Invited Speakers

Carmine Colella
Federico II University in Naples, Italy

Talk: "Cronstedt's zeolite"

Dr. Colella is Professor of Material Science and Technology and Head of the Department of Materials and Production Engineering at the Federico II University of Naples, Italy.

Professor Colella authored over 250 publications, mostly in the field of science and technology of microporous materials. Specific research subjects were:

• zeolite synthesis and characterization
• ion exchange and adsorption properties of natural and synthetic zeolites and relative applications
• utilization of natural zeolites in the removal of pollutants from gaseous effluents and municipal and industrial wastewaters
• separation of gaseous mixtures of industrial relevance.

Professor Colella is member of various scientific committees and commissions in the field of zeolite science and technology. Among the others, he is Chairman of the Natural Zeolites Commission of the International Zeolite Association (IZA) and ex-officio member of the INZA Committee (with the responsibility of IZA Liaison). In the period 1999-2002, he served as Chairman of the Federation of European Zeolite Associations (FEZA); previously, he had been founder and the first President of the Italian Zeolite Association (1991-95) and President of the Italian Association of Materials Engineering (1999-2002).

He organized or co-organized several international conferences, most recently, Zeolite ’97, the 5th International Conference on the Occurrence, Properties and Application of Natural Zeolites (Ischia, Naples) in 1997; the NATO Advanced Research Workshop on the Applications of Natural Microporous Materials for Environmental Technology (Smolenice Castle, Slovakia) in 1998; the International Workshop “Oxide-Based Systems at the Crossroad of Chemistry” (Como, Italy) in 2000; the International Workshop “Oxide-Based Materials: New Sources, Novel Phases, New Applications” (Como, Italy) in 2004. He edited or co-edited the proceedings of all the organized meetings.

William S. Wise
University of California, Santa Barbara

Talk: "Early discovery of zeolite minerals"

Dr. Wise is Professor of Geology, Emeritus, in the Department of Earth Science at the University of California at Santa Barbara. Following his 1961 doctoral research on the zeolitic alteration of the Eocene volcaniclastic underpinnings of the Cascade Range of Washington, his research interests have continued in the fields of volcanic geology and zeolite mineralogy.

He has published numerous papers on the occurrences and crystal chemistry of zeolite minerals. Among these are the descriptions of the first known occurrence of clinoptilolite crystals (after those of the type locality) and two zeolites new to mineralogy. His work in volcanic geology includes extensive studies of Mt. Hood, Oregon, and Mauna Kea, Hawaii.

After retiring from teaching and administrative duties in 1993 he wrote the zeolite section of Deer, Howie, and Zussman’s 2004 volume 4B of Rock Forming Minerals, Silica Minerals, Feldspathoids, and the Zeolites. Currently, he is a member of the Commission on Natural Zeolites of the International Zeolite Association.

Dimiter Tchernev
The Zeopower Company

Talk: "Discovering the properties of natural zeolites: adsorption and molecular sieving"

Dr. Tchernev is the founder and president of the Zeopower Company. He received his PhD in Electrical Engineering and Material Science from the Massachuset Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1965. After a couple of years in the Space Program at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) of Cal-Tech in Pasadena, California, he became Professor of Electrical Engineering and Material Science at the University of Texas at Austin. He was also Visiting Professor at the Universidad Central and at the Universidad Simon Bolivar in Caracas, Venezuela.

His research with zeolites started back in 1969 at the University of Texas and continued at MIT Lincoln Laboratory from 1974 to 1978. Dr. Tchernev founded the Zeopower Company in September 1978 to conduct research and development of solar adsorption zeolite cooling systems. His research focuses on closed-cycle regenerative adsorption zeolite technology in heating and cooling systems. Of special interest is the dynamics of the adsorption and desorption process in zeolites and its application to heating and cooling heat pumps.

Dr. Tchernev has 29 foreign and domestic patents. He has published over 40 research papers in refereed publications and is the author of Chapter 17 in the new Zeolite Book published by the Mineralogical Society of America in 2001.

Roberto Pabalan
Southwest Research Institute

Talk: "Discovering the properties of natural zeolites: ion exchange"

Dr. Pabalan is Institute Scientist in the Geosciences and Engineering Division at Southwest Research Institute. Dr. Pabalan is responsible for conducting technical work in geochemistry and physical chemistry to address primarily the research and licensing needs of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), but also the research needs of other clients.

Dr. Pabalan has a broad background in geology, geochemistry, and physical chemistry, with expertise in a variety of experimental, analytical, and computer simulation methods. For the NRC, he has contributed to several projects designed to understand geochemical processes relevant to the geologic disposal of low-level and high-level nuclear wastes. He has applied various techniques to study radionuclide sorption and transport, including batch sorption experiments, surface-complexation models, atomic-level molecular simulations, and synchrotron-based x-ray absorption spectroscopy.

Dr. Pabalan has developed computer codes, exercised commercial software, and conducted laboratory experiments to evaluate the evolution of the chemical environment surrounding metallic waste packages containing high-level nuclear wastes. He also has conducted studies aimed at identifying potential safety issues in the pretreatment of radioactive tank wastes.

His other studies include sorption and ion exchange on natural and surfactant-modified zeolites, thermodynamic properties of aqueous electrolyte solutions, cement chemistry, desalination technology for municipal water applications, and surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy of Mars biomarker analogs.

R. L. (Bob) Brathwaite
GNS Science, New Zealand

Talk: "Exploration guides for zeolite deposits in lacustrine tuffs, with reference to the Taupo Volcanic Zone, New Zealand"

Dr. Brathwaite is a Senior Minerals Geologist, emeritus, in the Geothermal and Minerals Section of GNS Science, a New Zealand Government-owned geoscience research institute. He has had a 40-plus-year career in exploration and research on hydrothermal mineral deposits in New Zealand and Australia. He has published numerous papers on the formation of gold, silver, zinc-lead-copper, and molybdenum deposits, geothermal fields and zeolites, as well as producing geological maps and reports on the distribution mineral deposits throughout New Zealand. He is a coauthor of a popular book on the Mineral Wealth of New Zealand.

His main research activity has been geologic mapping of mineralized volcanic terranes and using geology, mineralogy, and geochemistry to reconstruct the formation of hydrothermal mineral deposits. Since 1999 he has been researching the occurrence and origin of zeolites in lacustrine tuffs in the Taupo Volcanic Zone.

G. Diego Gatta
University of Milano, Italy

Talk: "Does porous mean soft? The state of the art on the elastic behavior of microporous silicates"

Dr. Gatta is a Researcher/Assistant Professor in the Department of Earth Sciences at the University of Milano, Italy. His main field of interest is high-pressure behavior and pressure-induced structural evolution of
microporous materials. He is also Associate Editor of American Mineralogist.

His post-doctoral research at the Bavarian Research Institute of Experimental Geochemistry and Geophysics University of Bayreuth focused on the following:

• structure-property relationships of synthetic minerals and their solid solutions, in particular order-disorder processes, equation of state and phase transitions
• phase characterization by single-crystal and powder X-ray diffraction, electron microscopy and various spectroscopies, as well as in-situ measurements of physical properties

Dr. Gatta has received numerous awards including:

• Best PhD Thesis of the Year, Italian Society of Mineralogy and Petrology (SIMP), 2002
• Best scientific contribution received, 34th International School of Crystallography on High Pressure Crystallography, Erice (Sicily), Italy, June 4-15, 2003
• Best young researcher for excellence and novelty of research activity, Italian Association of Crystallography (AIC), 2004

Domenico Caputo
Federico II University in Naples, Italy

Talk: "Ion exchange studies on Italian natural zeolites: experiments and data processing."

Dr. Caputo is Associate Professor of Materials Science and Technology in the Department of Materials and Production Engineering of the Federico II University in Naples (Italy), where he graduated in Chemical Engineering in 1993. He received his PhD in Materials Engineering from the University of Rome La Sapienza in 1998.

His research activity is essentially in the field of science and technology of microporous and mesoporous materials, as demonstrated by over eighty papers mainly in the following sectors:

• use of zeolitic materials in wastewater treatment
• study of thermodynamic and kinetic aspects of cation exchange reactions involving zeolites
• use of microporous and mesoporous materials as physical sorbents.

Professor Caputo is Secretary/Treasurer of the Italian Zeolite Association and the Italian Association of Materials Engineering.

Edward J. Maginn
University of Notre Dame

Talk: "Atomistic simulation of adsorption, diffusion, and ion exchange in zeolites"

Dr. Maginn is a professor in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at the University of Notre Dame. He received his BS in Chemical Engineering from Iowa State University in 1987 and his PhD in Chemical Engineering from the University of California at Berkeley in 1995. He also worked as an engineer for Procter and Gamble from 1987-1990. He joined Notre Dame in 1995.

His research focuses on the development and application of molecular modeling techniques for understanding structure-property relationships in materials, including ionic liquids and inorganic ion exchange materials. He has over 60 refereed publications and two patents. He is the recipient of the Dow Outstanding New Faculty Award from the American Society for Engineering Education as well as the Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Award from the National Science Foundation. He has received several teaching awards, including the John A. Kaneb Award from the University of Notre Dame and the American Institute of Chemical Engineers Student Chapter Outstanding Teaching Award.

Martha C. Mitchell
New Mexico State University

Talk: "Predicting adsorption and transport in zeolite thin film membranes for hydrogen separation using grand canonical Monte Carlo and molecular dynamics simulations"

Dr. Mitchell is an Associate Professor and Academic Department Head of Chemical Engineering at New Mexico State University. Her research is on molecular theory and computer simulations of fluids confined to zeolites and other nanoporous materials, thermodynamics, and statistical mechanics.

Dr. Mitchell joined the NMSU faculty in August 1996 after completing her PhD at the University of Minnesota-Minneapolis. Her dissertation was titled “Predicting Adsorption of Fluids Confined to Nanoporous Media.” She received her BS ChE from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

In the summer of 1997 she worked at Exxon Research & Engineering in Annandale, New Jersey, modeling fluid catalytic cracking (FCC) units. In the summer of 2001 she worked at Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque, New Mexico, modeling transport in ion channels using Molecular Density Functional Theory and the massively parallel computers available at Sandia. She became registered as a Professional Engineer in the State of New Mexico in 2002.

Lumin Wang
University of Michigan

Talk: "Irradiation and thermal effects in zeolites for the sorption and release of radionuclides in the geosphere"

Hideo Minato
The University of Tokyo & Hyogo University of Teacher Education

Talk: "New clay barrier technology for final waste sites and treatment of contaminated water flow-outs from waste sites through application of natural zeolites"