 Good afternoon. My name is John Sutherland. I'm the Phasenfeld head of environmental and ecological engineering and I have the distinct honor to introduce our third speaker this afternoon Over the lunch hour and that is professor Amisha Shaw I'll just tell you a little bit about her. She received her bachelor's degree in chemical engineering from Washington University in St. Louis She then went on to receive her PhD in environmental engineering from Georgia Tech She held a postdoc position at Yale for a few years and then Had a postdoc position at the Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology She came to Purdue in 2014 Her 10-year home is civil engineering and she has a joint appointment in my my department In terms of her research, I'll be fast Her research is experimental oriented experiment oriented and focused on fundamental chemical and physical processes related to environmental engineering I will note that she is an absolutely outstanding mentor and teacher She does an amazing job in mentoring her students and in fact The students recently recognized her with an instructional excellence award in Tripoli so with that brief introduction Amisha gosh, okay so Thank you for the invitation I thought I would just share my scientific journey that I've had here Really throughout my life Again, you all know who I am so I'll get started Um So I actually wanted to put this schematic up because this is really a representation of what I really love to do I love to study chemical reactions in Any type of environmental system and so this means starting from a reactant and looking at all the different transformations that occur An intermediates that are formed. Is this not a laser? Oops Which one's the laser? There's no laser. Okay all the intermediates that form and Finally reaching product stage. Okay, so I love to study how Bass these transformations are how slow they are What type of external forces impact them and often times? Maybe there's a catalyst that needs to speed things up that may be interesting to look at So I love to examine these processes and I thought it was a really interesting parallel to my own life as Me a little baby starting out as a little reactant and then going through life's transformations Oftentimes there's external forces that kind of impact who you are sometimes there's very good mentors and parents who Catalyze your transformations. Oh, it's okay. It's okay and yeah, um end up with me as Someone who really loves discovery and hopefully has a good impact on society. So that's kind of where I'm coming from here So just to give you a little bit of a sense of what inspired me It really didn't come until my teenage years. I think I was just too busy trying not to kill my younger brother before that Make sure he stayed alive when I was babysitting But this is really when I was in high school I really love to read and I opened up National Geographic and I just thought it was the most amazing thing I Learned about different cultures learned about human evolution and I just ate it all up And I loved to learn about the beauty of science and exploration And I was really drawn towards environmental problems and grand challenges related to sustainability and different aspects of nature and and all those things that We are going to be challenged with in the next century and I thought chemistry was such a huge integral part of this this process So just to give you a little bit of how I kind of went on from there Of course value education is really the most valuable thing. I Went all the way down to Georgia Tech in Atlanta a wonderful place to live. Oh, sorry. Sorry. I didn't first I first went to college And that's my hometown st. Louis, Missouri. I Have to say that I actually took an introductory physics class that really was a game changer for me I loved it. I loved the instructor. I thought it was so exciting And so I changed from a chemistry environmental science degree to chemical engineering after my first year Well, unfortunately, I did more process engineering than chemistry. So I got a little bit Disappointed there. That's why I have a little sad smiley face. So I needed to kind of reroute myself So I went ahead and went to grad school down south and Atlanta, Georgia at Georgia Tech And there I really found the true place for me And that's an environmental engineering and I got to use root really look at physics and chemistry Within an environmental framework, which was really exciting. So I learned about how to Remove contaminants from water treatment how to understand different physical and chemical processes that are involved in making water quality better both in the US and abroad and I just really loved environmental chemistry looking at those chemical reactions that I talked about earlier and with that That was really a great Scientific aspect of graduate school But I actually want to point out that my advisors were my mentors for life and that was really the first time that I realized that They're there with me for the long haul they taught me so many life lessons at that stage I made so many mistakes and They they really rerouted me. So I can't Emphasize the value of those mentors enough from there I Went up straight on 95. Oh, wow five minutes. Geez went up straight up 95 and Did some post-doctoral work? I Really took that knowledge to new realms really It's just the science that I did the chemistry that I did I got to take it to new aspects of New applications both related to carbon capture at Yale and then I got to look at ballast water treatment Which was really fascinating and trying to understand how that we could mitigate the transfer of invasive VCs by Disinfecting ballast waters and so there was some really cool chemistry there In terms of research At Purdue and I really make the statement at the top which is kind of encompasses me as a whole Be myself discover inspire be creative and at the very end do excellent science That's very important to me. This project here is really a Classic example of all the things that I love to explore and learn about looking at how Chemical reactions of monomers and in a homogenous solution can change as we start looking at 2d structures So a 2d polymer and what are the different? How does the reaction change as we move to these larger scale systems? Can we? Evaluate each aspect individually, but then they're not translatable. So I think this This connection is very intriguing. I Also looked have ongoing projects that are a little bit more Globally related to problems like climate change. So looking at how organic sulfur Can undergo photochemistry to form these really interesting little molecular sulfur compounds that? undergo Cooling when they reach the atmosphere and so what are the cool? Transformations that occur in the water face than that than that if that Subsequently affect atmospheric processes and of course getting some really interesting data there related to how do these chemical? Reactions takes place over time and what are some external forces that can affect them With that I just want to give a shout out to wonderful collaborators that I had Both with Dr. Welton looking at wildfire impacts on drinking water. This was very exciting basically my graduate seat sitting here gets to burn a lot of stuff and There's some clear effects of how wildfires can affect drinking water distribution systems and communities that are affected by these problems and I also had another Set of collaborators. I was also interested very exciting to work with that is really just to indoor air quality and I think we had a really fun time looking at how Disinfectants that we've been commonly using during COVID can really affect the indoor airspace and we got to measure a lot of cool things with that said I I hoped that I hope that I've been able to take all of this chemistry that I've learned and integrated into my classes Effectively, it's been really fun to Collaborate or to work with the students One shout out that I really want to make is that one mission I have is to really help women in STEM and That goes with women in engineering But also to mentor undergraduate and graduate women to enhance their scientific identity Scholarly productivity and to inspire them to also go on and do MS and PhD degrees So that's a very important part of why I'm here with that Students are the centerpiece of my success. I hope that they can Learn things from me and it can inspire them not only to be excellent scientists, but to be excellent human beings and Of course, I would like to thank my foundation, which is my family and friends who have made me grow into Hopefully a beautiful tree So, yeah Thank You Amisha Everybody I am Rao Govind Raju. I'm the head of civil engineering So that's the other department that Amisha belongs to so she's served by two heads Yeah First let's see if we have any questions from the audience first great presentation. So One of the slide that you mentioned about the climate change and What? Have been your experience in linking this, you know short term kind of the process or interest to very long term You know the client meet, you know the changes of concerns. So what have you been your like again? Interaction or strategy to move forward? Yeah, this is really interesting, you know, this field kind of goes from really fundamental small-scale chemistry that I work on to people who You know look at who model global scale Sulphur budgets across the globe and so I remember talking to them and it was interesting that, you know All the model inputs that they have Don't actually match what I see at the fundamental level. So there's this Disconnect and I Think what is really required is for me to sort of try to translate that, you know Kind of move closer to them and they move closer to me so that we can come to a compromise and an understanding of what's really happening because it's really difficult for them, you know for For these model inputs that they have of course they have to go out into the middle of the ocean and try to do all these experimental things and so Looking at these really small-scale things is really challenging But yeah, that's really kind of the biggest problem that we face is trying to merge those two sides and getting us together But it's fascinating We have another great question from professor alabak, how do you manage joint relations with Tripoli and civil? Well, I have two answers one for when these two are in the room with me and one where they're not John and I can leave Yeah, I mean It's just another thing to put on your list of time management. I mean Being a successful faculty member is all about time management And so this is just another thing to put on the list, but I'm it's funny because they're actually From the apartment heads go they're quite different from each other. So so if I don't like one I just go to the other and if I Don't like the other I just go to the other. So that's that's a wonderful beauty about that Yeah, but I mean it's the same with mentors, right? You you take the things you learn from all of them and you learn not only the good things about them But you also learn the bad things and so it really kind of helps you and forms forms who you are in the end but nobody's perfect and so We just take the good and try to improve over time, but yeah, it's fine Yeah Amisha really enjoyed the presentation one thing that struck me was You know the the amount of Policy impact a lot of your research, you know can have and I know some of your collaborators are Trying and I feel like you know to move the needle on policy impact, and it's not it's it's a hard thing to do But maybe based, you know based on your experience, maybe at Georgia Tech and then you know What are some things? You know universities can do to help open that Door make it a little that little easier To have that well, I really want Purdue to be a learning lab of sustainability Like why can't we be an example for what a sustainable? community can be and I think that would be an excellent way to Move things forward. I Mean, unfortunately Like with all things It's not just about the science. It's about Change people don't want to change and people are stuck where they want to be and it's just hard to convince them to To create a more sustainable future But I would love yeah, I would love for us to be an example since stewards of that, but yeah I mean politics is here as well. So, you know, what are you gonna do? I? Just read an article about trying to get high-speed rail in California, and it was Horrible so yeah These are things I would love to see I would love to see high-speed rail from Indianapolis to Chicago via West Lafayette, but will that happen in my lifetime? Probably not so yeah, just all these things that I think would be sustainable but You get more cynical when you get older unfortunately I used to be much more inspired when I was 22 Yeah, so Amisha, thank you for your talk and so thinking of inspiration What are the topics in your environmental chemistry courses that is that is inspiring to students or what gets them really excited? Students really want to be part of the solution. I think they really want to make the world a better place and Anything that I can teach them that lets them do that. I think Excites them. I think they really Want I mean, I know you know, maybe I maybe they just want to go out and get jobs and make money I mean, but I hope that they would be excellent stewards of of the earth and think about sustainability and think about Equality and Take all of those things into account when they as they grow Yeah, I Don't know it's not about right or as my mentor or Yeah All right. Well, well other thinking of questions I was going to sort of chime in and what Jan Aranbuck said Understand you know having two heads it can you know two departments. It has its pluses But you know, you do have to manage To department two department heads two different rules. So I agree with Amisha I think when John and I leave the room and when she answers the You know, I hope I'm not always the bad cop The I wish I do have another question for you I'm going to use your analogy, which I think is very apt for the university in my simplistic view of thinking You know for a university the faculty and the students are the ingredients the reactants You know and for the chemistry to work and for things to go to the right Direction everything else is a catalyst Facilities and what else but these two are the main ingredients And you're and being a good mentor, you know and working with students What do you think are the important catalysts for the reaction to go in the right direction take a few moments to think and oh Wow How truthful do you want me to be here? Oh be brutally honest, you know brutally honest Okay, it might as well if I don't get a paycheck next month We'll know the reason why faculty that are amenable to change that's Yeah Faculty administration that are amenable to change. It's hard. I mean, yeah, that's it's not just here It's just life. That's how people are, but I would love to see us be Thanks, thank you all for coming I just wanted to remind you what when is the next Oh, thank you. Yeah. All right, so we will gather again for the third Celebrating associate professor's event on November 2nd on Wednesday. So do put that on your calendar And thank you for joining us here today You know really to celebrate Feng Wang Maggie and Amisha's success. So thank you all