RICE UNIVERSITY CONSORTIUM FOR PROCESSES IN POROUS MEDIA SPRING 2015
I nves tor News l etter
Annual Newsletter for the Rice
University Consortium For
Processes in Porous Media
We are please to kick off the
MESSAGE FROM
THE DIRECTOR
inaugural newsletter that
highlights some of our activities
The goal of this consortium is to
from this past year. Our team of
engaged in collaborative
faculty, staff scientists, and
research to advance the
students have made a number of
fundamental understanding of
advancements understanding
Research Highlight:
Biswal and Hiraski
awarded STS-AICHE
Best Fundamental
Paper for visualizing
bubble flow in
individual pores
This past year, the South
core research areas include the
processes in porous media. In
particular, projects this year have
Texas Section of the American
study of surfactant and foam
focused on:
Institute of Chemical Engineers
porous media processes. Our
Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR)
✦Chemical
enhanced oil
awarded their annual best
processes, asphaltene
recovery - in particular
fundamental paper award for
deposition, NMR studies of core
surfactant stabilized foam
their work in visualizing the flow
samples, core analysis, methane
✦Foam
gas hydrates and carbon
✦Low
capture and storage. As the
✦Wettability
Alteration
Director of this research
✦Adsorption
and surfactant
consortium, I thank you for
your support of our research
mobility control
interfacial tension foam
retention onto different mineral
surfaces
and welcome you to potential
✦The
opportunities for collaboration
✦Visualization
and participation.
use of sacrificial agents
of transport
processes at the pore-scale
✦Developing
models for 1-D
and 2-D foam transport
✦Molecular
modeling of
surfactant interfacial behavior
✦Nanotechnology
media processes
- George Hirasaki
www.owlnet.rice.edu/~gjh/Consortium/
for porous
and deformation of individual
bubbles through a single pore:
“Neighbor-induced bubble pinch-off:
novel mechanisms of in situ foam
generation in microfluidic channels"
published in Soft Matter, 2013,
9, 10971 by Rachel Liontas, Kun
Ma, George J. Hirasaki, and
Sibani Lisa Biswal
Watch the video at
http://youtu.be/-TJocLRaGZU
Save the Date:
19th Annual
Consortium Meeting
will take place
Wednesday April 22,
2015 at 8am in Duncan
Hall at Rice University
Houston, TX
RICE UNIVERSITY CONSORTIUM FOR PROCESSES IN POROUS MEDIA News
Flood Damage
The Hirasaki laboratory was flood
this past August from broken
plumbing. This was a mixed blessing.
We had to work in temporary space
for 6 months but we were able to
replace everything that was damaged
damaged from the water. This
includes replacing the two 20 year
old NMR spectrometer with a new
Oxford 2 MHz spectrometer with
probes that can measure short
relaxation times for oil and gas shale.
We are negotiating to have an
experienced NMR research scientist
join us as well as a young visiting
professor from China. We expect to
showcase many of the new core
flooding apparatus during a lab tour
at the annual meeting.
Welcome new staff
We added two new Ph.D. students to
join projects related to the
consortium projects. Three postdocs
and two visiting professors have also
recently joined on our group.
Good-bye!
We had four students graduate this
past year:
✦ Dr. Charles Conn and Dr. Aparna
Raju Sagi joined Shell Westhollow
Technology Center in Houston, TX.
✦ Dr. Leyu Cui joined Total in Pau,
France.
✦ Hadi Shams Jazayi joined Clariant
Oil Services in Houston, TX.
New Consortium!
This past year, our newest faculty
member, Francisco Vargas, established a
Consortium on Petroleum
Thermodynamics and Flow Assurance.
www.vargaslab.org/ptfac/
www.owlnet.rice.edu/~gjh/Consortium/
Publications
✦ Cui,
L., Puerto, M., López-Salinas, J.
L., Biswal, S. L., & Hirasaki, G. J.
(2014). Improved Methylene Blue TwoPhase Titration Method for
Determining Cationic Surfactant
Concentration in High-Salinity Brine.
Analytical Chemistry, 86(22),
11055-11061.
✦ Conn, C. A., Ma, K., Hirasaki, G. J.,
& Biswal, S. L. (2014). Visualizing oil
displacement with foam in a
microfluidic device with permeability
contrast. Lab on a Chip, 14(20),
3968-3977.
✦ ShamsiJazeyi, H., Verduzco, R., &
Hirasaki, G. J. (2014). Reducing
adsorption of anionic surfactant for
enhanced oil recovery: Part I.
Competitive adsorption mechanism.
Colloids asnd Surfaces A:
Physicochemical and Engineering
Aspects, 453, 162-167.
✦ Ma, K., Farajzadeh, R., LopezSalinas, J. L., Miller, C. A., Biswal, S.
L., & Hirasaki, G. J. (2014). Nonuniqueness, Numerical Artifacts, and
Parameter Sensitivity in Simulating
Steady-State and Transient Foam Flow
Through Porous Media. Transport in
porous media, 102(3), 325-348.
✦ Chen, Yunshen, et al. "Switchable
Nonionic to Cationic Ethoxylated
Amine Surfactants for CO2 Enhanced
Oil Recovery in High-Temperature,
High-Salinity Carbonate Reservoirs."
SPE Journal 19.02 (2014): 249-259.
✦ Kini, G. C., Yu, J., Wang, L., Kan, A.
T., Biswal, S. L., Tour, J. M., ... &
Wong, M. S. (2014). Salt-and
temperature-stable quantum dot
nanoparticles for porous media flow.
Colloids and Surfaces A:
Physicochemical and Engineering
Aspects, 443, 492-500.
SPRING 2015
FACULTY
✦ George
✦ Ed
Hirasaki : Director
Billups
✦ Lisa
Biswal
✦ Walter
Chapman
✦ Clarence
Miller
✦ James Tour
✦ Francisco Vargas
✦ Rafael Verduzco
✦ Scott Wellington
✦ Michael Wong
STAFF
✦ Maura
Puerto
✦ Annie Wang
✦ Indra
Mukherjee
✦ Suvasree
✦ Bin
Mukherjee
Huang
✦ Cheng
Fu
✦ Zhen Wang
Contact Us:
Porous Media Consortium
6100 Main St. MS 362
Houston, TX 77005
Ph: 713-348-5416
[email protected]
PDF copies of research articles are available
upon request
Houston, TX