Cohort 5

Bio:

While completing his Chemical Engineering Degree at the University of California, Berkeley, Caleb Alexander served as the president of the AIChE chapter and started a brewing club and biodiesel club to give the students more hands-on engineering experience. He also took a chemical engineering economics class, which taught him finance and game theory where he did the technical and financial analysis for his business plan for a deepsea rare earth element mining company. This business experience taught him to zoom out, look at the big picture and ask, “what problem is actually worth solving?”. As a chemical engineer, he was trained in scaling up processes to worldwide industrial scale, so he asked himself this question… and then thought very big. By combining his electrochemistry experience from his corrosion course at the University of California, Li-ion research experience at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and PhD studies in metal-air batteries and fuel cells at the University of Texas, Austin, he looked at the periodic table and reasoned his way to the highest practical energy battery chemistry with the lowest cost. Despite his best efforts, he just could not kill it. He seeks to join Innovation Crossroads to make the Na-Air battery scalable, long-lasting, and for a clean, sustainable world.

Bio:

Sam Evans received a Bachelor of Science degree in Chemistry from the University of South Carolina in 2015, an Master of Science degree in Chemistry from Georgia Tech in 2017, and a PhD in Energy Science and Engineering in August 2020 from the Bredesen Center for Graduate Education at the University of Tennessee (UTK), an Oak Ridge National Lab (ORNL) and UTK graduate program partnership. Sam performed research at ORNL over the course of his PhD, which included the development of magnetic adsorbents for water remediation and additional projects involving water treatment, lithium-ion removal, and desalination. Sam has also worked with various start-up, mid-level, and multinational corporations to develop materials, processes, and IP within the energy and water business landscape. Engagement with ORNL and the Department of Energy’s research programs and collaborations with cutting edge industry partners has prepared Sam for a fast-paced high-technology entrepreneurial path. Sam’s research has resulted in 10 publications (4 first-authored), multiple invention disclosures, and a submitted patent on water remediation systems and materials. His portfolio of work spans a breadth of topics and expertise, making Sam an adaptable expert that can flourish at ORNL in Innovation Crossroads.

Bio:

Tommy Gibbons comes to Hempitecture with experience in corporate finance and growing early stage companies. He complements his business experience with a green building background that includes a certification as a LEED Green Associate, a designation as a 2021 Building Technologies Office IMPEL+ innovator, and training from France’s l’École Nationale du Chanvre (National School of Hemp Construction). He was also a founding board member and treasurer of the United States Hemp Building Association, a 501c6 trade association for the hemp building industry. Before founding Hempitecture based in Ketchum, Idaho, Tommy worked at Piper Computers in San Francisco and Goldman Sachs in New York City. He graduated from Princeton University with a degree from the Woodrow Wilson School of Public Policy in 2013.

At Hempitecture, he oversees the company’s operations and new product development which most notably includes Hempitecture’s HempWool insulation. HempWool is a non-toxic, high-performing, carbon-negative insulation material with the ability to drastically reduce a building’s embodied carbon footprint while increasing the occupant’s health and comfort. In 2021, Hempitecture plans to conduct research and testing on new, proprietary blends of its insulation material to improve its insulation value and fire resistance. Hempitecture also plans to onshore insulation manufacturing using industrial hemp waste from American farmers. Beyond insulation, Hempitecture hopes to develop other hemp-based building products that will help fulfill the Public Benefit Corporation’s mission to “create healthy, energy efficient habitats that positively impact inhabitants as well as environment through the sequestration of Carbon Dioxide”. In 2020, Tommy was named to the Forbes 30 Under 30 list for manufacturing and industry with his co-founder.

Bio:

Shuchi “SK” Khurana has twenty years of work experience in predictive analysis and commercialization of new products and technologies. SK’s technical expertise is in computational weld modeling, material science and predicting material properties, and microstructure based on thermal signals. He has published more than 10 research papers in peer-reviewed journals on prediction of microstructure and engineering simulation. SK is also an innovator and has more than 5 granted patents to his name, including a patent on cloud-based simulation software for material joining. SK has the expertise in managing and developing all aspects of a software product. Prior to founding Addiguru, SK worked at Intralox where he led the development and launch of a predictive software product for industrial use. SK has a lot of experience in developing novel technologies and commercializing them. Previously, SK co-founded and ran a startup company for which they raised $4 MM in venture funding. SK earned his Bachelor of Technology in Materials and Metallurgical Engineering degree from Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kanpur and holds two masters’ degrees – Master of Science and Master of Business Administration, both from Ohio State University.

Bio:

Forrest Shriver is the Chief Executive Officer of Sentinel Devices LLC and a 4th-year PhD candidate in the Nuclear Engineering program at the University of Florida (UF), scheduled to graduate in May 2021. His dissertation is on the application of deep learning models to reactor modeling and simulation tasks, specifically on how to use these models to perform high fidelity parameter prediction based off of simulated data and specific data needs and pitfalls that arise when doing so.

He graduated summa cum laude with a Bachelor of Science in Physics from the University of Texas, Rio Grande Valley and also has a Master’s degree in Nuclear Engineering from UF. Over his undergraduate and graduate research career he has worked on various projects ranging from design implementation on Field Programmable Gate Arrays to developing CUDA kernels investigating complex computational behavior and has learned a variety of computer languages and programming models to accomplish these tasks. His interest in making technology more secure, as well as his passion for optimization, inspired him to co-found Sentinel Devices LLC to bring the power of machine learning to the “edge” of the industrial internet of things. In his private life he enjoys reading science fiction and cooking.

Bio:

Philip Stuckey has over sixteen years of hydrogen fuel cell experience directly related to research, development, and intellectual property. Philip received a Bachelor of Science degree in Materials Science and Engineering from North Carolina State University and a Master of Science degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Hawaii at Mānoa. He completed his PhD in Chemical Engineering from Case Western Reserve University, while conducting most of his doctoral research at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

For the last 7 years, Philip has served as a Patent Examiner reviewing fuel cell and battery applications for the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) and his career achievements at the USPTO have designated him as a Patent Agent. Prior to joining the USPTO, Philip researched the electrochemical kinetic processes at proton exchange membrane fuel cell electrodes at Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s Fuels, Engines, and Emissions Research Laboratory. He developed a novel technique to measure the kinetics and the amount of the oxide layer on the catalyst of an operating fuel cell in-situ. He also executed a project involving the growth of carbon nanotubes that created ultrahydrophobic materials for diffusion media and electrocatalyst support materials. Stuckey’s R&D provided an innovative solution for water management issues inherent to operating fuel cells.