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Nov. 8, 2019

MSU Foundation professor to be honored for pioneering thermal engineering research

James Klausner of Michigan State University's College of Engineering has earned the 2019 Heat Transfer Memorial Award from the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, or ASME, for advancements in thermal engineering research.

Klausner, MSU Foundation professor and chair of the Department of Mechanical Engineering, will be honored during the International Mechanical Engineering Congress and Exposition in Salt Lake City, Nov. 10-14.

He is being recognized for his areas of expertise, including boiling heat transfer, humidification-dehumidification, desalination and thermochemical conversion. Klausner's efforts in the thermal engineering community, particularly ASME’s Heat Transfer Division and the U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Project – Energy, or ARPA-E, are also noted in the recognition. 

According to ASME, the Heat Transfer Memorial Award is bestowed on individuals who have made outstanding contributions to the field of heat transfer through teaching, research, practice, design, service, leadership and inventions.

Klausner joined MSU in 2016 from the University of Florida in Gainesville. He has authored more than 150 refereed publications and his theoretical work on bubble dynamics is included in the “Handbook of Heat Transfer.” He holds 10 patents and four provisional patents.

Klausner is also a leader in the recent receipt of three ARPA-E grants to advance high-impact energy technologies for MSU and its collaborative partners. 

Those three grants are:

Developing an energy efficient freshwater recovery system that provides environmental remediation by extracting clean irrigation water from hydraulic fracturing wastewater.

 • Developing innovative materials and system designs for low cost, long-duration energy storage on the U.S. power grid. 

Leveraging super alloys and additive manufacturing, known as 3D metal printing, to develop high performance heat exchangers for efficient power generation.

Klausner is the third expert from MSU to receive this national honor. Professors Jack Lloyd, in 1995, and James Beck, in 1998, were recognized previously by ASME.

Read more on this year’s IMECE Congress and Exposition.

By: Patricia Mroczek