entered in
the competition and won the $25,000 grand prize to further develop NANOTaxi TM , a
nano-sized drug-delivery device.
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