
By REBECCA SHEARER
Four PhD students were each presented with £500 bursaries for their work at the Institute of Mechanical, Process and Energy Engineering (IMPEE) conference, held recently at Heriot Watt University.
Energy harvesting and conversion is one of the four key IMPEE themes and much IMPEE research also involves strong industrial links across a range of mechanical and engineering sectors.
This was the second IMPEE conference, held to stimulate networking and enhance research within the Institute. The conference, largely attended by early researchers and academics, promoted the scale of cross-disciplinary research being conducted by the Institute, particularly in the areas of energy, chemical and process engineering and product design and manufacturing.
At present, IMPEE comprises more than 130 members – including 80 PhD students, 14 research associates and 39 academics.
The guest speaker was Patrick McCarthy (PhD) Business Development Executive, who spoke about Heriot-Watt’s Energy Academy and encouraged those in attendance at the conference to get involved.
He said: “The perspective of energy research at Heriot-Watt has changed and our interaction with the international agenda of climate change, sustainability and security of supply has informed a bigger-picture vision of how best to match our skills base to the research and knowledge-exchange challenges.
“Energy research is a core activity at Heriot-Watt and through our pan-university Energy Academy research excellence ranges from solar energy and energy-focused materials through to energy use, economics and logistics“.
The winning students were Mr. Ademola Odunsi ,Mr. Javier Palacio Torralba, Ms. Najah Battik and Mr. Peter Szabo. They are pictured above (from left) with Prof. James Ritchie (Dean of Science and Engineering) and Bob Reuben (Professor at IMPEE).
For more information on the work conducted by the committee contact:
