Center Overview
The Center for Advanced Research in Drying (CARD) focuses on developing novel technologies, equipment, and strategies that enhance and optimize the drying of semi-moist, porous materials such as food and agricultural products, pulp and paper products, chemicals, textiles, and pharmaceuticals. CARD’s mission is to assist U.S. manufacturing industries in becoming more environmentally sustainable and improving the quality of their products by using advanced and novel technologies in heat/mass transfer processes, such as drying, heating, cooling, freezing, dewatering, and baking.
CARD has these objectives:
- Reduce energy, water consumption, and carbon footprint in drying and related heat/mass transfer processes.
- Enhance both product quality and throughput of our member’s products.
- Train the next generation workforce for 21st-century jobs.
CARD will help member industry partners:
- Lead in novel drying process improvement technology.
- Capture a healthy share of the manufacturing market.
- Generate and maintain new U.S. jobs.
- Assure a strong U.S. economy and standard of living.
Universities
- Worcester Polytechnic Institute
- University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
Center Personnel
Dr. Jamal Yagoobi
Center Director
508-831-4979
jyagoobi@wpi.edu
Dr. Hao Feng
UIUC Site Director
217 244-2571
haofeng@illinois.edu
Dr. Irfan Ahmad
UIUC Site Co-Director/Innovation Director
217 333-2015
ishmad@illinois.edu
Dr. Cosme Furlong
WPI Site Co-Director
508-831-5126
cfurlong@wpi.edu
Dr. Mark Lippi
Program Manager
269-420-7432
mlippi@wpi.edu
Patricia Howe
Program Administrator
508-831-4875
phowe@wpi.edu
Research Focus
Improving Existing Processes
CARD is using new methods and strategies to improve and speed up drying of existing drying operations. This includes deep dives into the fundamental microstructures of products.
- Enhance heat and mass transfer with innovative impinging jet nozzles.
- Improve spray drying design using novel nozzles to create fine, uniform particulates.
- Foundational research characterizing moisture transfer and microstructure of products.
Developing Novel Technologies
CARD is finding alternative methods to drive moisture out of products. These technologies reduce overall energy expenditure to dry a given weight of product.
- Develop unique applications using electric field and ultrasonic drying.
- Separation of ethanol from fermentation media using ultrasonics.
- Enhance paper drying using electrohydrodynamic principles.
Developing Novel Sensors
There is tremendous need to develop novel drying technologies and sensors that can be incorporated in new ways to advance the science of drying, baking, freezing, and more. Many of these sensors need to be able to operate in harsh environments of high and low temperatures and elevated stress. These technologies will ultimately be used to create artificial intelligence programs to improve drying processes.
- Tip-based optical fiber sensors for continuous, in situ measurements of trapped moisture.
- An integrated multiscale modeling and sensors-based approach to study strains and stresses in foods undergoing glass transition during drying.
- Optics-based sensors in harsh environments that can measure morphological changes during drying.
- Smart Drying enabled by multisource data fusion and machine learning.