Igor Novosselov, PhD
About
After receiving my academic training in Mechanical Engineering (fluid dynamics and combustion modeling), my efforts have been aimed at the development of instrumentation and methods for aerosol sampling and characterization. My particular interests are: use of low cost sampling devices for personal aerosol exposure monitoring, trace material (particles and vapors) detection, and synthesis of nanostructured materials in flames. My academic training and work in the field of aerosol science have allowed me to be a lead engineer/PI on multiple government and industry sponsored research projects. During my tenure as a Senior Research Scientist and the R&D Manager of a small R&D Company, I have developed novel particle sampling techniques and received several patents in the area of aerosol science, as shown below. I came back academia in 2014 as a research assistant professor at the University of Washington, Mechanical Engineering. I continue my research in the area of aerosol physics, as well as working with industrial partners on the commercialization of the novel technologies related to particulates sampling and analysis and combustion pollution control.
Mentorship
Not available to mentor new students.
Research
Research Interests:
Develop instrumentation and methods for sampling and quantification of biological and chemical aerosols that would deliver environmental samples to laboratory analysis, microfluidic devices and other detection platforms. This detector agnostic methodology can be interfaced with multiple spectroscopic techniques, analytical chemistry methods and biological assays. The use of the technology will range from in security applications, environmental monitoring to epidemiological studies. This research is in close collaboration with UW DEOHS, the current funding for this research comes from NIEHS, NIBIB and UW Commercialization Gap Funds.
Interaction between particle- surface- flow: application to particle re-suspension from the surfaces, particle transport in the flow, particle collection and analysis. The effort will build on the previous non-contact surface sampling research and is driven by a need for detection of trace amounts of chemical or biological contamination in security, pharmaceutical, food processing industries. The multi-physics sampling approach combines pulsed jet sampling with the electrostatic particle collection. The main difficulty of particle re-suspension is the inability of the jet to penetrate a viscous sub-layer and transfer momentum to particles to overcome adhesion forces.
Novel methods of aerogel synthesis based on the nanoparticle aggregation in inverted flame. The current method for gels production has limited economic viability due to its complexity. The proposed aerosol gel method replaces the complex aerogel process and eliminates the need for extracting a liquid component. Research will focus on controlling aerosol gelation and physiochemical properties of the gels. Numerical modeling of flame chemistry and particle growth will guide experimental investigation of aerosol gel production in several fuel-oxidizer systems. Anticipated results include improved knowledge of fluid dynamics and chemistry for inverted flame synthesis, demonstration of inverted-flame technology for generating high surface structures and biocompatible materials with novel surface properties.