IN THE NEWS: PROFILES
Assoc. Prof. P.T. Vasudevan
Chemical Engineering
B.S., Univ. of Madras, '74
M.S., SUNY at Buffalo, '84
Ph.D., Clarkson Univ., 1988
Research interests:
biocatalysis purification,
enzyme deactivation studies,
and hydrodesulfurization
catalysis
Other interests:
Plays cricket with his son,
Ajay, and daughter, Anu
IN THE LOOP: FEEDBACK IN THE CHEMICAL ENGINEERING DEPARTMENT
"What is the objective of taking a shower?" the professor asks.
It is the first day in Process Dynamics and Control, a course about controlling the various elements of industrial chemical processes. The 24 chemical engineering seniors know this course will challenge them to make use of all they've learned about thermodynamics, mass transfer, and other mathematical concepts.
"To maintain a given temperature," a student volunteers.
"No," replies the professor, "it is to become clean!"
Everyone laughs. In this highly technical course, the blackboard will usually be filled with complex mathematical equations. But today the class begins its discussion of feedback loops with the simple example of taking a shower. And the student was right--maintaining a comfortable temperature will be the goal of controlling this process. The setpoint is 85 degrees, explains P.T. Vasudevan, associate professor of chemical engineering. The sensor is your fingertips; the controller, your brain. With feedback from the sensor, the controller can determine when the final control elements--hot and cold faucets--need to be adjusted.
"I always find it useful to introduce the concept first," says Vasudevan, "then the math."
As a college professor, Vasudevan is part of his own feedback loop. Since he came to UNH nine years ago, the feedback he's received on his teaching has been overwhelmingly positive. Each spring, the senior class in the department votes on the outstanding teacher of the year. Seven out of the last nine years, Vasudevan has won that honor. This year, he has received the award for Teaching Excellence in the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences.
"Dr. Vasu," as his students call him, gets high marks for his attitude toward students. "He really seems to care about us," says senior Katherine Wallace. "If he knows you had a job interview he asks you how it went. And in class he will not go on until he makes sure that everybody understands."
Vasudevan helps students understand in part by grounding abstract mathematical concepts in the real world. Many of his examples come from industry.
"He has an industrial background, so he really knows what he's talking about," says Darleen Pike ('91). Pike took Vasudevan's course on biochemical engineering--and his advice to get her master's degree. Now she's a biomedical engineer at Lonza Biologics, in Portsmouth.
Before he moved to the United States in 1983, Vasudevan helped design, construct, and operate a massive petrochemical complex in Baroda, India. More recently he has worked on industrial catalysts in Madrid and with local industry in plastics processing and development.
Vasudevan has many tales to tell. Pike remembers one of his stories, about a monkey that got into some wires and knocked out power at a petrochemical plant in India. Without power, the controllers could no longer monitor the status of the hazardous hydrocarbons throughout the plant. The class then discussed how a plant can be designed to shut down safely in a such an emergency.
For the students, Vasudevan's emphasis on safety simply completes the loop in his caring attitude toward students and others. "He reminds us that what we're doing involves human life," says Wallace, "and we don't want to make a mistake."