DEPARTMENT OF CHEMICAL ENGINEERING

Faculty

Dr. Ahmed A. Abdala Associate Professor Bu Hasa Building, Room 2214 Sas Al Nakhl Campus Office: +971 2 607 5584 Fax: +971 2 607 5200 Email: aabdala@pi.ac.ae

• BS, Petroleum Refining Engineering, Suez Canal University, Egypt (1990)
• MS, Petrochemicals, Suez Canal University, Egypt (1995)
• MS, Chemical Engineering (non-thesis), North Carolina State, USA (2001)
• PhD, Chemical Engineering and Fiber & Polymer Science, North Carolina State, USA (2002)

Employment History

• Assistant Professor, The Petroleum Institute, Aug 2006-current
• Assistant Professor, Faculty of Petroleum and Mining Engineering, Suez Canal University, Egypt, Sep 2004-Aug 2006
• Research Associate, Princeton University, May 2003-Sep. 2004.
• Research Associate, North Carolina State University, Dec 2002-Apr 2003

Teaching Interests

• Gas Processing Engineering
• Petroleum Refining Processing
• Chemical Reactions Engineering
• Mass Transfer
• Polymer Properties
• Polymer Nanocomposites
  

Research Interests

• Nanomaterials
• Production of single graphene sheets
• Characterization of graphene
• Functionalization of graphene
• Graphene for environmental applications
• Oil-spill removal
• Waste-water treatment
• Polymers
• Polymer nanocomposites
• Polymer rheology
• Rheology of water soluble polymers
• Electrospinning of nanofibers
• Optimized CO2 emission in Refineries

Recent Publications:
Patents:

• R. Prud'Homme, I. Aksay, D. Adamson & A. Abdala, “Thermally Exfoliated Graphite Oxide,” US Patent No: 7,658,901, February 9th, 2010.
• R. Prud'Homme, I. Aksay, D. Adamson & A. Abdala, “Thermally Exfoliated Graphite Oxide and Its Use in Nanocomposites,” European Patent No: EP1934139, June 25th, 2008.

Peer-reviewed Journal Articles (2006-):

• H. Kim, A. Abdala, and C. Macosko, “Graphene/Polymer Nanocomposites,” Macromolecules, 43(16), 6515-6530, 2010. (Prospective article) (Cover Article)
• S. Mahammad, A. A. Abdala, G. Roberts, and S. Khan, “Manipulation of hydrophobic interactions in associative polymers using cyclodextrin and enzyme,” Soft Matter, 6 (21), 4237-4245, 2010.
• T. Ramanathan, A. A. Abdala, S. Stankovich, D. A. Dikin, M. Herrera-Alonso, R. D. Piner, D. H. Adamson, H. C. Schniepp, X. Chen, R. S. Ruoff, S. T. Nguyen, I. A. Aksay, R. K. Prud'Homme, and L. C. Brinson “Functionalized Graphene Sheets for Polymer Nanocomposites,” Nature Nanotechnology, 3, 327-331, 2008.
• Margarita Herrera-Alonso, Ahmed A. Abdala, Michael J. McAllister, Ilhan A. Aksay, Robert K. Prud’homme, “Intercalation and Stitching of graphite oxide with Diaminoalkanes,” Langmuir, 23 (21), 10644-10649 (2007).
• M. McAllister, J. Li, D. Adamson, H. Schniepp, A. Abdala, J. Liu, M. Herrera-Alonso, D. Milius, R. Car, R. Prud’Homme & I. Aksay, “Single Sheet Functionalized Graphene by Oxidation and Thermal Expansion of Graphite,” Chemistry of Materials, vol. 19 (18), 4396-4404, (2007).  (Cover Article)
• X. Guo, A. Abdala, B. May, S. Lincoln, S. Khan, R. Prud'Homme, “Rheology Control by Modulating Hydrophobic and Inclusion Associations in Modified Poly(acrylic acid) Solutions,” Polymer, vol. 47, no.9, pp. 2976-2983, 2006.