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In This Issue

Dr. Carson Meredith Receives $7.5 Million Funding from DOE MURI Program

Department of Energy Program Seeks to Develop Southern Pine Biorefinery Center

Pradeep Agrawal Named Lead Investigator on $1.5 Million Coal Biomass Gasification Project

Catalytic Processes for the Production of Fuels and Chemicals from Biomass

Art Ragauskas Speaks October 15, 2010, at Second International Symposium on Bioenergy and Biotechnology in Wuhan, China

Faculty Exchanges

Awards and Recognition

IPST Membership Welcomes General Mills Operations, LLC and Metso Paper USA, Inc.

From the Paper Museum

People News

IPST Membership Welcomes General Mills Operations, LLC and Metso Paper USA, Inc.

Recent PSE Graduates

From the Director

Norman Marsolan

As we enter the new year IPST industrial membership continues to grow with 12 companies now participating.  We are pleased these companies view value in a membership relationship with IPST-GA Tech.  Our goal is to grow the membership in our three strategic focus areas;  pulp & paper operational excellence, biorefining, and new products from forest biomaterials. Today there are five major pulp & paper companies among the membership.

In September, I attended the TAPPI Conference for Nanotechnology in the Forest Products Industry and observed a rapidly developing technology.  The previous several years of this conference focused on identifying and characterizing nanomaterials generated from the tree.  There was a greater focus this year on commercialization ideas for these materials.  Two materials of development focus are the nanocrystalline cellulose derived through aggressive hydrolysis of bleached pulp, yielding nano-length sections of crystalline cellulose.  These whiskers are typically 200 nm long and 5 nm in diameter.  The other material generated through aggressive grinding (in a mass collider) is nanofibrilated cellulose.  This material is a long chain of nano-dimension diameter.  Both materials are still only produced on the bench scale, but Canada and Sweden are installing one ton-per-day reactors in 2011.  Georgia Tech has a world-class materials program, and IPST is collaborating with these professors in advancing innovative ideas for the forest products industry.

During the last quarter, faculty associated with IPST traveled the world to engage in collaborative research.  In the last several months faculty visited the countries of Finland, Sweden, China, Egypt, Brazil and Chile.  IPST remains engaged in the international forest products community and continues to be recognized as a contributing research institute.

Three PhD’s were granted to Paper Science and Engineering (PSE) students this past summer.  For the period 2003-2010 there have been 76 graduates from the multi-disciplinary PSE program with 55% joining pulp & paper and industry suppliers.  IPST continues to provide well prepared leaders to the forest products industry.

The faculty and staff of IPST and Georgia Tech wish you a happy holiday season and new year.

Norman

From the Georgia Tech School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering News

	Carson Meredith

Dr. Carson Meredith, ChBE associate professor and strategic area coordinator for IPST, will lead a team of researchers in a $7.5 million multidisciplinary project funded by the Department of Defense (DoD) to fabricate particles that can adhere to surfaces and emit light on demand communicated over long distances at specific frequencies.   There are numerous potential national security and defense applications for such technology, including locating vehicles, documents and packages, and even downed aircraft pilots.  The project, entitled Bio-enabled Particle Adherents for Interrogative Spectroscopy (BioPAINTS), was one of 32 projects selected by the DoD as part of the Multidisciplinary University Research Initiative (MURI) program for 2010.   The MURI program supports research by teams of investigators that intersect more than one traditional science and engineering discipline in order to accelerate both research progress and transition of research results to application.

Dr. Meredith’s team will include four GT researchers—Ken Sandhage (MSE), Joe Perry (Chemistry), Nicole Poulsen (Chemistry), and Nils Kroger (Chemistry/MSE)—and four professors from three other universities.

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Art Ragauskas

Professor Art Ragauskas and a team, with funding and support from the U.S. Department of Energy, will develop the necessary laboratory data to identify how new biofuel operations could be integrated into a modern kraft biorefinery operation, generating both 2nd- and 3rd-generation biofuels and value-added green materials. 

In Georgia and the Southeast, the forest products industry is poised to take a lead role in the conversion of pine to value-added green materials, fuels and energy. The challenge for the near future is to accelerate technological developments to facilitate the conversion of southern softwoods into pulp, paper, bioenergy and biofuels. These technologies would take advantage of the existing capital investments the forest products industry has made in the Southeast for wood collection, fractionation, pulping and processing. A key challenge for the implementation of these technologies is to demonstrate that these benefits can be achieved with ongoing forest products unit operations and will generate current and future product streams.

Dr. Ragauskas’ project seeks to develop an integrated southern pine wood to biofuels/ biomaterials processing facility to test advanced integrated wood processing technologies at the laboratory scale, including generation of the bioethanol from pine residues and hemicelluloses extracted from pine woodchips; conversion of modified woodchips to enhanced linerboard and bleach grade pulps; and efficient conversion of pine residues, bark and kraft cooking liquor into a useful pyrolysis oil.

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Pradeep Agrawal		Carsten Sievers		Scott Sinquefield

Dr. Pradeep Agrawal has been named the lead investigator on a $1.5 M project to study coal-biomass co-gasification for the U.S. Department of Energy.  Funded primarily by DoE with additional contributions from Georgia Tech and the IPST graduate student support program, the project commenced in October and will continue for three years. Dr. Carsten Sievers of ChBE and IPST, along with Dr. Kristiina Iisa of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) in Golden, Colorado, serve as co-principal investigators.  IPST research faculty member Dr. Scott Sinquefield will participate in this research, which will use IPST’s pressurized entrained-flow reactor.

Pressurized Entrained Flow Reactor

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– Dr. Carsten Sievers –

Carsten Sievers

A research group led by professor Carsten Sievers is working on development of solid catalysis to allow converting different types of biomass and waste products from paper mills into value-added products.   The group is using a combination of synthesis and characterization of solid materials, spectroscopic studies on catalysts under operating conditions, and reactor design to reduce the energy requirements for biomass conversion and avoid the production of waste. Efficient and economical processes for the production of fuels and chemical from biorenewable resources will depend on the availability of active and selective catalysts that can accelerate chemical conversions and drive them in a specific reaction.
Specific research projects include:

1. Upgrading of pyrolysis oils to eliminate the use of hydrogen sulfide to remove oxygen, which limits the stability of pyrolysis oils and reduces their energy content. 


2. Gasification reaction kinetics and chemistry studies to find efficient process conditions for production of syngas, which can be used for the production of many industrial chemicals and fuels.  Pradeep Agrawal, Scott Sinquefield, and Steve Lien are collaborating.


3. Tar Removal from Syngas which must occur before syngas can converted into useful products. The team will develop catalysts for the purpose.


4. Stability of Solid Catalysts in Hot Liquid Water.   Many processes for biomass conversion will be performed in aqueous phase. However, surprisingly little is known about the stability of solid catalysts in hot liquid water.  Studies are being performed with a variety of metal oxides and supported metal catalysts that have shown potential as stable catalysts for aqueous-phase conversion of biomass.


5. Surface Chemistry of Biomass Compounds in Water.  Understanding the surface chemistry of reactants (Figure 3) is a critical prerequisite for designing efficient catalysts. In case of biomass compounds, these studies are particularly challenging because of their low vapor pressure.


6. Aqueous Phase Reforming of Biomass.   Aqueous phase reforming (APR) is a promising process for the production of hydrogen from sugar alcohols and sugars


7. Production of Value Added Chemicals from Biomass.   In addition to fuels, biomass can be converted into specific chemicals with significantly higher value. Particularly elegant processes retain structural elements from the biomass feedstock. In some cases platform chemicals can be produced directly from biomass compared to complicated multi-step processes from fossil feedstocks. Specific projects in the group target methanol and lactic acid.

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Topic Covers Recent Advances in Biorefining and Pretreatment Chemistry

Over the past several years  we have  examined the chemistry  of acid pretreatment  focusing  on the  ultra-structure of cellulose, lignin functionality and hemicelluloses in the bulk and surface of poplar and switchgrass.  From these studies a re-occurring theme is that acid pretreatments typically increase overall crystallinity and changes the relevant amounts of amorphous paracrystalline cellulose along with 1a and 1b while decreasing the DP of cellulose.  The polysaccharide component of biomass has also been recently shown to generate pseudo-lignin which increases the residual Klason content after pretreatment.  Accompanying these changes in carbohydrate chemistry, lignin is changed during pretreatment leading to increases in polydispersity, increases in condensed lignin and decreases in b-O-aryl ether content.  Surface studies by ToF-SIMS have shown that surface pretreatment chemistry is uniquely different from bulk chemistry especially in residual hemicelluloses.  Art Ragauskas’ presentation examined these chemical reactions and identified what established reactions suggest about acid pretreatment chemistry and which select reaction chemistries need further investigation to refine the efficient pretreatment and facilitate the next generation of low-recalcitrance engineered crops.

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Georgia Tech’s Dr Cyrus Aidun will continue his 2010 Gunnar Nicholson faculty exchange at KTH next summer. Currently Christopher Carrick, a student from Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), is spending a year at IPST working in Professor Aidun’s group on microfluidics methods of nanocellulose capsule formation. If successful, this approach would be groundbreaking in many celllulose applications.

Cyrus Aidun

The Gunnar and Lillian Nicholson Graduate Fellowship and Faculty Exchange Fund was established in 1984 at IPST (Inc.) to provide funds for a Swedish student/faculty exchange program. Candidates for funding are nominated by the Swedish Gunnar Nicholson committee, consisting of executives from Innventia (previously STFI), Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), and Chalmers University of Technology.

On a separate faculty exchange program, Professor Aidun is collaborating with Professor Gustav Amberg, Dean of the School of Engineering Sciences at KTH, on a project titled "Direct Numerical Simulation of Fiber Suspension with Applications to Paper Forming”.   KTH graduate student Mubashar Khan and assistant professor Minh Do-Quang, both funded by KTH, are also involved with this collaboration. For the first time the IPST-KTH team, using a novel multi-scale computational method shows the effect of shear on the microstructure, effective viscosity and primary normal stress of deformable fiber suspension at 1% to 5% volume fraction – the range useful for paper making at low and high consistencies. The results were presented at the annual meeting of the Division of Fluid Dynamics of the American Physical Society.  The model makes it possible to determine the microstructure and flow characteristics of fiber suspension at concentrations relevant to papermaking processes. The funding from the Gunnar and Lillian Nicholson Foundation has been a catalyst in this productive collaboration. The plan for the coming year is to use this method to simulate low and high consistency forming in silico (via computer simulation).

In addition, final approval has been granted for Chalmers (Sweden) post-doc Dr Tobias Köhnke for a one-year assignment at IPST-Georgia Tech, supported by the Gunnar Nicholson fund, to work with Dr Art Ragauskas’ research team on a project entitled “Influence of xylan structure on the properties of nanocellulosic-xylan composite films."  Dr. Köhnke will join Georgia Tech for one year beginning April 2011.

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Entire Professional Career Spent at the Institute

John Swanson

The Paper Industry International Hall of Fame has inducted a former IPST professor, John Swanson, into its ranks in a ceremony held September 23rd,  in Appleton Wisconsin. Dr. Swanson worked at the Institute from 1941-1982 and resided at its former location in Appleton, Wisconsin. His area of specialty was surface and colloid chemistry which ushered in the scientific era of papermaking.  Dr. Swanson passed away in 2004.  For information on the Paper Hall of Fame and other inductees please see www.paperhall.org

	Kasi David

Dr. Kasi David, a post-doctoral member in Dr. Ragauskas’ research group, has published the paper "Switchgrass as an Energy Crop for Biofuel Production: A Review of its Ligno-Cellulosic Chemical Properties." The paper has made the top 10 most-read articles from the online version of Energy & Environmental Science for September 2010, as announced by Christina Ableman of the Royal Society of Chemistry, Thomas-Graham House in Cambridge UK.

Jamshad Mahmood and Preet Singh

The Joseph Wolf Founders - Stowe Woodward Award for Best C&ME Paper went to Preet Singh and Jamshad Mahmood for their paper, "Effect of Flow on Corrosion of Pulp Mill Equipment."  The award was presented "in recognition of excellence in promoting the correct application and effective utilization of all elements of corrosion and materials science and technology associated with the pulp and paper Industry."

AF&PA's "Sustainability and the Road to the Future"

IPST and CPBIS Both Make 2010 Sustainability Report

	Photo from 2010 AF&PA Sustainability Report

The 2010 American Forest & Paper Association's Sustainability Report names the Institute of Paper Science and Technology and the Center for Paper Business and Industry Studies as two of the three organizations that have demonstrated "measurable progress" on key sustainability indicators despite a hard economic environment. The National Council for Air and Stream Improvement was also cited. Emissions, effluents and chemical substances reduction, ecological and business sustainability and research findings dissemination were all noted as areas of success.

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Katheryn Clark making paper Photo by Todd Matos

A 40th-anniversary exhibit at the Paper Museum September 23-December 17 celebrates the impact of Twinrocker founders Kathryn and Howard Clark on hand-papermaking in the United States and on the process of creating Fine Arts Books over the past four decades.
 
Over the years, Twinrocker papers have appeared in the portfolios of some of American’s most
important artists and fine limited-edition book publishers. The exhibit includes a number of these
first-edition fine art books, each a work of art in itself. Among the artists represented in the exhibit are Robert Rauschenberg, Sally Mann, Louise Bourgeois, Jasper Johns, Jim Dine, Chuck Close, Willem de Kooning and Larry Rivers. A number of photos of the papermakers at work throughout the history of Twinrocker are included.

The Clarks attended the opening celebration on September 23rd which attracted a crowd of over
150 visitors.

Cindy Bowden, Director - American Museum of Papermaking, and Chris Amundsen, Director - American Craft Council

Cindy Bowden had the opportunity to speak at the “Craft in America” conference hosted by the
Smithsonian Institute October 8th. She addressed the audience at the American Museum of Art about the importance of paper.  Other speakers included the Director of the Public Broadcasting Service, the Director of Americans for the Arts, and several Smithsonian curators.

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Cindy Bowden, Director of the Robert C. Williams Papermaking Museum, has accepted a career change and will join the American Association of Woodturners. After 17 years with IPST and the paper museum, we say good bye to Cindy and wish her success in her new assignment.

On Saturday, October 23, TAPPI graduate student chapter members and their friends from IPST at Georgia Tech went on a picnic to Stone Mountain Park, enjoying outdoor games, a paper airplane contest, and a laser show at the park. The event gathered graduate students from different departments of the school, which is a part of TAPPI Student Chapter's mission. Social activities like this one along with the continuing professional Seminar Series contribute significantly to the life of community at IPST.  IPST student Mikhail Levit serves as chapter president.

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IPST Member Companies

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