I. Executive Summary

Vision & Goals The NSF Science and Technology Center for Environmentally Responsible Solvents and Processes (NSF STCERSP or CERSP for short) supports multidisciplinary research aimed at developing energy-efficient and environmentally-friendly processes that use liquid and supercritical carbon dioxide to replace aqueous and organic solvents in many key manufacturing processes. The CERSP provides collaboration and innovation in research, undergraduate and graduate training, industrial outreach and educational outreach designed to:

create and disseminate new knowledge to the academic, industrial and governmental sectors;

educate a new generation of scientists and engineers in environmental problem-solving;

increase scientific literacy among K-12 students and last, not least,

increase participation of historically underrepresented students in science and mathematics.

While the primary focus of the CERSP is science and engineering, we recognize the opportunity and responsibility to contribute to social and economic development. We plan to continually monitor and report impact of our science in those two key areas. In order to assure that CERSP fundamental programs have practical relevance, they are being conducted in cooperation with industrial partners. Collaboration across distance and among diverse disciplines is essential for success of the CERSP. We have incorporated as an integral part of our Center social scientists to observe and advise regarding our management processes. Moreover, our scientists are themselves the subject of social science research on collaboration and innovation, which we expect to benefit other NSF Centers as well as ourselves.

The CERSP, which officially began operation November 1, 1999, is off to a strong start. The following is a brief status summary.

Research All 30 technical programs are staffed and work is progressing well. During the first nine months of operation, much of the effort has gone into preparations, such as staffing, design and construction of facilities and equipment, installation of computer networks, testing code, etc. About 70% of the instrumentation in the Shared Experimental Facilities will be operational by September and much of the rest, by the end of the year. There have been no significant changes in research programs from the original proposal. A few highlights include:

First nanocrystals made in CO2; Pd nanocrystals found to control Heck reaction

First computer simulation of SCCO2/water interface

First cationic surfactant developed for CO2, used to stabilize water-in-CO2 emulsions

First demonstration of polar reactants, such as SN2 displacement, conducted in CO2

First regiospecific chemistry demonstrated in CO2, possible pharmaceutical application

First selective oxidation of amines to hydroxylamine in CO2, without over-oxidation

First demonstration of phase transfer catalytic activity in CO2

New cell design used in 500MHz NMR to measure unimer/micelle exchange dynamics

Weekly videoconferenced group meetings which interconnect four research institutions

Thirty papers, six preprints, 71 presentations at technical conferences and invited lectures, and two patents were partially supported by NSF funding through the Center to date.

Education and Human Resources Using the Science House at North Carolina State University as the focal point of our K-12 outreach has enabled us to contribute to this educational segment almost immediately. Our K-12 website is devoted to students and teachers. Care has been taken to use language and demonstrations involving CO2 aimed at reaching children. To date 35 CERSP personnel have participated in ten programs reaching >700 young people, primarily girls and African-Americans. CERSP supports development of a laboratory activity book aligned with the new NC high school environmental science curriculum. A book of 10-12 modules, drawn from nationally recognized materials, is in preparation. The Research Opportunities for Under-graduates (REU) program at NCSU has trained five students in topics related to the CERSP with assistance of five faculty and five graduate students.

The CERSP has been active in recruiting from under-represented segments of society. Thirty-one faculty, 19 post-docs, 33 graduate students, 33 undergraduates, and four high school seniors received partial support from the Center this year. Twenty-nine percent of faculty, 32% of post-docs, and 67% of graduate students and 71% of undergraduates are from historically under-represented groups. Of all students and post-docs, 61% are from these groups and 81% are minority or female. Each graduate student is required to contribute one hour per month to some K-12 outreach activity in order to receive CERSP support. Many volunteer more than that.

Work is underway on the Personal Development Program (PDP). A PhD student in the UNC-CH School of Information and Library Science is designing the PDP workshop on collaboration and its evaluation is her doctoral dissertation research proposal. A pilot workshop will be held Fall semester 2001. A PDP workshop on innovation is scheduled for Spring 2001.

Outreach and Knowledge Transfer Existing technology transfer programs—the Separations Research Program at the University of Texas-Austin with 30 industrial sponsors and the Kenan Center for the Utilization of Carbon Dioxide in Manufacturing with 16 industrial sponsors—provide a direct link to many of the leading candidates for commercializing CERSP technology. In addition, 45 researchers from outside the CERSP are collaborating with Center PIs in research at least partially supported by the CERSP. Eight researchers are using CERSP facilities for their own research. Thirty-six tours were conducted in UNC-CH and NCSU laboratories. These 80+ researchers come from nine domestic and two foreign government laboratories; seven domestic and 22 foreign universities; and include scientists from 16 foreign countries. In return, CERSP scientists have access to equipment, facilities, and knowledge bases in most of the collaborators’ laboratories.

The advent of CERSP has catalyzed the establishment of a unique, proactive program at UNC-CH and NCSU to partner with companies having carbon dioxide technology which they do not plan to commercialize on their own. Most often these partnerships will include patent donations to the Universities. The Patent Assessment, Acquisition and Transfer Initiative is a two-year experiment funded by the Universities and supporting foundations. Initial screening has reduced the number of potential patents for donation from 44,000 to 1000. The intent is to identify two to four commercial assessment targets per year. One patent estate, initially valued at over $2,000,000, is already in the acquisition process.

Collaboration The CERSP is about collaboration. As discussed above, our students are being trained specifically in collaboration and innovation techniques. Our communication systems are being installed with a view towards encouraging collaboration. For example, we have a formal schedule of weekly videoconferences. Each thrust area is covered monthly, and each student presents his/her work semiannually. As a training measure, students are assigned to organize and document these conferences. They are also trained in effective presentation techniques for videoconferencing. Each student is also assigned a secondary thrust area to monitor, in order to foster cross-area fertilization. Students and faculty have readily adapted to the video format, and lively seminars have resulted. Our televised orientation in Spring 2000 went a long way towards getting everyone on the same page. With the possible exception of Thrust Area B (see below) collaboration links are beginning to be established as a result of the seminars. In addition to thrust area meetings, we have made arrangement to begin Fall 2000 to broadcast invited speakers to all CERSP sites as a way to add perspective and enrich the educational experience of our students and post-docs. We are developing plans to “stream” these presentations to our corporate partners using the Internet. We will also consider “streaming” for other collaboration.

As part of our formal study of collaboration, a sociometric survey of students and faculty was conducted to determine who collaborates/interacts with whom, what they collaborate about, and how they interact. This will guide assessment of technology needs; and thus, investment of our capital funds for collaboration. E.g., do we invest in whiteboards for seminars or desktop videoconferencing equipment for one-on-one discussions using PCs. Capital for this purpose is still available as we have used existing video studios in each of our four schools.

Increasingly, our website is becoming an integral tool to facilitate internal as well as external collaboration. For example, group meeting and other scheduled events are posted. All PIs, graduate students and post-docs have (or soon will have) home pages which describe technical skills and interests. They can also include personal information as a way to become acquainted with remote colleagues. All programs are listed with objectives, plans, and highlights (including most of this report) to help assure that everyone is “connected.” We also have links to many other sites doing similar work to facilitate communication. To date our website has over 4000 hyperlinks and over 3500 “hits”, most of these from internal users.

Administration There have been no changes in organizational structure this year. However, we have filled the proposed Deputy Director position and added several support staff. We also have changed several thrust area leaders in an attempt to identify leaders willing to commit the time to this critical but somewhat thankless task. Recently, CERSP technical leadership has begun to meet with thrust area leaders and PIs to review progress and to encourage collaborative links. It is expected that these ongoing management meetings will be useful in fostering the connections among the various teams. Initial results are encouraging. We will begin in August receiving proposals for funding commencing in November 2000. Renewal of existing projects is not assured though none is currently in danger of losing its funding.

An External Advisory Board (EAB) was selected and installed. Comments from the first meeting of the EAB were generally favorable, but we did receive a number of helpful comments, on which we have already begun to act. Following our first meeting, a chair and co-chair were appointed. We were pleased at the commitment our board members have been willing to make in order to understand our mission and needs.

Structure has been put into place to assure alignment throughout the organization. This “cascade” process begins with weekly leadership meetings. At the suggestion of our EAB, the general management team now meets biweekly with special topics covered by a more select group every other week. Minutes of meetings are circulated (in the future they will be posted on the website) and important administrative issues are reviewed at weekly thrust group meetings.

We retained a management consultant, paid for by the Kenan Institute, to assist our management team to focus on key issues. Those were identified, and we have developed a very simple, understandable mission statement: We use CO2 research to develop and share knowledge profitably among students, scientists, industry and society for a cleaner environment.

Significant Problems in Meeting Goals We have experienced a few typical startup problems:

slow-developing “teamwork” in Thrust Area B

delays in delivery of key instruments

delays in staffing several programs

need to install special equipment and train several PIs in experimental techniques related to scCO2

communication problems related to distance, especially with U. of Venice

None of these are really major problems and most are well on the way to being resolved. The most serious is the first listed. Other issues will be discussed in the Director’s Narrative section. Thrust Area B has been slow to gel. This area has numerous high-powered researchers with many commitments. Finding leadership able to devote the time needed for this group has been a challenge. Some collaboration is taking place, but most of that existed before the advent of the CERSP. Recently, V. N. Kabadi has enthusiastically assumed the position of Thrust Group B leader, and CERSP technical leadership has become more strongly involved in establishing an active group with numerous collaborations within the group and with other groups. Alternative organizational structures will be considered if recent changes are unfruitful.