Affiliate Professor
Director, Center for Bioplastics and Biocomposites (CB2)
Walter B. Booth Distinguished Professorship
ISU Civil, Construction and Environmental Engineering (courtesy)

Dr. Grewell’s research team work on the following main focuses areas:

Bio-plastics
In this work, naturally derived proteins from corn and soybeans are compounded and processed to form bio-degradable, bio-renewable polymers. The research includes, formulation, processing and application development.

Bio-fuels
Based on the worlds need for “green” renewable fuels Dr. Grewell’s team is developing and characterizing the use of high power ultarsonics to enhance bio-fuels. Substrates ranging from corn to switch grass to soy-oils have been studied to enhance ethanol and bio-diesel fuels.

Bio-Mass treatment
In this work, high powered ultrasonics are used to treat municipal waste to enhance treatment and methane production. This work also include the treatment of animal waste.

Micro-fabrication
In this work, novel techniques for micro-fabrications on polymer substrates have been developed. These techniques are used to fabricate “labs-on-a-CD” for rapid, low costs frequent testing of various pathogens.

Ultrasonic welding
Based on fundamentals, polymer and metallic welds are modeled and characterize. The goal of this work it develop technology for aluminum cars, bio-renewable polymer packaging and environmentally consensus products.