Dr. Jay Akridge, the Glenn W. Sample Dean of Agriculture, joined us on Monday, May 12, 2014, to celebrate the 6th naming of the ABE grad program as #1 by US News & World Report (2009-2014). The undergraduate program is also enjoying its first repeat at the top slot (2004, 2012, 2013).

The work we do here matters! Congratulations to all of our faculty, staff, graduate and undergraduate students, and our fantastic alumni!

Several ABE Faculty will be honored at the ASABE Annual Meeting (information listed below):

• Dr. Bernie Engel will be named an ASABE Fellow
• Dr. Kevin Keener will be receiving the Rain Bird Engineering Concept of the Year along with three colleagues
• Dr. Indrajeet Chaubey will receive the ADS/Hancor Soil and Water Engineering Award
• Superior Paper Award Winners:
  • Dr. Richard Stroshine and Dr. Dirk Maier for "Three-Dimensional Transient Heat, Mass, Momentum, and Species Transfer in the Stored Grain Ecosystem: Part II, Model Validation." TRANS ASABE 56:1.
  • Dr. Mark Nearing for "Risk Assessment of Erosion from Concentrated Flow on Rangelands Using Overland Flow Distribution and Shear Stress Partitioning." TRANS ASABE 56:2.

2014 ASABE and CSBE | SCGAB Annual International Meeting

ASABE 2014 presents a forum to expand awareness of current industry trends, promote and acknowledge innovations in design and technology, and provide opportunities for professional development – all with a focus on the economic, political and societal impacts facing the industry. Join us for 4 days this summer in beautiful Montreal!

ASABE 2014 Highlights

• Networking Opportunities
• More than 1,000 Technical and Poster Presentations
• Professional Development Sessions
• Specialty Sessions which include invited speakers, panel discussions and round-table discussions
• Technical and Cultural Tours
• Professional Development Hours/Credits
• Career Fair

2014 Meeting Location

The ASABE and CSBE | SCGAB Annual International Meeting will be held at the Palais des congres de Montreal in Montreal, Quebec Canada beginning Sunday, July 13 thru Wednesday, July 16, 2014.

ASABE and CSBE | SCGAB Meeting registration desk will be located at the Palais des congres de Montreal convention center.
                            Registration hours:

The University instituted the Bravo Award with the Fall 2013 semester. Faculty and staff can nominate fellow faculty and staff for effort that helps to move the university forward.

Congratulations to the recent Bravo Award winners:

• Jenna Rickus
• Barb Davies
• Yvonne Hardebeck
• Scott Brand
• Gail Biberstine
• Martin Okos
• Klein Ileleji
• Dennis Buckmaster
• Abby Engelberth

Last fall, Bravo Awards were given to...

• Osvaldo Campanella
• Kari Clase
• Micky Creech
• Susan Gauger
• Pam Hancock
• Kathy Moore
• G. Narsimhan
• Becky Peer
• Jenna Rickus
• Richard Stroshine
• Carol Weaver

Boot Camp at Maha

On May 27, the Purdue REU Fluid Power Boot camp commenced in full force as this year’s REUs (undergraduates from other universities including the University of Minnesota, Georgia Tech, etc.) entered the Maha Fluid Power Laboratory for an intense fluid power training in preparation for CCEFP (Center for Compact & Efficient Fluid Power) research. The undergraduates were treated to lectures by Professor Ivantysynova, Professor Vacca, and a number of their graduate students including Gabriele Altare, Enrique Busquets, Naseem Daher, Dan Mizell, Guido Ritelli, and Lizhi Shang. Lectures included Guido Francesco Ritelli’s “Water Hydraulic Test Rig,” Naseem Daher and Enrique Busquets’s “Pump Displacement Controlled Actuation Technology,” Gabriele Altare’s Hydraulic Circuit Construction and Debugging,” and a demonstration of Maha’s displacement controlled wheel loader. Special thanks go out to Susan Gauger and Alyssa Burger for organizing the event. More information can be found on the Maha website: https://engineering.purdue.edu/Maha/

Maha Graduates

Congratulations to Natalie Spencer! She has graduated from Purdue with her master’s degree in mechanical engineering after two years of hard work at the Maha Fluid Power Laboratory. In her masters defense on May 30^th, she described the long journey that has culminated in the creation of a test rig which, through her efforts and those of Andrew Schenk (Ph.D. candidate) is able to measure the film thickness between the slipper and swashplate of an axial piston pump. Natalie will now move to Texas to pursue the career of her dreams in mission control at NASA. In addition to constructing the test rig, Natalie has been the author of Maha’s ABE Notes during her stay here— so again, congratulations Natalie and thank you for all you have done at Maha, and for your service in sharing our work in the ABE Notes!

New Faces

Maha is pleased to welcome Andrew Adelsperger, a new SURF student who will be working on modeling friction at the piston-cylinder interface of axial piston pumps under the guidance of graduate students Dan Mizell (Ph.D candidate) and Lizhi Shang (Ph.D candidate).