Wednesday, June 24, 2015

Infrared radiation, Thermoelectricity and Chaos


On Wednesday June 17 2015 JMU hosted the Workshop entitled “Infrared Radiation, Thermoelectricity and Chaos”.  Dr. Giovanna Scarel was the co-organizer with Benjamin Delp, Director of JMU Research Development and Promotion.  The Workshop discussed Dr. Scarel’s infrared power generation and featured two international speakers.  Prof. Giulio Casati of Italy spoke about Conservation laws, symmetry breaking and control of the heat current.  Prof. Francisco Javier Gonzalez Contreras of México described Seebeck nanoantennas for solar energy harvesting.  Three speakers represented the U.S.A. academic world.  Prof. Gabriel A. Rincón-Mora of the Georgia Institute of Technology, presented Microwatt CMOS harvesters.  Prof. Rajeevan Amirtharajah of the University of California at Davis, discussed on Powering systems from ambient energy sources.  Finally, Prof. S. Joseph Poon of the University of Virginia, presented Practical realization of ZT>1 from the materials perspective.  The business and entrepreneurial world was represented by Dr. Ronald J. Parise of Parise Research Technologies, who introduced The Nighttime solar cell®: infrared energy to deep space.  Dr. Joseph R. Blandino of the Virginia Military Institute, and Dr. David J. Lawrence of James Madison University, presented a poster on Transient response of a thermoelectric generator subjected to spatially non-uniform heating: implications for heat and IR sensing applications.  In her presentation Dr. Scarel explained the connection among the words in the title of the Workshop.

Two posters were presented by JMU Physics students Graham Gearhart and Brian Lang.  Graham presented “Infrared source and thermoelectric device trends in infrared power generation”, while Brian discussed: The interaction between current and infrared radiation”.  Graham and Brian are part of the Scarel’s research group.  Other JMU students joined the event asking questions and networking.

Dr. Brian Utter (Physics, JMU) and Lynn Petersen (U.S. Office of Naval Research) chaired the morning and the afternoon sessions.  Dr. Yvonne Harris, vice Provost for Research and Scholarship, and Lynn Petersen opened the event in the morning and addressed the final remarks in the afternoon, respectively.

The Workshop was funded by the U.S. Office of Naval Research, the 4-VA Consortium, JMU, and The Madison Trust—Fostering Innovation and Strategic Philanthropy.

The picture below shows a moment of the event.