Research Scientists (alphabetical)

• Dr. Casey Quinn ()
  • Casey focused on developing low-cost sensors for measuring air quality and assessing human health exposures from those data. He also worked on modeling methane emissions, techno-economic analyses, exposure science, environmental health, low-cost sensor development, citizen science data collection, and electric vehicles.

Postdoc/PhD (alphabetical)

• Dr. Ali Akherati (8/15-4/21), PhD Mechanical Engineering (co-advised by Jeff Pierce)
  • Ali used box and three-dimensional models to study the formation and evolution of secondary organic aerosol from novel precursors in urban environments, biomass burning emissions, and wildfire plumes. Ali is currently a software engineer with Ramboll Shair in California. 
• Dr. Kelsey Bilsback (3/21-9/21), Postdoctoral Scholar
  • Kelsey used a global chemical transport model to study the influence of artifact-corrected parameters on secondary organic aerosol production globally. She also helped in implementing a process-level model into a regional climate model. Kelsey currently works as a senior scientist at PSE Health Energy in Colorado. 
• Dr. Wayne Chuang (6/18-3/20), Postdoctoral Scholar
  • Wayne helped develop computationally-efficient representations to simulate the chemistry and microphysics of organic aerosols in chemical transport models. Wayne currently works with the Regional Air Quality Council in Colorado.
• Dr. Charles He (8/18-5/22), PhD Mechanical Engineering
  • Charles developed and applied process-level models to study the formation and properties of secondary organic aerosol from model VOCs and VOC mixtures. He is currently a postdoc researcher at Tsinghua University.
• Dr. Anna Hodshire (8/14-12/19), PhD Atmospheric Science (co-advised; primary advisor: Jeff Pierce)
  • Anna used box and three-dimensional models to study the evolution of atmospheric aerosols in diverse environments, including forests, remote ocean, and smoke plumes. Anna is currently a solutions lead with QuantAQ in Colorado.  

MS (alphabetical)

• Shiva Chenna (8/16-5/19), MS Mechanical Engineering
  • Shiva’s MS thesis focused on using artificial neural networks to model the fuel economy and tailpipe emissions from light-duty passenger vehicles. Shiva works as an engineer for Apple in Cupertino, CA.
• Abraham Dearden (8/20-12/22), MS Mechanical Engineering
  • Abe’s MS thesis explored the physical and chemical evolution of biomass burning emissions over long photochemical ages. He is currently an Air Quality Consultant at Ramboll in Fort Collins, CO. 
• Sailaja Eluri (9/15-1/17), MS Mechanical Engineering 
  • Sailaja’s MS thesis developed and applied two semi-explicit chemistry and thermodynamic models to predict the formation and composition of secondary organic aerosol from diesel exhaust. Sailaja is currently a PhD student at the North Carolina State University in Rayleigh, NC.
• Dylan Giardina (8/20-5/22), MS Mechanical Engineering
  • Dylan’s MS thesis designed and evaluated autonomous low-cost sensors to measure ozone pollution in the Northern Front Range of Colorado. Currently, Dylan is a research associate at the University of Hawaii at Manoa in Manoa, HI. 
• Abril Galang (1/15-1/17), MS Mechanical Engineering
  • Abril’s MS thesis involved the use of neural network models to predict fuel economy and emissions from electric and hydraulic hybrid vehicles.  Abril currently works as an engineer at Toyota in Ann Arbor, MI.
• Sreejith Sasidharan (8/19-1/23), MS Mechanical Engineering
  • Sreejith’s MS thesis focused on developing parameters for secondary organic aerosol formation from volatile chemical product emissions.
• Naman Sharma (1/17-12/18), MS Mechanical Engineering
  • Naman’s MS thesis examined the influence of fuel, engine load, and emissions control on the oxidative reactivity of diesel exhaust particles. Naman currently works at Element Materials Technology in Seattle, WA.

BS Thesis (alphabetical)

• Dylan Giardina (8/19-5-20), BS Mechanical Engineering
  • Dylan’s BS thesis focused on the design and development of a low-cost ozone sensor to provide long-term, autonomous measurements of regional ozone pollution.
• Mikaela Henness-Wilson (5/17-12/18), BS Mechanical Engineering
  • Mikaela’s BS thesis involved the development and application of statistical models to predict criteria pollutant emissions from on-road mobile sources.
• Christopher Heppding (8/15-5/16), BS Mechanical Engineering
  • Chris designed, fabricated, and tested an selective catalytic reduction (SCR) system for a Tier 3 diesel engine and helped measure isocyanic acid emissions resulting from the SCR chemistry.
• Brandon King (1/17-5/18), BS Mechanical Engineering
  • Brandon’s BS thesis used an environmental chamber to study the formation of secondary organic aerosol from next-generation biofuels. 
• Zachary Lustig (8/19-5/20), BS Mechanical Engineering
  • Zach performed vertical profile measurements of the particle sized distribution using an unmanned aerial vehicle using an optical particle counter. 
• Abbie Maben (6/19-5/21), BS Mechanical Engineering
  • Abbie deployed optical particle spectrometers in Fort Collins to study the spatiotemporal variability in particle size distributions and analyzed urban air quality impacts from the lockdowns mandated during the COVID-19 pandemic.
• Scott Parmelee (8/19-5/20), BS Mechanical Engineering
  • Scott’s BS thesis involved the design and development of a prototype to simultaneously measure fluoresced and scattered light from airborne particles.

 Undergraduate Researchers (alphabetical)

• Jonathan Boualavong (5/15-7/15), BS Biomedical Engineering 
  • Jonathan used an electrochemical microfluidic sensor to measure the oxidative load of diesel and biodiesel particulate matter emissions.
• Spencer Jordan (1/20-12/21), BS Civil and Environmental Engineering
  • Spencer used a computational fluid dynamics code to study aerosol transport and processes in a continuous flow diffusion chamber. 
• Liam Lewane (8/15-7/18), BS Mechanical Engineering
  • Liam designed, built, and maintained the CSU environmental chamber and played an important role on all diesel engine-related projects.
• Ben Platt (5/17-7/17), BS Mechanical Engineering
  • Ben performed chamber experiments to quantify secondary organic aerosol mass yields from a suite of biofuel substitutes for gasoline.
• Gabe Rodriguez (5/17-7/17), BS Mechanical Engineering
  • Gabe helped analyze particle size distribution data from several different instruments deployed during the FIREX campaign at the Fire Sciences Lab in Missoula, MT.
• Cody Vanderheyden (8/15-5/17), BS Mechanical Engineering
  • Cody helped measured and analyze aerosol emissions from diesel engines and cookstoves and also led the design of a portable, low-cost, variable dilution system for combustion emissions.