Lienhard Research Group

John H. Lienhard V: My bio is linked in the navigation at right.

Current Members

Karan H. Mistry: Karan is a PhD student currently studying hybrid desalination and power cogeneration systems. The goal of his research is to optimize the production of water and power to minimize cost while matching time varying demands and costs for both water and power. His current focus is on detailed modeling of multiple effect desalination (MED) systems. He earned his Master’s of Science degree in June 2010 with the group studying humidification-dehumidification desalination cycles. Prior to joining the group, Karan earned his Bachelor’s of Science in mechanical engineering from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA).

Edward K. Summers: Edward is a PhD student currently studying the design and optimization of membrane distillation (MD) based desalination systems for use with renewable energy. He earned his Master of Science degree in June 2010 with the group studying air heating solar collectors with integrated energy storage. Prior to joining the group, Edward earned his Bachelor of Science degree in mechanical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Ronan K. McGovern: Ronan is an Irish Fulbright Science and Technology Awardee pursuing a PhD. Ronan’s current research on the desalination of highly saline waters is further supported by the International Desalination Association Channabasappa Memorial Scholarship and an MIT Martin fellowship. To date Ronan has published in the areas of solar thermal power, humidification-dehumidification desalination and ejector compressors. He holds a Bachelor’s degree from University College Dublin and a Master’s degree from MIT. (More details at web.mit.edu/mcgov/www/.)

Gregory P. Thiel: Gregory is a is a Ph.D. candidate studying fouling in saline water treatment systems. Previously, he studied entropy generation minimization in heat and mass exchangers, with particular emphasis on those found in humidification-dehumidification desalination systems. He is the recipient of a Martin Family Fellowship for Sustainability and an Eni-MIT Energy Initiative Fellowship. Greg completed an S.M. with the group in June, 2012, and holds a B.S.E. in mechanical engineering, summa cum laude, from Case Western Reserve University. (More details at gregorythiel.com.)

Leonardo D. Banchik: Leo is a Master’s student in mechanical engineering currently analyzing chemically enhanced desalination technologies as means for energy recovery. Prior to joining the group, Leo worked at two national laboratories and received a B.S. in mechanical engineering from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Leo received the NSF Graduate Fellowship in 2013.

Karim M. Chehayeb: Karim is a Master’s student working on the thermodynamic balancing of humidification-dehumidification (HDH) desalination systems. Prior to joining the group as a full-time student, Karim worked with the group during the summer of 2011 on the same topic. He received his Bachelor’s of Engineering in Mechanical Engineering from the American University of Beirut, Lebanon in June 2012.

Mohamad H. Mirhi: Mohamad is a Master’s student. His research focuses on thermodynamic assessment of some wastewater remediation technologies. He is mainly concerned with purification technologies for water produced during oil recovery, water used during hydrofracking, and water contaminated with radioactive materia, e.g., as due to the Fukushima Nuclear Reactor accident. Mohamad received his Bachelor’s of Engineering in Mechanical Engineering along with the Highly Distinguished Graduate Award from the American University of Beirut, Lebanon in June 2011.

Kishor Nayar: Kishor is a Master’s student modeling how the thermo-physical properties of sea-water vary with pressure. Kishor received his B.Tech with Honors in Mechanical Engineering alongside a Minor in Energy Science from the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay (IIT-B), India. His primary research interests are in the field of clean energy and clean water. His past research includes work related to nanotechnology, heat transfer and thermodynamics. He is currently filing for 2 patents with the Indian PTO on new heat exchanger designs for HVAC applications.

Jaichander Swaminathan: Jaichander is a Master’s student currently analyzing inorganic fouling phenomena in Membrane Distillation (MD) desalination systems. He obtained his Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering with a minor in Physics from Indian Institute of Technology Madras, where he also received the award for Best Inter-Disciplinary project work.

Emily Tow: Emily is a Master’s student who is crazy about heat transfer. Her current research focuses on coupled heat and mass transfer in bubble column dehumidifiers for HDH desalination. Emily received her Bachelor’s of Science from MIT in June 2012, and is a recipient of a NSF Graduate Research Fellowship.

David Martin Warsinger David is a PhD student researching membrane distillation (MD) scaling. His past research includes scaled thermodynamic modeling of buildings, gas turbine compressor blade failure finite element optimization, oxycombustion flame extinction for carbon sequestration, solar thermal temperature maximization, and wetlands endocrine disruptor removal. David earned the Top of Class Outstanding Achievement Award for his Masters at Cornell University, where he earned his Bachelors as well. David is pursuing roughly a dozen patents for his inventions in the fields of renewable energy, energy efficiency, and medical technology.

Recent Alumni

Dr. Prakash Narayan Govindan: Prakash was a PhD student in the group, finishing in August 2012, and later a postdoctoral associate in the group. He was also a MIT Legatum fellow for the year 2010-2011. Prakash received the de Florez prize at MIT for graduate design and a best paper award at the IDA World Congress on Desalination and Water Reuse. His research experiences include pool boiling heat transfer studies of nanoparticle suspensions, thermodynamic design of combined cycle (gas and steam turbine) power plants, and thermal design of seawater desalination systems. He has co-authored more than 12 international journal publications and has filed more than 14 patent disclosures at the US PTO. He is now Vice President of Gradiant Corporation, a start-up which he co-founded with other members of the Rohsenow Kendall Lab.

Dr. Fahad Al-Sulaiman: Fahad is an assistant professor in Mechanical Engineering at King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals. His research focus is on the thermal, thermodynamic, and thermoeconomic (exergoeconomic) analyses of thermal systems based on solar thermal energy.  He received his PhD from the University of Waterloo in 2010.  He has authored more than 10 international journal papers and 6 conference papers. He was a member of the group from September 2011 to July 2012.

Dr. Anand K. Plappally: Anand is an assistant professor in Mechanical Engineering at the Indian Institute of Technology, Rajasthan. His research experience includes analyzing different pathways of energy use for water supply, treatment/purification and reclamation. He received his PhD (Engr) from The Ohio State University in 2010. He has worked in the areas of Fluids, Material Science, Fracture Mechanics, and Probabilistic Methods in Structural Engineering. He had also worked in the area of Agricultural Water Management. Dr. Plappally was a member of the group from February 2011 to February 2012.

Dr. Mostafa H. Sharqawy: Mostafa is an assistant professor in Mechanical Engineering at KFUPM. His research experience include computational fluid dynamics, boiling heat transfer, thermal & membrane desalination, geothermal energy, solar energy, optimization, borehole heat exchangers, cooling towers, heat transfer in porous medium, thermophysical and transport properties, and thermoeconomic analysis. Dr. Sharqawy joined the group from 10/2008 to 8/2010 as a postdoctoral associate. He worked on various tasks related to solar desalination and thermophysical properties. He has published over 20 international journal publications, US patents and has participated in many international conferences. Please visit his personal website for more information.

Jacob Miller: Jacob pursued his Master’s degree while continuing to work part time at GE Aviation in Lynn, MA as a gas turbine design engineer.  His research focused on the thermal balancing of desalination systems to reduce entropy generation and increase system efficiency.  Prior to MIT, Jacob worked full time at GE Aviation and graduated from Yale University with a BS in Mechanical Engineering. Jacob now works at TIAX, LLC.

Martin Sievers: Martin Sievers is a doctoral student at Stuttgart University, Germany. He obtained a B. Sc. in General Engineering Science and a Dipl.-Ing. in Mechanical Engineering from Hamburg University of Technology, Germany. In 2008/09 he was a visiting graduate student in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of California at Berkeley and in 2010 in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. His research interests are power electronics cooling, heat exchanger design, and fluid dynamics of multi-component mixtures involving heat and mass transfer.

Steven Lam: Steven started as an undergraduate researcher in the summer of 2011, and received his Bachelor’s degree from MIT in 2012. He has focused on high effectiveness, low capex bubble columns to be used as humidifiers and dehumidifiers in HDH desalination plants. In a joint partnership with Dr. Govindan, he received the de Florez prize at MIT in Graduate Design for multistage bubble column dehumidifier. Steven currently works

Maximus St. John: Maximus started as an undergraduate researcher in 2011 designing and building a humidification-dehumidification (HDH) desalination plant. He received his Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering from MIT in 2012. His SB thesis was on packed bed humidifiers, for use in oilfield desalination systems. He now works for Gradiant Corporation, a start-up founded by members of the Rohsenow Kendall Lab.

Yoshio Perez: Yoshio worked in the lab as a UROP (Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program) while completing his Bachelor’s in Mechanical Engineer. His work consisted in finding efficient expanders that can work with low pressure ratios. He designed a test setup to show that a car turbocharger,K03, can work at low pressure ratios with a moderate efficiency. Prior to working with desalination, Yoshio worked with Volumetric Solar Collectors and Zeolite material in the Device Research Laboratory.