Episode 52: Dr. Nesrin Ozalp
Rachel Kobus 0:09
Dr. Nesrin Ozalp is a distinguished academic and researcher in the field of mechanical engineering, renowned for her groundbreaking work in sustainable energy systems and thermodynamics. With a career spanning over two decades, Dr. Ozalp has contributed extensively to innovative technologies that address global energy challenges. Her work will guide Redbird students as she serves as Founding Chair of Mechanical Engineering for the College of Engineering, which welcomes its first class this fall. A dedicated mentor and advocate for diversity in STEM she has inspired countless students and professionals with her expertise leadership and unwavering commitment to advancing engineering solutions for a more sustainable future.
So without further ado, what's the word Redbird? Can you tell us a little bit about yourself, Dr. Ozalp?
Dr. Nesrin Ozalp 0:59
Hi, Rachel. Thank you for the introduction and inviting me and for this wonderful program. I hope that the listeners and audience would be happy to hear what we're going to be sharing through this so I am Nesrin, I'm the founding Department Chair of Mechanical Engineering at Illinois State University, New College of Engineering. I am very happy being here, and I would like to continue my research program and also mentorship and inspiring students to do their contribution to the mechanical engineering world through this program. So my hobbies, apart from how I enjoy doing research is painting. I like drawing historical sites and historical scenes, or especially mythological characters and cities that from the history, because I'm a huge fan of history. So that's what I do in most of my spare time.
Rachel Kobus 2:00
when you have all the spare time,
Dr. Nesrin Ozalp 2:03
very little spare time that I have. Yes,
Rachel Kobus 2:05
I love that you have a hobby that's just different from all the research and just gives you that time to have a different space for yourself then too. So I love it. Well, thank you for being here. We really appreciate it, and I'm very excited. What you just touched on is what I hope our conversation can talk about today, just our new College of Engineering, and welcoming our founding chairs and having I'm going to stress this a lot. Having a woman in engineering is amazing, and being able to talk about that with you and what your career has been like. So I just want to start out by saying, you know, there's several focuses one can study when we look at engineering, just here at ISU. We have general, we have electric, we have mechanical, and you are the Founding Chair of Mechanical. So what piqued your interest to know that mechanical engineering was your path? So
Dr. Nesrin Ozalp 2:52
thanks for this question, because I think the importance of like, what your passion in life is, basically what has driven me. I am a very energetic person. I have lots of internal energy, so I think that's the reason why I was always interested in energy. Like, you know, the different types of like, not just solar energy, which I do intensely in my research area, but all kinds of other types of energy, including nuclear energy and so on, fossil fuel also, which I studied, fossil fuel energy. So that's what I wanted to understand more. What are the energy types on our planet and in the in the universe, so that I can understand them and figure out how to make use of them. So this was basically mechanical engineering, because you use several energy resources, including all of these and more that I listed. And you basically produce power from it. And power runs everything the industry, you know, everything that we can think of, residential, you know, commercial. That basically foundation of what we experience and enjoy in this era. Yeah. So that was my main interest, that to study energy and design things that would convert that energy for more useful things directly that we can utilize. Yeah, that was my.
Rachel Kobus 4:16
love it. And I'm gonna go, Hmm, wow, great. Because engineering is this whole new realm for me I have no knowledge of so I am very much here to learn. So thank you. I was going to actually ask, like, can you describe mechanical engineering a little more? But you did. Thank you for doing that. Because, again, someone that may not have that background in engineering think it's important to understand, like you said, the foundation of it why all different aspects of engineering is important. So thank you, and I will be going. So I want to take time for you to share some exciting advancements and how they've impacted the field from you so your research, and then hoping we can talk about your patents, how you work with clean energy. So Nesrin, can you share a little bit about what excited you the most in some of your projects, and how that led to you getting them patented then too.
Dr. Nesrin Ozalp 5:08
So although my area is energy, I am really inspired and appreciating all other areas of mechanical so that all the audience would not think that energy is the best thing in mechanical engineering. There's robotics, there's artificial intelligence, there's 3D printing, advanced printing, and so on. So these areas are very big contributors of our society as well. My area, which is energy, is directly related to the environment, and I care for our planet, environment and where the global warming and all the energy which are basically energy resources pending, and we need to find a solution so that we have a sustainable planet which all the equipment that we are enjoying through the civilization would keep keep going without damaging the environment. Yeah. So this basically was my main inspiration, in addition to having an engineer father, okay, all right, yep. So I first studied fossil fuel combustion, like, like, how those main, for example, fossil fuel. It was referring to gasoline, diesel, kerosene. These are what we use in industry, and I studied like how the combustion of those fuels basically emit all the greenhouse gasses and toxic emissions. And as my project, when I was a graduate student at Stanford University, I developed a first time design a reactor that basically controls NOx emission. NOx is nitrous oxide, which is also toxic. So those are coming from all these engines that we use in cars and industry for various you know, sectors. Yep. So that was the first time that I basically designed, manufactured and tested a reactor. And then I thought that, like, why I am using fossil fuels? Is there anything else that can do this job and would kind of like, give us, like, the same output? Yeah. Then I had the opportunity to have a visiting professorship at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich. Okay, that's where I saw a something called solar reactor, which they use sunshine, yep, in order to heat up a chemical reaction. And the output is exactly what you expect from a reactor in industry that produces syngas, which is basically the source for gasoline kerosene, which we use in cars and airplanes. Yeah. So that was very interesting, that how a reactor that is not fueled by fossil fuel like combustion can use solar energy and still produce a gasoline. So this is how I basically had the interest. And then I, you know, studied in detail, and I basically built my first international recognized research program using natural gas and producing hydrogen through a solar reactor that I designed back then, it was first time that I filed the invention disclosure and before it went into public back then all the way so when I was young,
Rachel Kobus 8:31
you're still young,
Dr. Nesrin Ozalp 8:35
so it was basically Texas under the Texas a&m University, and an agreement made by Qatar Foundation and Fraunhofer, which is in Dresden, Germany. So that was decided to move forward with the Phase One of commercialization. So that was the first time an invention that on solar reactors for the purpose of producing 100% clean fuel was initiated. That was a very exciting collaboration. And then I continued working on development of solar reactors, and the most recent one was last year, collaboration with my colleague at Purdue University of West Lafayette, Professor Guillermo Paniagua, so we filed this patent on combination of gas turbine, which is in the aircraft that the engines that we see are gas turbines, which is expertise of my colleague, Guillermo. We wanted to combine it with the solar reactor, so that with the hope that you know, if this system can work out, of course, a lot of development needed. It's not like ready to put in an aircraft so that it would work, yeah, but hopefully then it would be two systems that working together. So the solar reactor would produce hydrogen using sunshine, and that hydrogen would drive the gas turbine, which produces power. So this way we would have like and if we have an excess amount of hydrogen, then we can collect it. And the byproduct of this process is something called carbon black. Carbon Black is whenever we see anything black, like computer, black printer, black tire, black polymer, black. These are all made of carbon black, and it's a very valuable commodity in industry. And the finest version of Carbon Black is used in batteries. When we break a battery, the Black Pine powder that we see is very advanced material, so this process produces that level of pure carbon. So we hopefully we will get to this project through the experimentation and prototype production, and have the hydrogen and pure level of carbon black and power produced like tri generation altogether. Wow. So we have been working on, you know, proposals together with him, and hopefully will soon hear the good news.
Rachel Kobus 11:26
How does that make you feel, like, just listening to all that and just what you're doing to impact the world, like, how do you take that in? You know, every day, basically, like you, you work on this, and then you, you're done for the day, and you're like, I'm I'm changing the world like I'm making the world better. How does that make you feel like emotion wise, I guess.
Dr. Nesrin Ozalp 11:44
So I don't think of it like I'm changing the world. [You're changing the world.] I'm thinking of this way. For me, my job is not a job. It's like being in a holiday. So that's why I don't take vacations, because when I'm at work, I'm on holiday. So when I work on these inventions, on my articles, on proposals, or working with students or collaborators, is like completely being myself and letting the universe do its job through me whatever it wants me to do. So I just let my brain work itself all through these discussions and all those like ideas and everything really so easily come out, yeah, and I express all of these also at the conferences and all that, and I share it, and when I hear feedback, that makes me more excited. And when I go back, I want to, you know, work more on these so, so I don't think that what I am doing and what the impacts or something, I am just letting myself and my brain work the way that it was built and supposed to work. Let's, let's put it that way. So natural flow,
Rachel Kobus 13:04
yep, go, yeah, yeah. Literally, you are the epitome of go with the flow. All right, got it. And you mentioned students, so I wanted to take us that direction too. About, you know, we're talking about clean energy use of hydrogen. And now that you're at Illinois State, I believe many of our engineering students, you know, they'll they can start focusing on this, and they're going to benefit from your research. And will they actually be able to take part in some of your projects with you? And what will that look like then for the College of Engineering?
Dr. Nesrin Ozalp 13:33
Well, throughout my career, I always enjoyed having a, you know, undergraduate students also involved, in addition to all the graduate level and postdoctoral researchers that I have in my program, I had many, many undergraduate students, as seen in my publications, many of them published in top journals. So you would be surprised how much those youngsters can think. And you know, sometimes, like through the education, they learn all the math, physics and so on and so forth. But before really going deep down into the math and physics of the profession, their creativity, their artist, artistic thought process, can create, yeah, super interesting engine, super interesting engine parts. I had a lot of undergraduate students designed very specific parts of very complex engines that, like my postdocs, my PhD students were like, really? They were like, and this is undergraduate so I have more than 100% trust in them, yeah, and I actually enjoy hearing their perspective and how interestingly they think, like from a different perspective, yeah, yeah.
Rachel Kobus 14:50
No, that makes sense, and I would never, I mean, we think STEM, like you said, we think math, technology, science, but to have that creative aspect and being artistic, and as you build. And make things come to life. You do need that as being an engineer then too. So that's a good point,
Dr. Nesrin Ozalp 15:05
absolutely. So I always say that one of my biggest inspiration apart from my father is Leonardo da Vinci. Oh, who was a great engineer and an artist. Yeah, right, yes, that makes sense. So I cannot think of engineering without art and plus history, actually. So learning, you know, all these like how we started from the Industrial Revolution, and then how we move forward. So those historical aspects which needed to supply agriculture needs of the society, which you need to design, all those agriculture machines for better harvesting the pro, you know, products. And so that we feed, you know, people, and we feed also army to defend the country or defend whatever you have. And design also some machinery for the Army, for for for peace, for, you know, production. So that's why, originally, especially in the US universities, had this a&m, meaning agriculture and military. So mechanical engineers in those universities were pretty strong, yes, because of meeting the demands of the society. So that's my perspective at art history and how we can deliver it to the needs of the you know, society is what underlies the success of mechanical engineering, in my opinion.
Rachel Kobus 16:30
Yeah, no, I love and then it kind of makes sense for your hobby, too, how you are a history buff and, like all that kind of so it all again full circle for you. I love it. And, you know, I do want to say I'd be remiss to not bring this up as we talk about your research or patents working with students that you had to navigate all of this and be a success in your field, which is typically a traditionally male dominated field. So have you had situations where you felt your expertise was questioned or challenges arose because you are a woman in this traditionally dominated male field. So how does that come to light? And how have you overcome these obstacles? I guess.
Dr. Nesrin Ozalp 17:08
Thank you very much for this question. Actually, there have been moments, especially when I was a student starting all the way from the students in the classroom where I was either one or one of the two female students in the classroom. And that basically continued throughout my career. Mechanical Engineering is 99.999 male dominant field. So when it is that way, maybe that gives a perspective to the male colleagues that like, what, what a woman is doing in this field is like, maybe, you know, she is not as good or something. Maybe that's the impression that gives them, I don't want to blame, but that basically creates some discouragement,
Rachel Kobus 17:53
yeah, oh, I can't imagine, yeah. But
Dr. Nesrin Ozalp 17:55
I think I was lucky, because my father was an engineer, and he taught me everything you can imagine math, starting from math and all the engineering discoveries and inventions all the way from my childhood. So I did not take it too much, you know, kind of like deeply, but starting from my confidence, through my family, but I have seen like in other female colleagues, and what we did was like, you know, supporting each other and supporting the ideas and also utilizing some mentors in the field. Yes, very few female older also, because in older generations, it was a lot rare got it so we can count in, literally, in the whole mechanical engineering world, we can count with our fingers. How many older than you know my job? Yeah, basically, yeah. So mentorship is important to ask, you know, how I can approach this, but patience and hard work. I never gave up and I got so I would like to acknowledge that all those male colleagues are the ones that basically nominated me, you know, for those awards and everything, and eventually basically accepted the fact that it's not your gender or whatever it's like you know, your contribution, your thought process, how hard you work and how you share, what you've learned is your contribution, who you are, not what your gender is, yes, no,
Rachel Kobus 19:28
I like and so when you say there was only, you know, counting on your fingers, how many female mentors in the STEM field is, what did you have any specific ones from that? Or did it? Was it more just finding, and like you said, rallying with your women that had to work alongside you as an engineer, or what did that feel like, then, to find that support group, I guess.
Dr. Nesrin Ozalp 19:48
Yeah, so it's my mentors first. Initially were all men, my PhD advisor and other, like, you know, significant figures, in our view, have a lot to do. You had that. Yeah, yeah, okay. But as I started going into conferences and meeting more, then I discovered that those rare gems, that few females, yeah, and then at that time, like one by one, like I was able to reach, because it was not like possible to kind of like altogether mentorship as well. But then we decided that, why don't we invite them for the conferences and have female groups? Yeah, and the largest conference in our field is American Society of Mechanical Engineers. And when we get together for a dinner or something, it's like, it's like, and that includes assistant professors, Associate Professor, full professors, like the everyone, like all age groups. It's not even more than 20. Gosh, that's, yeah, it's the in the whole conference that usually that ASME conferences, for example, the mechanical engineering Congress is more than 2000 people, and there's 20 of us. Is like, that's, that's how we were able to get together. Yes,
Rachel Kobus 20:59
yeah, yeah. Easy to see each other out, because out of 2000 people, only 20 of you. So with that, now you're a leader in the field. Now you get to be the mentor. Now you are looked up to. So how do you plan to mentor and inspire the next generation, especially when it comes to women that may be interested in the STEM field, specifically engineering.
Dr. Nesrin Ozalp 21:19
So my main motto is, like, you know, go with your passion, yeah? So as long as, like, you go with your passion and don't worry about the critics that may come from male colleagues, and sometimes it may come from female colleagues as well, yeah. And if you just, like, focus on what you wanted to do by get going through this education and let the universe do its job through this patience and hard work, is what I believe is the recipe, without worrying about it, because everyone also has different pace. I know of a lot of female colleagues and even also like male colleagues in the earlier times of their career. They did not come up with big inventions and so on, but later down the road. So then patience. And in some ways, sometimes it's the other way around, like early times, and then they feel like I'm no longer useful. But then then again, patience and wait, that's a different phase. Then probably, you know, you are absorbing, and maybe you're radiating so much of that absorbance that that's the time that you are radiating to your students and everyone around it. You don't have to be constantly invent. You don't have to be constantly file patents, and, do you know, publications and so on. There are times that you basically give what you have accumulated so far. So that's how I my basically mentoring style is to expect people to respect themselves and be patient for themselves, and when they come with problems and questions, I empathy how I was feeling or how I would have felt. Yeah, and I think my style worked out because all of my friends, like students, became down the road like friends, and they're all in touch all my former postdocs, graduate students and so on, we're still in touch, and they still consult me with their, you know, career decisions. Majority of them went into industry, and they even asked questions about like industry like advice. So it seems like Like to me that they really understood that I felt for them. Yeah, yes, I cared for them. And whatever the advice that I recommended them, I gave them, they found it useful that they're now adults, and they're, like, very successful in their careers, and they're still in touch with me and still like casual conversations and so on. We are.
Rachel Kobus 24:04
I think that the number one thing about being a mentor, is when your mentee can confide in you, even after the quote, unquote mentorship is over with, and you create that friendship, that means you've done something right, that you've created a bond that others may not have, and you from what you've described. It's also just being present and being there with your mentors, with your students, and making sure that they again understand you've been there at 1.2 and you're here to guide them along the way. So thank you for sharing that with us. I do have one more question for you so we see the field of Mechanical Engineering now, and how is that going to be a part of Illinois State University. Now that you are the founding chair, what do you see in this program that's going to prepare our future engineers?
Dr. Nesrin Ozalp 24:49
Actually, I think it was the really right time for Illinois State University to start the College of Engineering, because with all the technological advancements that we see. In a you know, unseen speed all around the world, so not including within the body of Illinois State University, which is very successful already, would have made it not being able to contribute to the ongoing efforts towards clean energy, clean environment, space exploration, robotics, artificial intelligence and so on through college of engineering and mechanical engineering. So I think it's really, really good time to be in there. And when we look into statistics in the US and in the world, we see that new generation has a lot of interest towards engineering and mechanical engineering in if we see is one of the number one preference of the students. Usually it's the highest number of enrollment, probably because they see all these space explorations and the movies and everything that robots around and all the machines around and spacecraft around, so they wanted to. So I hope that, like we will make our efforts valuable in here to train the students and make them like entrepreneurial mindset in addition to inventor mindset, so that they would not just think that I, you know, can invent and contribute, but by that I also I can be an entrepreneur and create some job opportunities for many. And I'm hoping to see those students, even from undergraduate, coming from Illinois State, and making the news that this invention came from this startup. And these are the students from Illinois State University. Yes, why not? Yes, I love
Rachel Kobus 26:48
Yes, I love it. I hope so too. And then they can be on Redbird Buzz, and then we'll have you back as their mentor and talking about her. It's going to be a full circle moment, and I'm going to love every bit of it. So I can't wait to see you know, being biased at Illinois State but our value and sustainability, our value in teamwork and working together and building our students up for success. I think mechanical--the College of Engineering--but you, as chair for mechanical engineering is going to do great things, as we see in our future, too. So thank you for being here with us today. I love learning again, knowing nothing about mechanical engineering, and hearing this from your perspective, it's been very enjoyable. So thank you again.
Dr. Nesrin Ozalp 27:24
Thank you very much for inviting me and giving me the opportunity to elaborate about mechanical how exciting mechanical engineering and how great to be at Illinois State University. Thank you.
Rachel Kobus 27:40
And that was Founding Chair of Mechanical Engineering for the College of Engineering, Dr. Nesrin Ozalp, thanks for listening and tune in next time for more stories from beyond the quad.
Unknown Speaker 28:02
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