Profile

Dr. Mayank Sabharwal

PhD
Pronouns: he/him/his

Affiliations

Assistant Professor

Schulich School of Engineering, Department of Chemical and Petroleum Engineering

Contact information

Web presence

Phone number

Office: (403) 220-8777

Location

Office: ENB204E
Lab: ENG330

Background

Educational Background

PhD Mechanical Engineering, University of Alberta, 2019

BE Chemical Engineering, Birla Institute of Technology and Science-Pilani, 2011

Research

Participation in university strategic initiatives

Projects

Operando imaging and diagnostics of electrochemical systems

We are working on using x-ray computed tomography at synchrotron beamlines across the world to investigate the transient fluid behavior in electrochemical systems, such as water electrolyzers, fuel cells, and redox flow batteries. This diagnostic technique provides local transport behavior at the pore scale (~ 1 um) thereby allowing a fundamental understanding of the role of the porous media microstructure on the transport-related losses.


Pore-scale numerical modeling of transport and electrochemical processes

Direct numerical simulations on the reconstructed microstructures of the porous media are being utilized to simulate the transport and electrochemical processes which cannot be directly studied using operando imaging, such as transport and electrochemical reactions in the nano-pores of catalyst layers for fuel cells and water electrolyzers. In collaboration with the University of Alberta, we are using and actively developing functionalities in the open-source package OpenFCST (http://www.openfcst.mece.ualberta.ca/) to advance the microscale simulation capabilities of the framework.

In the News

More Information

Fuel Cells; Water Electrolyzers; Microstructural Modeling; X-ray tomography; Numerical Modeling; Porous Media Characterization; Focused Ion Beam -  Scanning Electron Microscopy; Hydrogen Storage; Green Chemistry Technology; Electrocatalysis

Dr. Sabharwal's group is looking for motivated graduate students to work on the challenges associated with green hydrogen production using water electrolysis. If you are interested, please email your CV and cover letter to Dr. Sabharwal.