Laird receives teaching award

(Media-Newswire.com) - Dr. Carl Laird, assistant professor in the Artie McFerrin Department of Chemical Engineering at Texas A&M University, has been named this year’s recipient of the Celanese Excellence in Teaching Award.

The award recognizes Laird for his dedication and outstanding contributions to the education and professional development of chemical engineering students at Texas A&M.

“Teaching is essentially the mission of the faculty of this department, and Dr. Laird has excelled at teaching,” said Department Head and Charles D. Holland ’53 Professor Michael V. Pishko. “He is a dynamic and outstanding educator.”

Laird teaches an undergraduate class on numerical methods and co-teaches a graduate level class on carbon dioxide capture and sequestration.

In addition to his teaching responsibilities, Laird conducts research focusing on large-scale nonlinear optimization, parameter estimation and parallel computing. As part of his research, he has worked on developing algorithms as part of an early warning contaminant detection system in municipal drinking water networks. He also is involved in the modeling and optimization of infectious diseases, working to determine the fundamental driving forces affecting the spread of infectious disease.

Laird was presented the award in conjunction with the announcement of the winners of this semester’s student plant design competition, part of an intense senior-level capstone chemical engineering course taught by John Baldwin, senior lecturer and assistant head for lower division programs in the department.

The competition, which was sponsored by Celanese, tasks students with designing a fully functional chemical processing plant. It’s a task that Celanese representative Chris Harrison said the soon-to-be graduates will draw upon as they begin their professional careers.

Three groups of students were recognized for their designs of a vinyl acetate production facility in South America. Vinyl acetate, Harrison explained, is a monomer used in paints, coatings and other adhesives.

In designing the plant, students had to account for both the specifications for the plant and product set by Celanese as well as safety factors associated with developing such a facility and process.

Sara Guest of Paris, Texas; Jason Jeansonne of Lewisville, Texas; Ufuoma Boma of Lagos, Nigeria; and Regina Ramsey of Nederland, Texas are members of the team awarded first place by Celanese for its original design of a vinyl acetate plant.

Daniel Balch of Liberty, Texas; Ankush Bhalla of Missouri City, Texas; Oscar Cabada Kriebel of San Jose, Costa Rico; and Majemite Dafinone of Lagos, Nigeria were awarded second place.

The team composed of Brian Klussmann of Brenham, Texas; Richard Lietzau of Austin, Texas; and Brook Marshall of Humble, Texas received third-place honors.

Each of the winning teams received a monetary prize from Celanese, and the first-place team also will be recognized with a plaque commemorating its achievement.

Celanese Corp., which is based in Dallas and employs approximately 8,900 employees worldwide, is a global leader in the chemicals industry. The company manufactures acetyl products, including acetic acid, vinyl acetate monomer and polyacetal products. Celanese also is a world leader in the production of high-performance engineered polymers used in consumer and industrial products.