Freshmen Gain Experience Through Amoco Program

Freshmen Gain Experience Through Amoco Program

BY LIA UNRAU
Rice News Staff
Sept. 24, 1998

Shortly before summer, freshman Michael Cohen had two options for a summer job–make
some money as a lifeguard, or do some type of data entry work. Then he learned
about a new research program for first-year students only.

The Amoco Summer Research Program is designed for freshmen who typically do
not have prior research experience. It allows them to get into the lab and pick
up that all-important experience and to gain an understanding of what chemical
engineers really do.

"This was a perfect opportunity for me to stay in Houston during the summer
and to learn what chemical engineering is all about," Cohen says.

The full time, 10-week summer program matches students with faculty and research
projects. At the end of the summer the students summarize their results in a
written report and make a final oral presentation to other members of the program
and representatives from Amoco.

The program was established by a three-year, $75,000 gift from the Amoco Foundation.
It is administered by Tom Badgwell, assistant professor of chemical engineering,
through the new Center for Chemical Processing Technology (CCPT), which Badgwell
directs.

"We think this program is filling a special need," Badgwell says.
"The chemical engineering research class and various Research Experience
for Undergraduates programs have benefited many of our sophomores, juniors and
seniors, but because those programs are competitive, freshmen, who have no upper-level
courses, lab experience or technical job experience, are usually left out. Because
of this, some of our most promising students must spend their first summer in
a job totally unrelated to science or engineering."

Says Hunter Rowe ’77, general manager for risk assessment at Amoco Energy Group-North
America: "We saw this program as meeting a need that hadn’t been met. Amoco
especially likes to help students directly and we saw this as a great marriage
between benefiting the students and helping the faculty tackle projects that
perhaps they had been wanting to get at with no other way to do it."

The program will sponsor five students every summer, each receiving a stipend
and funding for research supplies and materials. Students work on one of several
research projects offered by Rice engineering faculty.

The students who applied and were chosen this first year were outstanding freshmen
interested in chemical engineering, Badgwell says. This year’s students were
Michael Cohen of Philadelphia, Edaire Cheng of Sugar Land, Kim Little of Houston,
Rafeal Verduzco of Sugar Land and Jimmy Wu of Houston.

Sarah Delaney, an engineering recruiter for Amoco, has this perspective on the
program: "This is a unique opportunity for exposure to various engineering
challenges. We find that meaningful work experience contributes to the motivation
and value of a new employee, and this program benefits the younger students
by making such work accessible."

"I would give this program the highest rating," says Verduzco, who
spent the summer studying biochemical aspects of how plants can clean up explosives.
Verduzco studied the kinetics of phytoremediation of TNT under Jackie Shanks,
associate professor in bioengineering and chemical engineering.

"I learned a lot, I worked with great people, and it was a chance for me
to be independent with my own research," Verduzco says. He was able to
work with chemical engineers, graduate students, postdoctoral students and other
undergraduates. "It was much more than an introduction," he says,
"I was taking part in an actual, important project. I feel like I’m a step
ahead of the other chemical engineering students."

Cheng agrees: "It does give you a foot in the door." Cheng worked
on a project for George Hirasaki, the A.J. Hartsook Professor in Chemical Engineering,
that involved the development of a flow measurement experiment.

Her job, more of a practical problem, was to determine why last year’s students
got bad results in a junior-level undergraduate lab course involving flow measurements
through pipes. She determined it was likely both student error and the equipment.
She was able to fix the system, which needed some cleaning and more sensitive
instruments.

Wu, who is interested in going into biochemistry or perhaps pharmacology, researched
the effect of stretch on smooth muscle cells for David Hellums, research professor
in chemical engineering and bioengineering.

"It’s hard to get this kind of experience in your first year," Wu
says, "and I would recommend this program to anyone who is interested in
chemical engineering. This was a great opportunity to get some research experience
and to get something productive done during the summer."

The summer before her freshman year, Little did work at an engineering firm,
but she did office-type work. This program allowed her to see the research side–something
she really wanted to explore, as she is considering a medical career. "It
convinced me I really do want to do chemical engineering at Rice," she
says.

Little, working for Marc Robert, professor of chemical engineering, conducted
a theoretical and experimental investigation of colloid and polymer suspensions.
She looked at phase behavior and measured interfacial tension to support current
theories, understand the fundamentals and experiment with a system.

In addition to the research experience, Little says it was also a good opportunity
to meet other faculty and students in chemical engineering. About once a week,
students and faculty involved in the program would have lunch together, allowing
them to talk informally, discuss different issues and research and get to know
one another.

Without the Amoco Summer Research Program, Cohen, who, without experience, was
unable to find a job related to chemical engineering, would have gone home to
Philadelphia to lifeguard for the summer. The program gave him an opportunity
to learn more about the field and to decide if chemical engineering is what
he wants to study.

Cohen worked with Sam Davis, professor of chemical engineering and computational
and applied math, on the development of computational tools for chemical engineering.
With Cohen’s strong interest in computers, he had the right project. He developed
an efficient computer program that made major improvements upon an old system,
taking advantage of new features in MATLAB, mathematical software, and doing
away with FORTRAN 77, which won’t run on some computers now. His system will
be used by three professors and students in the chemical engineering 301 course.

"This was a first step toward an even better job next summer and in the
future," Cohen says.