Graduate students from UNM’s Anderson Schools, School of Engineering to work on energy conversion project
The University of New Mexico announced today that Avistar, PNM’s research and development subsidiary, has signed a research agreement in energy conversion under which the School of Engineering will supervise a study on that subject by graduate students. The program will be administered by UNM’s Electrical and Computer Engineering Department, although the work will be done by students from the UNM’s School of Engineering (SOE) and the ASM (ASM).
“Avistar is pleased to engage the University of New Mexico in this study of energy conversion,” said George Rhodes, Avistar executive vice president and chief operating officer. “The work from the UNM student team will supplement data we already have on current research on the commercially viable processes in stored electrical energy and its retrieval. We believe this study will help in forecasting the methodology to be used for more efficient and effective use of energy storage, generation and transmission.”
Under the arrangement supported by Avistar and UNM, a student team will review the current research literature and commercial efforts in stored energy conversion and compile a summary of the data for Avistar. UNM will receive a stipend from PNM to cover the costs of the student assistantships.
Supervision of the Avistar program at UNM will be jointly handled by Professor Andres C. Salazar, PNM chair of Microsystems, Commercialization and Technology, and Professor Chaouki Abdallah, chair of the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department.
“We are happy that PNM has decided to participate in this technology assessment program with UNM,” said Joseph Cecchi, dean, UNM School of Engineering. “It provides a challenging way for both SOE and ASM students to assist in the research of a real world problem in energy conversion. In addition, the work is focused in an area of concern to everyone today – energy.”
Contacts: Steve Carr, (505) 277-1821; e-mail: scarr@unm.edu or Greg Johnston, (505) 277-1816; e-mail: gregj@unm.edu