Presentation Title: How Can Physicist Help to Contain the Spread of COVID-19 Pandemic?
Prof. Zhifeng Ren presented this talk in the webinar on Materials Science, Engineering and Technology organized by Vebleo
Affiliation: Department of Physics and Texas Center for Superconductivity (TcSUH), University of Houston, Houston, TX 77204, USA
Biography
Prof. Zhifeng Ren is the M. D. Anderson Chair Professor of Physics and the Director of the Texas Center for Superconductivity at the University of Houston (TcSUH).
Prof. Zhifeng Ren received his BS in 1984 from Xihua University, MS in 1987 from Huazhong University of Science and Technology, and PhD in 1990 from the Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Prof. Zhifeng Ren’s research has been on thermoelectric, boron arsenide single crystals for high thermal conductivity, enhanced oil recovery, water splitting for H2 generation, heated filters for catching and killing SARS-CoV-2 causing COVID-19 pandemic, carbon nanotubes, solar absorbers, flexible transparent conductors, superconductors, etc.
Research Interests: High performance thermoelectric materials: nanostructure approach to reduce thermal conductivity and to improve thermoelectric properties for waste heat conversion into electricity;
Catalysts for water splitting: synthesis and testing of efficient catalysts for hydrogen and oxygen evolution reactions;
Nanosheet for enhanced oil recovery: synthesis and characterizations of high performance nanosheet for enhanced oil recovery;
Thermal management: efficient cooling materials, thermal storage, high thermal conductivity;
Superconductivity: synthesis and characterizations of new superconductors;
Solar energy conversion: electricity and heat co-generation by thermoelectric materials;
Flexible transparent electrodes: fabrication and understanding of flexible transparent electrodes;
Carbon nanotubes and nanocomposites: deformation and mechanical properties of carbon nanotubes and other nanowires by high resolution transmission electron microscope.
Abstract
SARS-CoV-2 virus has caused COVID-19 pandemic leading to over 62 million infections and 1.5 million death worldwide. Normally we would not think physicist can help too much on containing the spread of the virus.
Well, we proved that physicists can also help.
I will present our recent work on developing a heated filter to effectively catch and kill the SARS-CoV-2 virus and any other viruses, bacteria, germs, etc. to contain the spread of COVID-19 pandemic.
This talk was delivered in the webinar organized by Vebleo