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In lieu of our holiday cookie-exchange, we did a virtual  gathering this year. Was good fun to put on "holiday backgrounds", play online games (better luck to the RED Team for the next time we play!) and catch up on general things. Thanks Alexis for showing up as well :)

I am so proud of all the students in TREE-Lab to have held up through a challenging 2020 while working hard and enthusiastically on their research projects. We wish for a fresh, happier and a healthier 2021 for everyone. 

Very happy that Zijie Chen, who is currently a 1st year PhD student in our group, was awarded the Rackham International Student Fellowship for 2020-2021. This fellowship awards 25 students at UM with $10,000 that can be used towards stipend and tuition. Congrats Zijie! 

Rohini gave an invited talk, titled "Understanding Radiative Transport in Flowing Particles Via Monte Carlo Ray Tracing and Data-Driven Techniques" at the Fall AIChE Annual Meeting, 2020. Thanks to the conference organizers for giving me this opportunity.

Congrats to Zijie, Bingjia and Mike for passing their qualifying exam with flying colors. All three are PhD candidates from Winter '21. 

Our first ever preprint is out on ChemRxiv. Check it out here. Big takeaway is that theoretical predictions show promisingly large solar-to-chemical efficiencies and nutrient recovery rates to transform wastewater nitrates to valuable chemicals, including ammonia, in a photoelectrochemical device. Effects of NO3- concentration dependent mass-transfer limitations and competing reactions are discussed in detail. 

Despite the "new-normal" of virtual interactions behind a screen, we find it SO important to meet in-person as a group, whenever possible. Nice to be outside and enjoy the splendid fall colors around campus

Rohini gave an invited seminar (virtual) at the University of Waterloo. Thanks Xiaoyu Wu for the invite, it was great to learn about the ongoing research activities in the energy and water space at Waterloo. 

Rohini was invited to give a talk at the ME-Connect Seminar Series at her alma mater -- Mechanical Engineering at the University of Minnesota. So happy to be back (even if virtually) to talk to students highlighting my experiences in academia and to interact with several other faculty in the department. Thanks for inviting me Suhasa and ME-Connect at UMN, and for the fun surprise of having Jane (my PhD advisor) introduce me at the seminar.