Strong Pitt Showing at Recent Gordon Research Seminar and Conference on High Temperature Corrosion
Students in the Department of Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science at the University of Pittsburgh participated in the Gordon Research Seminar (GRS) and Conference (GRC) on High Temperature Corrosion in New London, N.H. The GRS is limited to young investigators in the field and is held on the weekend prior to the start of the GRC, which was held July 16-21, 2023. The students were all members of Professor and Department Chair Brian Gleeson’s research group.
At the GRS, one student gave an invited presentation, and two students were awarded 1st and 2nd in the poster competition. According to Gleeson, the strong showing by his students is a credit to the high quality of their research coupled with hard work and unbridled enthusiasm. Grace Vanessa de León Nope, a PhD student, also gave a presentation entitled “Influence of Manufacturing Process on the Fatigue Performance of High-Temperature Oxidized Alloy 625.” This work was supported by the National Science Foundation. There were 39 attendees at the GRS, and Grace was one of 11 speakers.
Preston Nguyen and Rafael Rodriguez, both PhD students, received 1st and 2nd place respectively in the GRS poster competition. A total of 36 posters were presented. Preston’s poster was titled, “Effect of NaCl Addition to Na2SO4 on Deposit-Induced Corrosion at 900°C” and Rafael’s poster was titled “Assessment of the Role of Minor Refractory Alloying Additions in Affecting Alumina-Scale Formation During High-Temperature Oxidation.” Preston’s research is supported by the Office of Naval Research and through an RK Mellon Graduate Fellowship from Pitt’s Center for Energy. The project is also in collaboration with the aerospace company Pratt and Whitney. Rafael’s project is in collaboration with Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
At the end of the GRS, Grace was elected to co-chair for the next GRS in 2025. This represents impressive recognition by her peers. But this was not the end of Grace’s successes, as she was selected the winner of the Best Student Poster Award at the GRC out of a field of 36 student posters. Her poster was titled, “Influence of Manufacturing Process on the Fatigue Performance of High-Temperature Oxidized Alloy 625.” The co-authors on this poster were Professors Guofeng Wang (MEMS Dept.) and Brian Gleeson.
At the same GRC, Professor Gleeson was the Discussion Leader for the “Deposit-Induced Corrosion” session. Gleeson is a previous (2005) elected Chair of the GRC on High Temperature Corrosion. Also attending the GRS and GRC from Gleeson’s group was Isabela Dainezi, a visiting CAPES-PrInt Scholar from the Federal University of São Carlos, Brazil, where she is a PhD student. Isabela was a Discussion Lead for the GRS session titled, “Coupled Mechanical and Oxidative Performance in Extreme Environments” and she also presented a poster at the GRS and GRC titled, “Sulfidation/Sulfidation-Oxidation Behavior of Equimolar NbTiCr Alloy at 800°C.”
There are over 300 GRCs and associated GRSs, providing an international forum for the presentation and discussion of frontier research in a given topic area of the biological, chemical, physical and engineering sciences.