Steve Buckley Energy and Industrial Sustainability Research

Welcome!

Prof. Buckley’s research lies at the intersection of energy science, sensors, and industrial processes.  Current projects include the development of novel sensors for recycling, building the circular economy, and investigations into green hydrogen and green ammonia production.  As an Affiliate faculty member, he also has strong ties to the commercial world, where he presently leads the Applied Systems business unit of Ocean Insight.  He has founded or co-founded several companies in energy and photonics, including Solo Energy, Photon Machines, and Flash Photonics, and had several successful exits.  He was a tenured professor in the MAE and NanoEngineering Departments at UCSD before moving to the Seattle area in 2007.  His Ph.D. is from U.C. Berkeley and B.S.E. is from Princeton University.

Prof. Buckley is open to collaboration on energy and spectroscopic projects, and happy to advise students on energy, air pollution, sustainability, product development, and/or entrepreneurship.

Steve’s relatively current C.V. is linked HERE.  He can be reached at sgbuck “at” uw.edu.

 

Students

Advising: Research Direction

Undergraduate

  1. Scott Heatwole (UMCP Class of 2003), Infrared Spectroscopy in Microscale systems.
  2. Sam Krehnbrink (UMCP Class of 2003), Programming Control for Engineering Instruments.
  3. Steven O’Hara (UMCP Class of 2004), Design of a Combustion-Driven Flow Reactor.
  4. Tom Serra (UMCP Class of 2004), Fabrication of Fiber Bragg Gratings.
  5. David Hoffman (UCSD Class of 2005), Design and Testing of a Novel Aerosol Spectrometer.
  6. Geoff Rapoport (UCSD Class of 2005), Interfacing of Tunable Diode Laser Sensors for Combustion Control.
  7. Christine Lao (UCSD Class of 2007), Tunable Diode Laser Measurements of CO and CO2.
  8. Halden Oxenbol (UCSD Class of 2007), Design of a Biofuel Burner.
  9. Jason Harp (UCSD Class of 2007), A Robust Liquid Fuel Vaporizer.
  10. Jimmy Kerins (UCSD Class of 2007), A Robust Liquid Fuel Vaporizer.
  11. Michael Gollner (UCSD Class of 2007), Combustion of Biodiesel.

Masters

  1. Sivashankar Pandetti, UMCP M.S. December 2002, “Thermal Treatment of Chlorobenzene using Molten Salt Oxidation.” Thesis / research advisor.
  2. Jayakumar Patil, M.S. UMCP May 2003, “Development of a Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy Based Metal Monitor and Application to Molten Salt Oxidation.” Thesis / research advisor.
  3. Eric Kommer, M.S. UMCP Fall 2003, “Variations of Engine Particulate Matter in a Miniature Dilution Tunnel.” Thesis / research advisor.
  4. Travis Tempel, M.S. UMCP May 2004, “Investigation of Supersonic Mixing Using Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy.” Thesis / research advisor.
  5. Scott Heatwole, B.S. / M.S. UMCP August 2004, “In situ Infrared Diagnostics for a Microscale Combustion Reactor.” Thesis / research co-advisor with Prof. Chris Cadou.
  6. Kyle Kratzsch, M.S. UMCP M.S. Fall 2004, “Effects of Temperature and Aerosol Content on Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy Detection Limits.” Thesis / research advisor.
  7. Ezra Chen, B.S. / M.S. UMCP Spring 2005, “Temperature Mapping of an Acoustically-Forced Laminar Diffusion Flame Using Planar Laser Rayleigh Scattering.” Thesis / research advisor.
  8. Ariel Schuger, M.S. UCSD M.S. Spring 2005, “Diode Laser Measurement of H2O, OH, and Temperature in a Premixed Methane and Air Flame through the Application of Wavelength Modulation Spectroscopy.” Thesis / research advisor.
  9. Alex Zimmerman, UCSD M.S. Summer 2006, “Quantitative Study of Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy for Equivalence Ratio Measurement in Laminar Premixed Methane-Air Flames.” Thesis / research advisor.
  10. Erin Simpson, UCSD M.S. Fall 2006, “Signal Enhancement in Laser Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy of Single-Particle Aerosol Samples.” Thesis / research advisor.
  11. Marco Leon, M.S. UCSD Fall 2007, CO and NO Detection in High Pressure Combustion Systems at Elevated Temperatures.
  12. Jeff Yin, UCSD M.S. Fall 2009, Laser-Induced Incandescence Measurements Compared with a Scanning Mobility Particle Sizer.

Doctoral

  1. Martin Christiansen, UMBC Ph.D. Fall 2001, “Spectrometer with CMOS Demodulation of Fiber Optic Bragg Grating Sensors” – I co-advised this student with Prof. Koh of UMBC. Dissertation / Research advisor. Presently: Northrup Grumman
  2. Ponniah Sivaneson, UMCP Ph.D. (Physics) Spring 2002, “Fiber Bragg Grating Sensor and Demodulation System for the Simultaneous Measurement of Temperature and Strain.” Dissertation / Research advisor. Presently: Physical Optics Corporation
  3. Chris Baldwin, UMCP Ph.D. Fall 2003, “Distributed Sensing for Flexible Structures Using a Fiber Optic Sensor System.” Dissertation / Research advisor. Presently: Aither Engineering, Inc.
  4. Mohammadreza Gharavi, UMCP Ph.D. Fall 2004, “Infrared Optical Sensor for Combustion Diagnostics Using Wavelength Modulation Spectroscopy.” Dissertation / research advisor. Presently: Petrochemical industry
  5. Francesco Ferroli, UMCP Ph.D. Summer 2005, “Experimental Characterization of
    Laser-Induced Plasmas and Application to Gas Composition Measurements.” Dissertation / research advisor. Subsequent employment: Postdoctoral Researcher, TU Delft
  6. Ali Rangwalla, UCSD Ph.D. Spring 2006, “Flame-Spread Analysis using a Variable B-Number.” Dissertation / research advisor. Presently: Assistant Professor, Worchester Polytechnic Institute
  7. Gregg Lithgow, UCSD Ph.D. Spring 2007, Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy for Aerosol Measurement. Dissertation / research advisor. Subsequent: NRC Canada, Presently: Senior Scientist, Photon Machines, Inc.
  8. Zuhair Ibrahim, UCSD Ph.D. start May 2004 / expected Spring 2007, Prediction and Mitigation of Oscillatory Instabilities in Lean Premixed Combustion. (Joint with Prof. Forman Williams) Dissertation / research advisor. Presently: Exponent, Inc.
  9. Andrew Effenberger. UCSD Ph.D. (Chemistry) Fall 2009. Physics of Laser-Induced Breakdown Plasmas Relevant to Hazardous Material Detection. Dissertation / research advisor.  Presently: Idaho National Engineering Laboratory

Post-doctoral / Research staff

  1. Mickael Coutin, (2001-2002) Post-doctoral researcher, flame spread processes, joint with Prof. José Torero, Fire Protection Engineering.
  2. Ponniah Sivanesan (January 2002 –May 2002) Post-doctoral researcher, optical sensors.
  3. Warren Choi (June 2002 – July 2003) Programmer.
  4. Bruce Thomas (July 2003 – June 2007) Laboratory technician.
  5. Mohammadreza Gharavi (February 2005 – January 2007).

 Independent Study, Tutorial, Post-doc, Internship Supervision.

European Diploma Student Projects

Guillaume Lehnasch (University of Poitiers, Diploma Student, April – September 2000)

Thomas Schmid (Technical University Manheim, Diploma Student, April – September 2001)

Aurelien Most (University of Poitiers, Diploma Student, April – September 2001)

Marco Borchers (University of Munich, Diploma Student, November 2005 – June 2006)