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This page contains links to short versions and to the full versions
of the final projects. Access to the full version of the projects is password protected. To get such
password, please contact Prof.
Miguel Bagajewicz at bagajewicz@ou.edu
INDIVIDUALS ARE ALSO RECOGNIZED BY THE INSTRUCTOR IN THE HALL OF FAME BELOW.
FIRST PRIZE WINNER
($700 To split)
BODY DRUG DISTRIBUTION SIMULATOR: The objective of this project was to create a body simulator that is able to predict the rate at which a drug is metabolized. A physiologically based model has been formulated consisting of four sections: absorption, distribution, metabolism, and excretion. The absorption section models the stomach as a stirred tank with an impulse input and the small intestine as a PFR. The distribution system is also modeled as a series of PFR, or simple flows in tubes. The metabolism section includes the liver which is simulated by a convection-dispersion model. The excretion section includes the kidney which is modeled as three well-stirred regions. We show results pertaining to specific drugs.
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SECOND PRIZE WINNER
($300 To Split)
HEAT EXCHANGER NETWORK RETROFIT : The retrofit of heat exchanger networks as a way of increasing the energy efficiency of pre-heating trains and heat exchanger networks in general. Such increase in energy efficiency reduces CO2 emissions, thus achieving two goals simultaneously (reducing carbon print and costs). Retrofitting usually implies the addition of new exchangers, the reduction of area in some existing exchangers and in some cases the relocation of exchangers. Various techniques have been proposed for this purpose. We show results for two existing techniques and compare them.
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THIRD PRIZE WINNERS
($100 To Split)
HEPATITIS C PROTEASE INHIBITOR: Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infects 150-200 million people worldwide. Americans account for 4.1 million of the people affected with hepatitis C. There are several proteins that may be inhibited to prevent the virus from spreading, including those involved in cell entry and viral replication, but one particularly promising target is the NS3/NS4A complex. This complex is responsible for the cleavage of several essential viral proteins. If an inhibitor molecule can bind to the NS3/NS4A complex active site, a catalytic triad, the formation of infectious virions can be prevented. Twenty-one potential drug candidates have been identified, nine from known serine protease inhibitors. Twelve of the potential drug candidates were identified by modifying the functional groups of a known HCV drug, boceprevir. The functional groups were modified to choose the combinations that would likely give the highest binding affinity and highest HNE/HCV. These drug candidates were tested for their binding strength using molecular docking software. Attempts to identify other molecules through molecular discovery are described.
Extended Abstract
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WATER MANAGEMENT IN PROCESS PLANTS
:Water management in process plants has been the object of several studies in which the option of reusing water in effective ways has been explored. In addition, the possibility of regenerating freshwater out of polluted water to further reuse it has been mentioned. The extreme case of this is the so-called zero-liquid discharge cycles, which has been found possible and even economically beneficial in certain cases. Currently, methods are being employed which model regeneration processes (i.e. water treatment processes) under the assumption that treated water has a fixed outlet contaminant concentration. In order to increase the accuracy in mathematical optimization models used to design water reuse/regeneration systems, we developed models of several common regeneration and water-using processes which relate the outlet concentration of contaminants present in wastewater to parameters of the inlet stream and/or unit. We present these as well as a few equipment cost models to advance progress towards the ultimate goal of zero liquid discharge in a refinery. The performance of these models in the overall water management designs is also presented and discussed.
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HONORABLE MENTIONS
NOVEL METHOD FOR GAS SEPARATION: Removal of Nitrogen, CO2 and H2S from gas is an important step in gas conditioning for further separations or direct use. Once these impurities are removed from the gas, the next step is the removal of ethane and heavier components. The removal of CO2 and H2S is traditionally done through a process called amine sweetening. Nitrogen, in turn is removed using membranes or PSA. Finally ethane and heavier components are separated using cryogenics methods. Because these methods are not simple, nor inexpensive, finding alternatives would be beneficial. In this project, we overview the aforementioned methods and we present the economics of a new technology for separating impurities out from natural gas that has been developed at OU.
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Technical details of the findings on the novel technology part of this project are withheld per the request of the Office of Technology Management at the University of Oklahoma. Please contact them or Prof. Bagajewicz for details on how top get access to these details.
UTILITY INTEGRATED BIOREFINERIES: In this project we show how capacity planning models can be used to plan investments in biorefineries. For this, we have considered several processes belonging to a chemical supply chain that can be fed by a raw material, such as switchgrass, and used to produce valuable commodities. To build our model we have considered 58 possible processes to choose from, part of which are 12 chemicals chosen by the U.S. Department of Energy for production of value-added chemicals from biomass. The model maximizes net present value, considers budgeting conditions to self finance expansions and determines what process ought to be in the biorefinery, its initial capacity, as well as construction time and the timing and size of future expansions. Projected raw material availability, market projected demand and prices, as well as transportation costs are included. Among other results, the model is also able to provide the location of the refinery. We also added the integration of centralized utilities to determine the optimal value added chain of processes, a feature that has not been considered in any previous models.
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MEMBRANE NETWORKS FOR NATURAL GAS PROCESSING: In natural gas processing, membrane networks compete directly with amine units to separate carbon dioxide from natural gas. However, membrane systems do not handle large flow rates effectively and require significant compressor power under these conditions. Currently, membrane networks are not as economically sound as amine units at high flow rates, but operate affordably under lower flow rates. A model was designed in GAMS to assess the feasibility of an amine unit versus a membrane network in which the annual processing cost was minimized. Prior to comparing the cost of the designed membrane network to the cost of an amine unit, several networks were designed. In order to determine which network was optimal, the annual processing cost and the amount of methane lost were considered. For the cases we analyzed, the results indicate that the membrane network is more economically feasible than the amine unit, but processing conditions involving larger flow rates are likely to favor amine units.
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PROGRESSIVE OIL FRACTIONATION: Progressive crude distillation (United States Patent number 4,664,785) is being increasingly mentioned as an energy savings alternative to existing crude fractionation columns. One plant using this technology has been built in Europe and different industrial circles are paying increasing attention. This presentation will show under what conditions these claims are warranted. The technology involves successively separating increasingly heavier petroleum cuts in a first series of columns. A second series of columns is being fed by the products of the first one. The first series of columns separate loose cuts of the most volatile components fed to each column. Columns in the second series sharpen the cuts and produce naphtha, kerosene, diesel, and gas oil product streams within specification. An assessment of some of the patent claims is made for a light and heavy crude.
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NEW OIL DISTILLATION TECHNOLOGIES
: In this project we study the energy efficiency of several different proposed technologies for distillation yield enhancement in oil fractionation. We discuss a patent developed at OU.
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PIPELINE LEAK DETECTION: Petroleum pipelines transport over 600 billion ton-miles of freight each year in a cost effective and safe manner. The threat of pipeline leaks poses serious safety, environmental, and economic risks though. In this project, different hardware and software leak detection methods were evaluated in terms of response time, leak-locating ability, and power. The Generalized Likelihood Ratio (GLR) was considered as a software method. Our presentation will show an in-depth economic analysis of the GLR method versus other leak detection methods for both single pipeline systems and gathering/distribution networks transporting oil and natural gas over a range of pipeline lengths, oil and gas prices, pipe diameters, and spill clean-up costs.
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OTHER (ALSO GOOD) PROJECTS
(No particular Order)
BTEX REMOVAL FROM NATURAL GAS: We study problems associated to the removal of CO2 from natural gas. In particular, we discuss the issue of aromatics and their discharge to atmosphere. The ability of existing simulators to model the solution of BTEX (Benzene, Toluene, Ethyl Benzene and Xylenes) in amine systems will be discussed. We will present alternative solutions to the current incineration methods based on the use of silica aerogels. We also explore the use of scrubbing methods using ionic liquids and other technologies.
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USE OF HYDRATES FOR NATURAL GAS STORAGE
: In this study, natural gas hydrates were considered as a possibility for the storage of natural gas. A system was designed for the production, and re-gasification of natural gas hydrates. This storage economics were later compared to existing methods (salt caverns, aquifiers, etc.)
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ENERGY INDUSTRY PLANNING IN OKLAHOMA
: Oklahoma will have to upgrade its energy infrastructure to address the next decades of growth. We considered the use of planning models to determine what are the new biofuels plants and refinery expansion needed to address the fuel needs, what are the wind power and clean coal plants needed to address the electricity demands and finally what are the gas infrastructure expansion needed to address gas use for heating as well as for eventual transportation. We present two models, one that determines what facilities need to be built, with their capacity and when they ought to be built to satisfy the demands and minimize the overall cost. We added restrictions on carbon emissions and job creation, so we show how these restrictions affect the plans. Our second model looks at overall profitability of investors and incorporates tax incentives as well as pricing decisions.
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PIPELINE NETWORK DESIGN: In this project, we outline a new methodology and model to design natural gas pipelines over a long time horizon considering and determining timely expansions by the addition of compressors. We compare our methodology to the current state-of-the-art methodologies, highlighting the limitations of the latter and showing the advantages of the former. We also apply this method to a case study to prove its accuracy and time-saving ability.
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PROTEIN FOLDING PREDICTIONS: The search for an accurate and efficient protein conformation predicting method started around 1972 with a theoretical study on the ribonuclease folding. Surprisingly, physicist, chemists, and mathematicians have only been making very minute progress towards the empirical prediction algorithm of three-dimensional protein folding structures. The three most commonly accepted methods used in the past decade consist of homology prediction, folding recognition, and ab-initio determination. Our research takes the ab-initio approach. We built a model that follows the folding as the protein is coming out of the ribosome. This model minimizes the total energy as each aminoacid is added to the chain, using the previous folding as the starting point. We also used a genetic algorithm (GA) search method. The GA is based on the basic concept of evolutionary natural selection for the “fittest” individual. To this technique we added an adaptation search with gene alteration. We have successfully developed a GA program that minimizes the potential energy of target sequence and generates the corresponding Cartesian coordinates for each atom. By using a three dimensional graphing software, Accelry’s, we were able to visualize the predicted conformation and compare to natural conformation.
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REFINERY OPERATIONS PLANNING: Running refineries require decision making about the amount of product to produce (Naphtha, gasolines of different qualities, diesel, fuels, etc.). It also requires determining what quality of crude is needed to be bought to match the demand of the different products. Because crude takes time to arrive, one is planning what to purchase today to be able to process it weeks afterwards. In addition, equipment has to be run at different conditions of temperature and pressure. Historically the first models were linear. Later, industry made efforts to handle their nonlinear nature. In this work we present a methodology that is an alternative to the successive linearization technique popular in industry.
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Chad Duncan Amy Frink Hope Baumgarner Chelsea Ryden Nathan Liles Benjamin Munda
   
 
Sarah Scribner Trevor Hallberg Landon Carroll Conner Cruson Matthew Byford Andrew Robbins
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