Dr. Cohen was an invited panelist at the "Danger on the Delta" conference, Aquarium of the Pacific, Long Beach, CA, March 13, 2007.

Dr. E. M.V. Hoek gave a plenary address, “Nanotechnology for Advanced Membrane Processes,” at the Nanotechnology-Enabled Water Treatment Workshop, Houston, Texas, February 25 - 27, 2007.

Former WaTeR Center Ph.D. student, Dr. Arun Subramani, began working in the Applied Research Division at MWH Global in Pasadena, California in January 2007.  Arun completed his Ph.D. on “Microbial Adhesion Mechanisms in Reverse Osmosis and Nanofiltration” (Ph.D. Advisor: E. M. V. Hoek)
 

The 2006 AIChE Topical Conference on Water Resource Management: Production, Recycling, Purification and Conservation, was held on November 12-17, 2006 San Francisco Hilton San Francisco, California.  Read more about the conference technical and plenary sessions.   The National Water Research Institute (NWRI) and the WaTeR Technology Research Center were co-sponsors of the above meeting.

October 2006
Congratulations to Michal Uchymiak and Eric Lyster for winning a First Place Student Poster Award for his work on "Ex-Situ Scale Observation Detector (EXSOD) for Early Detection of Mineral Scale Formation and Surface Crystallization Kinetics on RO Membranes" which was presented at the CA-NV AWWA Annual Fall Conference, October 2-5, 2006, Lon Beach, CA.   

UCLA Ph.D. student Eric Lyster was awarded the 2006 National Water Research Institute/Cargill Ph.D. Research Fellowship

September 2006
The First Annual Western Water Technology Workshop was held at UCLA, September 29, 2006. The workshop was attended by more than eighty participants.  

Former WaTeR Center M.S. student, Jodie Nygaard, began working at Malcolm-Pirnie Inc. in Irvine, California in September 2006.  Jodie was advised by Prof. Eric M.V. Hoek in the Civil & Environmental Engineering Department at UCLA.  Results from Jodie’s M.S. thesis, “Combating Long-term, Irreversible Fouling with Nanocomposite Membrane Technology,” were presented at the AIChE Annual Meeting in Fall 2006 and at the AWWA Membrane Technology Conference in March 2007.

Wen-Yi (Winnie) Shih joined Carollo Engineers.  Winnie completed her Ph.D. on surface mineral crystallization on nan-structured polymeric surfaces and RO membranes (Ph.D. Advisor: Y. Cohen).

August 2006
WaTeR Center receives a travel grant from the Sol Leshin Foundation in support of collaborative research with the Ben-Gurion University.  The two groups will collaborate on ""Enhanced Water Recovery from Marginal Waters".

July 2006
WaTeR Center students are working on a new project to design a mini- modular and mobile RO system.  This system will be utilized for both laboratory and field studies of water desalination.

June 2006
A new major WaTeR Center Project on "Advanced Monitoring, Optimization, and Control Technologies for High-Efficiency Membrane Desalination" will be initiated this year with funding support from the State of California Department of Water Resources and a number of WaTeR Center Industrial Affiliates. 

May 2006
Professor Cohen gave an invited presentation on "High Recovery membrane Desalination of Brackish Water; Limitations and Opportunities" at the 2006 Reclamation’s Brine Management Implementation Study Workshop May 3, 2006, organized by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation and the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California.

April 24-28, 2006
WaTer Center Faculty and students participated in the 2006 CA-NV-AWWA meeting that was held April 24-28, 2006 in Burlingame, CA.  UCLA students and Faculty gave eight presentations and presented nearly a dozen posters.  

March 2006:
Professor Cohen presented an invited paper on “Membrane Surface Nano-Structuring: Selectivity Enhancement, Fouling Reduction and Mineral Scale Formation,” at the U.S. - Israeli Workshop on Nanotechnology for Water Purification, Arlington, VA, March 13-15, 2006.

January 2006:
Professor Cohen delivered a keynote lecture on "High Recovery Water Desalination" at the 4th Eastern Mediterranean Chemical Engineering Conference (EMMC4), will be held on January 9-11, 2006 at Le Meridien Hotel, Dead Sea, Israel.

WaTeR Center files for patent on "Ex-Situ Scale Observation Detector (EXSOD)".  The EXSOD system will enable online monitoring of RO plants for scale formation and for  optimization of feed pretreatment and membrane cleaning strategies.

December 2005:
A novel optical membrane scale observation detector developed by WaTeR Center researchers

September 2005:
Professors Yoram Cohen and Julius "Bud" Glater lectured on "Reverse Osmosis Desalination: A Glimpse at the Past and a View Toward Future Water Independence for California" on Thursday, September 29, 2005 6:30 pm,  100 Moore Hall, UCLA. Click here  for more information.

May 2005
The WaTeR Center proposal "Desalination Research Innovation Project" was selected as the top research proposal for funding under California Proposition 50.

Honors and Awards

UCLA Ph.D. student Eric Lyster is awarded the 2006 National Water Research Institute/Cargill Ph.D. Research Fellowship

UCLA Ph.D. student Arun Subramani receives an Outstanding Paper Award at the 2005 North American Membrane Society Annual Meeting held in Providence, Rhode Island for his oral presentation titled, 'Application of Direct Observation of Biofouling (DOB) Technique to Quantify Initial Adhesion of Microorganisms on NF/RO Membranes.'  Arun is currently working with Assistant Professor Eric M.V. Hoek (Civil and Environmental Engineering). 

UCLA Ph.D. student Eric Lyster Receive Outstanding Paper Award at the 2005 North American Membrane Society Annual Meeting (held in Providence, Rhode Island) for his oral presentation of his work on "Numerical Model of Concentration Polarization: Considerations of Membrane Channel Geometry and Spacer Configurations." Eric is a Ph.D. student working with Prof. Yoram Cohen (Chemical Engineering Department).