University of Toronto

I have gone to University of Toronto for my undergrad from 2011 to 2016.

I earned my degree in Bachelor of Applied Science (BASc), major in Chemical Engineering & Applied Chemistry, and triple minor in Engineering Business, Environmental Engineering, and Sustainable Energy. I also did a PEY (internship program) for one year.

I have received 3.2 GPA for my last two years and activities and more details on my studies during these times are shown below.

Highlights

U of T Finalist - Team Canada for PetroChallenge
Sponsored by NExT-Schlumberger and ShawCor.

Close to 90 students registered for the event and only 48 were offered spots. In teams of four, 12 groups used OilSim – an upstream learning simulator that takes its participants through the entire oil and gas exploration and production business process – to acquire expertise in strategy selection and decision-making.
Our team won at U of T and was flown to Houston, Texasand faced opponents from Rice University and Penn State in the Petro Challenege Final.
You can read more about it here
Photo of me being really happy when winning

Received Honors in my last semster.

Courses Taken

Projects Done in School

Capstone Design ProjectJan 2016 – May 2016

Team Leader: assign tasks to members, report to supervisor. We designed and built electrocoagulation reactor by ordering parts and build the reactor and test to demulsify oil from water. Optimization and modelling of the results was done for thorough analysis. We worked under Pavani Cherukupally, MIE PhD candidate. You can read more about the project here

Chemical Plant Design Project
Sept 2015 – Dec 2016

Our group designed a plant for the hydrometallurgical processing of current pyrrhotite tailing waste streams on Vale Limited site to analyze the feasibility of recycling waste for nickel extraction. Designing of the plant required process design, material selection, sizing of reactors and equipment, plant layout, plant operation, maintenance considerations, process control, hazard analysis, environmental impacts, process waste management, and economic assessment. I used AutoCAD to design PFD, P&ID, and Plant Layout in both 2D and 3D

Conference on a National Energy Strategy for Canada from APS305
May 2014 - June 2014

The whole class participated in a model conference to debate a National Energy Strategy for Canada. The class was divided into different teams and required to research the issues and represent the interests of the federal government departments, provincial governments, First Nations, environmental non-governmental organizations, and industrial associations. We were given the Government of Canada and each member in my team wrote a briefing note in stakeholders in this alliance. I was given Natural Resources Canada and researched and reviewed issues in three categories: populations, economy, and justice. In preparation for the negotiation, we were to write a technical report on the major issues on national energy strategy raised for our stakeholder, relevant stakeholders and alliances, the governance, policy context, and political situation for our stakeholder, and three possible stances to adopt in the national energy strategy negations.

Impact of Dichloromethane in Ontario Assessment Project from CHE460
Jan 2014 - Apr 2014

In this project, we looked at effects of dichloromethane in Ontario. We first looked at environmental effects, LD50 and LC50 values, Occupational Safety & Health Administration standard, physical chemical properties, and methods for dichloromethane analysis. Then, using the chemical properties, we looked at the model and evaluated Ontario's environment system, and calculated fugacity, fugacity capacity, and concentration of dichloromethane in each compartments: air, water, fish, soil, and sediment. We calculated these values using three different models. The level 1 model has following conditions: system is closed, the chemical is not created or destroyed and it is at equilibrium between the compartments. The level 2 model adds the removal processes involved in the system due to advection and degradation to the previous model, still in equilibrium. For level 3, the system is not at equilibrium because there is interphase exchange such as diffusion, evaporation, and deposition. We then could see the distribution of this chemical in different compartments in these three different models and compared to the real values. Finally, we then looked at sensitivity of these values to changes to some parameters such as system temperature, soil volume, water volume, and air advection time for all three models.

Toluene Hydro-Dealkylation Plant Design Project from CHE334
Jan 2014 - Apr 2014

This project required to design a process for toluene hydro-dealkylation. We were given desired production rate and conversion rate. Specifications for the reactors of the process are estimated along with mass and energy balances for the process. Different types of separators to obtain our product are also specified with dimensions and its properties. The PFD and P&ID; are also included to provide specifications and control to the process. Precautionary measures during the operation of the process are also analyzed using risk analysis strategies such as HAZOP tables and Risk Tree analysis. Recovery strategies are also provided for worst case scenarios.

This project overall required research of other designs, use of AspenPlus simulation to provide thermodynamic model data, E-Z solve to calculate the compositions from distillation process, using the McCabe-Thiele diagram, and risk analysis techniques such as plus/minus 10 degree deviation, worst case scenarios, control strategies, and start-up and shutdown procedure. The equipments in this design includes plug flow reactor, separators such as flash drum, pressure swing adsorption, distillation column, and heat exchangers.

Process Dynamics and Control of a Continuous Heat Transfer System Project from CHE322
Jan 2014 - Apr 2014

This project is divided into two parts: process dynamics experiment and process control experiment. The process dynamics section creates relationships that accurately model the dynamics of the system. We developed three linear transfer models using ident on Matlab and obtained and interpreted steady state plots for the continuous heat transfer system. The process control experiment was to analyze the differences between a Simulink model and real-world systems. For this section, we designed a feedback PI controller using rltool on Matlab, and tested the system using the PI controller that was designed by varying the disturbance inputs and the set point by a positive and negative step change. This process required drawing P&ID; of the process and dealing with large data sets from the experiment. This taught me how to use Simulink on Matlab to a practical laboratory experience. I learned to take raw data, represent them graphically, analyze the relationship between different variables, and draw conclusions.

Laboratory Student from CHE311
Jan 2014 - Apr 2014

This laboratory course focuses on experiments in fluid mechanics, heat transfer and related unit operations. It deals with various different separation processes for gases and liquids. Topics include equilibrium stage calculations, cascade separation, binary distillation, gas absorption and stripping, liquid-liquid extraction, membrane processes, adsorption and ion exchange. Each experiment required drawing of process flow design of the separation processes and technical writing report.

Forestry Projects from FOR421
Sept 2013 - Dec 2013

There were several projects in this course. Below are some examples.

Team-Based Tree Inventory Exercise
The first project allowed me and my partner to actually learn what it is like to make a tree inventory for ten trees. We learned how to analyze and synthesize the information that we have obtained through measurement in a scientific manner through many calculations such as canopy cover of the trees. We also learned how to use Neighbor woods Tree Condition Reference Guide to indicate conditions for the trees.

Report to council on an Urban Forest Inventory Strategy
The second project allowed me to communicate and represent my opinions and thoughts in writing to convince the council for the need of urban forest management plan for a city of 100,000 people. This gave me a greater understanding of the strategic planning and the benefits of urban forest. I first summarized benefits of having urban forest, and also made a strategic urban forest plan for 20 years. I made the inventory of trees to be included for seven different types of streets. Within this plan, I also included 5 year management and annual operating plan which consists of tree management plans and budget plans.

Strategic Urban Forest Plan Critique
In this project, we, along with my partner had to critique Victoria's Urban Forest Master Plan. This has allowed us to apply original, critical thought to the issues discussed in the plan, and give our own opinions how the plan could be improved. We also learn to apply the 25 different criteria and indicators for strategic urban forest planning and management by Kenney to critique Victoria's plan. The presentation of this has allowed us to improve our ability to communicate orally to the class about the plan.

Renewable Energy System Analysis Project: Geothermal-Ground Heat from CHE467
Sept 2013 - Dec 2013

This project required research on geothermal ground heat energy, a statute-recognized renewable energy that gets energy from the thermal energy of the interior of the Earth. This project required us to summarize the fundamental system operation, input and output, energy efficiency, footprint, capital expenditure and operation expense of geothermal energy system, as well as illustrate the assessment and recommendation for large scale deployment.

Petroleum Processing Projects from CHE451
Sept 2013 - Dec 2013

There were numerous projects in this course that requires playing with numbers and using goal seek function on Excel. These projects involved distillation separation processes of crude oil, calculating conversion rate for sulfur recovery reaction using Gibbs energy of formation, Clause process calculations with pressure drop by using Moody chart, obtaining distillation curve, and mixing different mixture of petroleum products to obtain desired ethanol weight percentage, octane number, and RVP.

Laboratory Student from CHE326
Sept 2013 - Dec 2013

This laboratory course mainly focused on experiments investigating thermodynamics and kinetics. Thermodynamic experiments covered topics such as phase equilibrium and calorimetry while kinetics experiment covered investigations of rate constants and Arrhenius behaviors. Instead of writing report for these experiments, we were required to present to other students as each groups were doing different experiments. This course significantly improved my presenting skills and learned how to communicate technical information effectively.

Laboratory Student from CHE324
Sept 2013 - Dec 2013

In this unit operations laboratory part of the course process design, which covered topics such as fittings through different pipe accessories (tubes, venture, orifice meters, and valves), study of heat transfer in batch reactor, etc. The experiments were conducted bi-weekly and writing of reports was required. This required research from different studies and knowledge from other courses such as fluid mechanics and thermodynamics.

Refrigeration of Acetylene Project from CHE323
Sept 2013 - Dec 2013

We were assigned to analyze acetylene and its effectiveness in an ordinary vapour compression refrigeration cycle that involves an evaporator, a compressor, a condenser, and an expansion valve. Peng-Robinson equation of state and fundamental thermodynamic relationships were used to calculate pressure, internal energy, entropy, enthalpy, and Gibbs free energy values for the streams were calculated using Microsoft Excel. This required dealing with large data sets of numbers, required iterative process by trial and error, and graphing these data sets against each other to find intersection to find operating conditions.

Sir Alex Ferguson Analysis Project from JRE420
July 2013 - Aug 2013

Sir Alex Furguson is the most successful manager in the history of Manchester United and British football. We looked at how he managed the team and some mistakes he have made during his management. We analyzed in depth, his leadership tactics, emotional intelligence, his culture, use of his power, and what made him a successful manager.

Commodity Chain Report from GGR221
July 2013 - Aug 2013

Fiji Water, second largest supplier of imported water to the United States, was analyzed in depth. Political and economic issues, environmental impact, and greenwashing related to Fiji Water were researched as well as their method of manufacturing demand.

Barrick Gold Corporation Analysis Project from JRE300
May 2013 - June 2013

We analyzed Barrick Gold Corporation in great depth. We first looked at the core business of the company, its business model, business environment, key stakeholders and financial reporting objectives of its financial report to shareholders. We then looked at its health and performance by calculating liquidity ratios, solvency ratios, and profitability ratios, for past two years: fiscal year ending 2011 and 2012. We also included market based calculation by looking at tis closing price and analyzed according to these ratios. Finally, we compared the company with a competitor: Kinross. The ratios for Kinross was also calculated and compared with Barrick.

Furthermore, we analyzed Barrick Gold Corporation a second time, from the perspective of an investor. We calculated investment related ratios and values such as earnings per share, price/earnings ratio, price/book ratio, return on equity, market capitalization, annual dividend yield, net profit margin, turnover ratio and leverage ratio. We also calculated return on investment using these ratios and calculated estimated stock price. We also looked at Medium Term Notes from Barrick and went through financial analysis.

Laboratory Student from CHE204
Sept 2013 - Apr 2013

This full year laboratory course had weekly laboratory experiments. Topics covered in these experiments were inorganic synthesis and analysis for first four months, and organic synthesis and analysis for the last four months. I learned several different laboratory techniques such as visible spectrophotometry, redox analysis, atomic spectroscopy, titrimetric analysis, and infra-red spectroscopy. I also learned how to analyze experiments both quantitatively and qualitatively. Many experiments involved process and industrial chemistry and practice such as refluxing, recrystallization, and purification.

Environmental Chemistry Project from CHE230
Jan 2013 - Apr 2013

During my second year in engineering, my team and I acted as consulting engineers and did a consulting project. Our project required us to write letter of intent and interim proposal to get approved on a hypothetical request for proposal: "Evaluation; of Soil Quality for the 2015 Pan-Am Games Athletes Village ".; We also had client meetings along with final proposal which included proposing timelines and budget.

This experience has given me a different view of engineering as I never knew what consulting engineers do before. We had to compete with other groups who were working on the same proposal as us and had to provide our client with more cost effective and better proposal. This pressured us to work harder as only the group who ends up at the top gets the client, the job and the rest would not get paid at all. This taught me how to deal with conflicts with the team as well as leadership skills. There was even more pressure as there were many things to do with deadlines in short amount of time, which improved my time management skills and also presentation skills in client meetings.

I learned from this experience that when working in group, communication is the key to success. We made deadlines for ourselves, since most of the work had to be done in chronological order. We constantly communicated with each other using Facebook group and Google docs, to make sure everyone is doing their part and helping each other.

Statistical Analysis from CHE223
Jan 2013 - Apr 2013

There were several different scenarios which required using of R statistics programming language to compute probabilities. In one of the scenarios, we were given data on different regions and their small business with six different factors such as population, number of stores, etc. We used excel to obtain residual graphs and regression statistics to eliminate any factors that are not significant. This allowed us to construct equation of the model, and analyzed business success rate.

Microforge Design Project from CHE210
Jan 2013 - Apr 2013

This project was highly relevant to the research topic of our professor. This project required the design of a microforge, which is an instrument which is used to create sharp flat tips at the ends of borosilicate glass micropipettes. We were given dimensions of platinum wire and spherical bead of lead glass along with their thermal properties to design a microforge. Using these properties, I found the relationship between temperature and voltage and also commented for improvement to the design. This project required me to research on dry air properties, calculating resistance and voltage using energy balance, and existing forms of resistors.

Fluid Design and Process Engineering Project from CHE211 and CHE208
Sept 2012 - Dec 2012

This was a joint course project which each course had different requirements. We were assigned to design a reverse osmosis desalination plant for a small Caribbean island: Aruba. We designed a system which is energy and cost efficient, and integrates the pre-existing plant buildings and pipe racks into the design. For the fluid mechanics part of the design, we calculated flow rates, divided into segments, constructed detailed schematic, calculated losses in pipe bends and made most economic decision for material and diameter selection of the pipes. For the process engineering part of the design, we drew process flow chart, solved mass and energy balance of the osmosis plant and organized information in stream table. Overall, this was a very interesting and exciting project to work on as we were applying what we have learned to solve real world problems.

Minnesota Micromotors Simulation from JRE410
May 2012 - June 2012

This was a marketing simulation project that allowed me to play the CEO of Minnesota Micromotors, a manufacturer for motors used in medical devices. This project required my knowledge of marketing, sales, competitive strategy, and research and development. I mainly focused on quality and rising the price and certain segments that are not sensitive on price. At the end, it was a success, increasing the budget from $800,000 to $1.2 million, market share of 8.4%, $73 million of cumulative revenue and $9.4 million of cumulative profit. I managed to satisfy all 4 segments except one, which had to be ignored due to its price sensitiveness.

Request for Proposal and Design Project from ESC101 and ESC102
Sep 2011 - Apr 2012

There were numerous projects associated with these courses. Below are some examples.

Praxis I Conceptual Design Report
This assignment gave us a definitive problem: food waste. My team and I, consisting of 4 people, came up with several solutions that would make the food more sustainable. This assignment focused on the generating possible solutions and the analyzing the solutions of my personal design process. We have defined the problem and the objectives at the beginning of the report to introduce the reader to the problem. We came up with multiple solutions and divided the work up among our teammates. At the end, we compared all the designs using factors such as ease of use, price, safety, etc. This would make it easier for us and allow us to choose the best solution with justification. This assignment taught me how to do these steps in engineering design process thoroughly collaboratively and improve my skills in engineering design.

Praxis II RFP Proposal
This assignment focused highly on the first two steps of the engineering design process. With 2 of my partners, we were to find problems in community of Toronto. We came up with collisions at two intersections that occurred often. We defined the problem with great extent and defined criteria and constraints. We also included background research that looks at technical and physical properties of the problem. This assignment has taught me to do the first two steps very thoroughly through research and collaboratively with teammates.

Praxis II Showcase
The showcase focused on step 3 and onwards in my personal engineering design process, especially on improvement. We were given a RFP this time with a problem already defined with criteria and constraints: winter cycling. We generated multiple solutions and analyzed them thoroughly, using our skills learned from the RFP proposal. When we chose the best solution, we skipped step 6 and 7 which relates to prototype and went straight to improvement. When we asked our teaching assistants and other individuals such as director of snow removal, we were strongly encouraged for improvement and forced to choose other solutions from our original group of solutions. We then ended up repeating these step and keep changing our solution to improve upon. However, time was not wasted as we found out some of our solution was turned down, but gave us justification and reason why we had to choose the solution we ended up selecting and why other solutions will not work. We then finally made our own prototype and were able to present our solution to the audience. Through this assignment, I learned how to overcome discouragements, improve my work, and generate numerous creative ideas with other individuals. We were then ended up with the best solution that is feasible and effective compared to other engineering design.

Computer Programming Projects from CSC180 and CSC190
Sep 2011 - Apr 2012

Before these courses in first year, I have never programmed in my life. There were numerous assignments and group projects from CSC180 and CSC190, which taught me how to program in Python and C programming language, respectively. These projects involved classes, functions, loops, pointers, recursions, and debugging of codes. These projects were very challenging and required pages of code to complete. This has introduced me to a new world of coding and I realized it is a very complicated process that requires a thorough planning ahead of time. Below are my thought process while working on projects.

For project 2 and 3 in CSC192, I had the option to work with a partner. However, I wanted to work alone to better understand the C language. For project 2, I was to create set of nodes to store elements that can be removed or inserted. At first, I did not understand the problem and thought it was an array. After writing the code assuming it was an array, I realized I have made mistakes when I tried to compile. Then, I researched and read the textbook to define the problem. Then I realized, fortunately, I only needed to make few modifications in order for the code to work. When writing codes, it is all about testing and improving, since it is hard to get it right the first time. Criteria were given for this project in the form of run time. This allows the functions to run in the shortest time, optimizing the code overall. Since it was hard to keep the criteria in mind and come up with the solution, code in this case, I first wrote the code, then saw if it met the criteria and constraints.

In project 3, I was to write code for index and also compare effectiveness of AVL and PSB trees, when generating index. Since the conditions of index were given to us, it was quite simple to write code for the index. For writing PSB trees, I just had to modify code for AVL tree. The PSB tree did not need rebalancing or height, which made it much easier to write. After I wrote the codes, I compared the effectiveness of the trees and I was surprised how much a few lines of code can make such big difference in run time: AVL tree ran much faster than PSB trees. This just highlights the importance of engineering design and shows that little bit of work now could result in great rewards later on.

Bridge Design from CIV102
Sep 2011 - Dec 2011

During my first year in engineering, my team and I designed a bridge that would go from a GB building to BA building in University of Toronto. This project aimed and allowed me to apply what I have learned in class and practice my skills.

Our group got together in meetings to allocate the work and help each other during this project. During these meetings, we looked at the requirements for the bridge, such as how much weight it is supposed to support, and also considered the wind force. After considering these requirements, we tried many different combinations of trusses and shapes to choose the most cost effective design. Therefore, we were able to show our creativity and try different things with the bridge. Then, we worked on it individually on our parts and got together before it was due to combine and have final touches.

On the day the project was due, we were to present our bridge and convince the professor and the teaching assistance that our bridge design is optimal and well designed. We were given short amount of time, so we had to organize our speech and only mention the key points of the bridge. We also drew an overall 3-D image of the bridge for visual aid and we ended up as the most cost effective team, which put us as one of the top bridge design in class. This project overall improved my team leadership skills as well as my presentation skills.

Laboratory Student from PHY180
Sep 2011 - Dec 2011

During my first year in engineering, a partner and I went through laboratory experiments in classical mechanics in various topics such as Newtons Third Law, simple harmonic motion, rotational motion, and acceleration due to gravity. This has taught me how to use DataStudio to collect data, record my records, display data in tabular and graphical form, estimate the uncertainties in experimental results, and taught me the difference between theoretical physics and experimental physics.