Recent engineering graduate wins $1,000 for research on power generation costs
Double Eagle Matthew DeMond wrapped up his graduate degree in mechanical engineering recently by earning a $1,000 award and second place in a student paper competition for his U.S. Department of Energy-funded research focused on decreasing the cost of power generation.
DeMond entered his research paper in a competition at the American Society of Mechanical Engineers Power 2022 Conference. His research focused on an area of novel sealing technologies for application in supercritical carbon dioxide power generation.
“The production of efficient, cost effective and environmentally friendly power is an issue that affects everyone on the planet,” DeMond said. “This project gave me the opportunity to contribute toward helping improve this critical process.”
DeMond worked under the supervision of Sevki Cesmeci, Ph.D., assistant professor of mechanical engineering, who served as an advisor for DeMond throughout his graduate and undergraduate careers. Cesmeci was immensely proud of DeMond’s success in the competition.
“This was an incredible accomplishment considering the competition,” said Cesmeci. “The first and third place finishers were both Ph.D. students while Matthew was a master’s student.”
Cesmeci and DeMond hope this research will go on to help not only decrease the cost of power generation, but also decrease its environmental footprint. After completing his degree, DeMond accepted a position with Boeing.
“It was an honor to receive recognition for my contributions to the project and it was a great way to end my time at Georgia Southern,” DeMond said. “My experience on this research team has prepared me well as I make the transition into my working career.”
In his new position, DeMond will work at the NASA Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans. as part of the production engineering team. The team will build the core stage of NASA’s Space Launch System rocket (SLS). The SLS rocket is part of the Artemis program, the goal of which is deep space exploration, returning humans to the moon and eventually to Mars.
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