Engineering isn't easy, and academic challenges can daunt undergraduate students, prompting them to leave the discipline. Student attrition tends to peak during the "sophomore slump." But a newly published study by Allison Godwin, associate professor of engineering education and, by courtesy, chemical engineering, CISTAR Workforce Development Co-Director; and Bryan Boudouris, professor of chemical engineering, demonstrates that this trend can be reversed. The research shows that redesigning a course to add cyber-assisted and active, collaborative learning can build students' motivation, confidence, and persistence – significantly boosting academic success.

An international team of scientists, including Davidson School of Chemical Engineering Professor Jeffrey Greeley and Research Scientist Dr. Zhenhua Zeng, has unraveled mysteries of two superstar industry catalysts, which could lead to more accurate design of new catalysts to advance greener technologies by combining solar and wind energy. The Purdue researchers, in collaboration with scientists and engineers in Germany, France, and China, studied the atomic-scale structure and mechanism of complex water splitting electrocatalysts, which are used for hydrogen fuel production. The team was able to identify, for the first time, the molecular-scale features of two of the most popular such catalysts.

Purdue's Energetic Research Center (PERC), directed by Davidson School of Chemical Engineering Professor Stephen Beaudoin, is entering a three-year cooperative research agreement with the U.S. Army to advance technology associated with explosives, propellants, and pyrotechnics, with an emphasis on sustainability.

Davidson School of Chemical Engineering is pleased to welcome new faculty member Dr. Cornelius Masuku as Associate Professor of Engineering Practice. Dr. Masuku will begin his new role on August 17, 2020. Dr. Masuku is currently a Postdoctoral Researcher in Lorenz T. Biegler's Group at Carnegie Mellon University. He holds undergraduate degrees in Chemical Engineering and Computer Science and a PhD in Chemical Engineering from the University of the Witwatersrand in South Africa.

Purdue Chemical Engineering graduate students Pushkar Ghanekar and Nicole Libretto were selected to receive two CISTAR Fellowships. Ghanekar was named recipient of the Bill Murray CISTAR Fellowship. Libretto is recipient of the Dick Reitz CISTAR Fellowship. The Center for Innovative and Strategic Transformation of Alkane Resources (CISTAR) is an NSF-funded Center at Purdue University, performing research to create a transformative engineered system to convert light hydrocarbons from shale resources to chemicals and transportation fuels in smaller, modular, local, and highly networked processing plants.