Dr. Philip Panicker
RESEARCH INTERESTS
CubeSats (nano-satellites), Instrumentation, data acquisition and experimental testing, wind tunnel testing (subsonic to hypersonic)
Energy harvesting, alternative and renewable energy sources, waste-to-energy conversion
Alternate fuel systems, fuel reformation, waste-to-energy conversion
Applied aerodynamics, gas dynamics, detonation and combustion for propulsion
Air-breathing and rocket propulsion, advanced propulsion concepts, including pulsed detonationengines (PDE) and continuous detonation engines (CDE), nuclear, electric and plasma propulsion
Plasma applications for energy, propulsion, and waste-to-energy conversion.
PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE
October 2012 – Present Senior Lecturer and Coordinator of Engineering Academic Laboratories
Engineering Division, New York University in Abu Dhabi, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates
Instruction of engineering courses (Statics, Dynamics, Fluid Mechanics, Electrical Circuits, Electronic Circuits, Vibrations, Instrumentation Sensors and Actuators, Computer Aided Design, Machine Component Design, Compressible Flow, Aircraft Flight Mechanics, Heating Ventilation Air Conditioning and Refrigeration)
Management of Engineering teaching laboratories, design and setup of teaching labs, Manager of Lab Health and Safety
Supervision of teaching assistants (instructors) and undergraduate teaching assistants
Procurement of instruments and equipment for teaching and research
Research of waste-to-energy technologies (microwave plasma), CubeSat/nanosatelliteapplications
Mentoring students, and advising of student interest groups, advising student teams forcompetitions
Supervision and planning of field trips, extra-curricular activities, engineering projects
Supervision of undergraduate research (in-term, summer and post-graduation) and capstoneprojects
Attending conferences of professional societies (AIAA, ASME, ASHRAE, WASTE-ENG, etc.)and presenting research
Organizing research conference (ICPAT 11, 2018)
Liaison with industry and government agents for academic and research activities.May 2008 – Mar. 2010 Post Doctoral Research Associate
Aerodynamics Research Center, Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Department, University of Texas at Arlington, Arlington, Texas
Experimental pulsed detonation engine (PDE) project sponsored by Temasek Labs, National University of Singapore, Singapore.
Philip K. Panicker, PhD +971-55-766 4937 Email: pkp7000@gmail.com LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/philipkpanicker Page 1/6
Designed and developed an air-breathing, liquid-fueled, dual rotary-valved pulsed detonation engine with distributed ignition and HVDC plasma reactor.
Led team that designed, assembled and tested propulsion systems.
Designed test set up using 3D CAD (Pro/Engineer), prepared detailed drawings for engine partsand liaised with machinists and welders for the fabrication of components.
Designed and built the pneumatics, hydraulics, and fluid delivery system (liquid fuel, gaseous fuel, oxidizers and neutral gases) for the test rig including piping/tubing, fluid control systems,pressure rated valving, fittings, motors, actuators, mechatronics.
Developed National Instruments’ LabVIEW based control and diagnostics systems, designedinstrumentation system for test rig, designed and built the high voltage ignition system, plasmaelectrodes and high voltage dc plasma power supplies.
Liaised with sponsors and principals.
May 2007 – May 2008 Lecturer
Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Department, University of Texas at Arlington, Arlington, Texas Taught class and laboratory in experimental methods and statistical data analysis for mechanical, aerospace and bioengineering sophomores, including topics such as technical report writing, error analysis, and instrumentation and measurement systems.
Was commended by staff and students as an exceptional teacher.
Developed and maintained an ABET approved teaching laboratory, designed experiments andwrote laboratory manual.
Sep. 2001 – Dec. 2003, Sep. 2004 – May 2007 Graduate Teaching Assistant
Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Department, University of Texas at Arlington, Arlington, Texas Taught laboratory, graded homework, projects and lab reports, developed and built instructional experimental set ups for introductory experimental methods class.
Lab was recognized by ABET accreditation team and other MAE staff as the best in the department.
1996 to 1999 Sales Engineer Refrigeration Equipment Enterprises, Dubai, UAE
Management and sales in retail and wholesale of heating, ventilation, air conditioning and refrigeration equipment, parts and tools.
Involved in all aspects of operations, including upper management, customer relations, purchasing, marketing, recruiting, warehousing, managing inventory and logistics, commissioning IT systems, and showroom design.
Expanded warehouses and showrooms, added delivery vehicles, recruited many staff members and expanded product range. Designed posters, brochures and advertisements. Streamlined showroom and warehouse operations and inventory control; reduced losses, increased efficiency and improved sales.
EDUCATION Ph.D. in Aerospace Engineering, August 2008University of Texas at Arlington, Arlington, Texas
Dissertation: The Development and Testing of Pulsed Detonation Engine Ground Demonstrators
Philip K. Panicker, PhD +971-55-766 4937 Email: pkp7000@gmail.com LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/philipkpanicker Page 2/6
Designed, built and tested experimental facility and PDEs to study detonation based engine concepts.
Worked on projects funded by Lockheed Martin, National University of Singapore (NUS), Temasek Labs Singapore and UT Arlington, and collaborated with researchers from NCKU University, Tainan, Taiwan.
Presented papers at AIAA Conferences in Reno, Nevada, Canberra, Australia and at NUS, Singapore.
Subjects included supersonic and hypersonic propulsion, high temperature gas dynamics, turbulence and boundary flows, astronautics, and renewable energy systems.
M.S. in Aerospace Engineering, August 2003University of Texas at Arlington, Arlington, Texas
Thesis: Ionization of Air by Corona Discharge
High Voltage induced corona discharge for application in supersonic flow.
Designed and built high voltage ionization DC power supply system and aided in the design anddevelopment of supersonic shock tunnel test set up.
Presented research paper at AIAA Student conference.
Subjects included core undergraduate courses in aeronautics and mechanical engineering, rocketpropulsion, air breathing propulsion, combustion, inverse design and optimization, computer aided design, experimental work on wind tunnels, shock tubes and detonation tubes, research on ionization and low density plasma, high voltage power supply design.
B.E. in Electronics and Telecommunications Engineering, 1996M.S. Ramaiah Institute of Technology, Bangalore, India
Capstone project: Universal EPROM Emulator PC Add-on Card
Development and testing of an external EPROM emulator card used for real-time testing of BIOSsoftware.
Subjects included electrical and electronic circuits, analog and digital circuits, power electronics,microprocessor design and programming and other electrical engineering courses.
HONORS AND AWARDS
John DeYoung Outstanding Research Award, 2003, 2007
Rudolf Hermann’s Graduate Fellowship, 4 years, Fall 2004
Kalpana Chawla Scholarship 2007/08, Fall 2007COMPUTER SKILLSCAD packages, SolidWorks, LabVIEW (NI systems, DIAdem), Matlab, MS OfficeACTIVITIES
Faculty Advisor for Student Groups at NYUAD, including Christian Students’ groups, Aerospace Club, Environmental group activities. Advisor for Student Competition Teams (Waste-to-Energy student competition, Group won 1st place, Dubai Expo Dutch Pavilion 2021).
Engineers for Social Impact (EFSI) program at NYU Abu Dhabi: One of the founding directors of the program. Partnered with Habitat for Humanity – Sri Lanka, week long building projects, supervising and coordinating students from NYUAD during Spring Break in 2013, 2014, 2015, and Habitat for Humanity Thailand in 2016 and 2018.
(2008-2011) Volunteered at HOPE (Helping Our Pupils Excel) Tutoring, Boys and Girls Club, Mission Arlington, UT Arlington Mentors, etc.
(2000- 2011) Started and managed various student organizations at UT Arlington including soccer club, rugby club, motorcycle riding club and Christian Students’ groups and helped organize events for the group activities, including soccer tournaments, seminars, etc.
(2000-2011) Aikido Club, International Students Organization, UTA Volunteers, Engineers Without Borders-UTA
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) member since 2002
Trained in CPR (certified), first aid, and usage of fire extinguishers.
LANGUAGE SKILLS English, Arabic (read and write only, very limited conversational), Hindi, Urdu (limited conversational), Malayalam.
PATENTS
Lu, F.K., Panicker, P.K., Wilson, D.R., and Li, J.-M., “System and method for power production using a hybrid helical detonation device,” US Patent No. 8,127,533 B2, March 6, 2012.
Lu, F.K., Panicker, P.K., Wilson, D.R., and Li, J.-M., “Internal detonation reciprocating engine,” US Patent No. 7,958,732 B2, June 14, 2011.PUBLICATIONS (NO JOURNAL ARTICLES)
Al Kindi L., Roberts M.S., di Giovanni A., Arneodo F., Al Qasim A., Al Mannaei A., Al Marri N., Al Khouri F., Ha S., Panicker P., Manenti L., “Space qualifying RAAD CubeSat for the study of terrestrial gamma-ray flashes and other short timescale phenomenon.” In Proceedings of the International Astronautical Congress, IAC 2020 (Vol. 2020). International Astronautical Federation, IAF.Francesco Arneodo, Adriano Di Giovanni, Philip Panicker,
Mallory Roberts, Ahlam Al Qasim, Aisha Al Mannaei, Fatema Al Khouri, Noora Almarri, Lolowa Alkindi, Francesco Arneodo, Adriano Di Giovanni, Philip Panicker, Sohmyung Ha, “A 3U CubeSat Mission to Optimize and Test the RAAD Detector for Studying Terrestrial γ-Ray Flashes,” Poster presentation at the First Sharjah International Conference on Particle Physics, Astrophysics and Cosmology held at the University of Sharjah, Sharjah, United Arab Emirates from 11 to 13 of November 2018.
Ahlam Al Qasim, Aisha Al Mannaei, Fatema Al Khouri, Adriano Di Giovanni, Francesco Arneodo, Philip Panicker, and Mallory Roberts, “Development of a Soft Gamma-ray Detector for the Study of Terrestrial Gamma-ray Flashes,” Poster presentation at the 3rd COSPAR Symposium Small Satellites for Space Research held on 18 to 22 September 2017 in Jeju, Korea.
Kumar, Raghav, and Panicker, Philip K., "Extraction of nuclear fuels from coal using microwave induced plasma gasification and electromagnetic plasma separation processes." Smart Grid and SmartCities (ICSGSC), 2017 IEEE International Conference on Green Energy.
Al Qasim, Ahlam, Mallory SE Roberts, Aisha Al Mannaei, Adriano di Giovanni, Francesco Arneodo,
Noora Almarri, Lolowa Alkind,
Sohmyung Ha
, "The RAAD mission for studying terrestrial gamma-ray flashes." In
Proceedings of
the International Astronautical Congress, IAC, vol. 2019, pp. IAC-19_B4_2_6_x53280. International
Astronautical Federation, IAF, 2019.
Panicker, Philip K., and Magid, Amani, “Microwave Plasma Gasification for the Restoration of
Urban Rivers and Lakes, and the Elimination of Oceanic Garbage Patches,”
ASME 2016 10th
International Conference on Energy Sustainability collocated with the ASME 2016 Power
Philip K. Panicker, PhD +971-55-766 4937 Email: pkp7000@gmail.com LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/philipkpanicker Page 4/6
Conference and the ASME 2016 14th International Conference on Fuel Cell Science, Engineering
and Technology
. American Society of Mechanical Engineers, 2016.
Panicker, P.K. and Lu, F.K., “Application of plasma for ignition and combustion enhancements in Pulsed Detonation Engines,” Proceedings of the 7th International Conference on the Frontiers of Plasma Physics and Technology, Kochi, India, April 13-17, 2015. Paper and poster presentation.
Panicker, P.K., Lu, F.K., and Wilson, D.R., “Practical methods for reducing the deflagration-to- detonation transition length for pulse detonation engines,” Proceedings of the 9th International Symposium on Experimental and Computational Aerothermodynamics of Internal Flows (ISAIF9), Paper 6C-2, September 8-11, 2009, Gyeongju, Korea.
Braun, E. M., Lu, F. K., Panicker, P. K., Mitchell, R. R., Wilson, D. R. and Dutton, J. C., “Supersonic Wind Tunnel Control Using LabVIEW,” 46th Aerospace Sciences Meeting and Exhibit, AIAA Paper 2008-852, January 7-10, 2008, Reno, Nevada.
Panicker, P. K., Lu, F. K. and Wilson, D. R., "Practical Issues in Ground Testing of Pulsed Detonation Engines," 2007 ASME International Mechanical Engineering Congress and Exposition, November 10-16, 2007, Seattle, Washington.
Lu, F. K., Panicker, P. K. and Webb, M. B., "Introducing Modern Laboratory Experiences to Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Students," 2007 ASME International Mechanical Engineering Congress and Exposition, November 10-16, 2007, Seattle, Washington.
Calhoun, S. A., Diwanji, B., Panicker, P. K. and Lu, F. K., "Acquiring Torque and Rotational Speed Data from a Stationary Bicycle for Undergraduate Teaching," 2007 ASME International Mechanical Engineering Congress and Exposition, November 10-16, 2007, Seattle, Washington.
Lu, F.K., Panicker, P.K. and Ortiz, A.A., “Hybrid pulse detonation engine (PDE) for electric power production,” World’s Best Technologies Showcase, Arlington, Texas, May 15–16, 2007.
Panicker, P.K., Li, J., Lu, F.K., and Wilson, D.R., "Application of a Pulsed Detonation Engine for Electric Power Generation, " AIAA-2007-1246, 45th AIAA Aerospace Sciences Meeting and Exhibit, Jan. 8-11, 2007, Reno, Nevada.
Panicker, P.K., Li, J., Lu, F.K., and Wilson, D.R., "Development of a Compact Liquid Fueled PDE with Predetonator, " AIAA-2007-237, 45th AIAA Aerospace Sciences Meeting and Exhibit, Jan. 8- 11, 2007, Reno, Nevada.
New, T., Panicker, P.K., Chui, K., Tsai, H., and Lu, F.K., "Experimental Study on Deflagration-to- Detonation Transition Enhancement Methods in a PDE, " AIAA-2006-7958, 14th AIAA/AHI Space Planes and Hypersonic Systems and Technologies Conference, Nov. 6-9, 2006, Canberra, Australia.
Panicker, P.K., Wilson, D.R., and Lu, F.K., "Operational Issues Affecting the Practical Implementation of Pulse Detonation Engines," AIAA-2006-7959, 14th AIAA/AHI Space Planes and Hypersonic Systems and Technologies Conference, Nov. 6-9, 2006, Canberra, Australia.
Panicker, P.K., New, T., Lu, F.K., and Tsai, H., "Experimental Investigations on DDT Enhancements by Shchelkin Spirals in a PDE," AIAA-2006-552, 44th AIAA Aerospace Sciences Meeting and Exhibit, Jan. 9-12, 2006, Reno, Nevada.
Panicker, Philip K., and Magid, Amani, “Microwave Plasma Gasification for Enhanced Oil Recovery
and Sustainable Waste Management,”
ASME 2016 10th International Conference on Energy
Sustainability collocated with the ASME 2016 Power Conference and the ASME 2016 14th
International Conference on Fuel Cell Science, Engineering and Technology
. American Society of
Mechanical Engineers, 2016.
Philip K. Panicker, PhD +971-55-766 4937 Email: pkp7000@gmail.com LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/philipkpanicker Page 5/6
Satyanand, U.S., Panicker, P.K., Lu, F.K., and Emanuel, G., "Preliminary study of ionization of supersonic air by means of corona discharge," AIAA Paper 2003–6925, 12th AIAA International Space Planes and Hypersonic Systems and Technologies, December 15–18, 2003, Norfolk, Virginia.
Panicker, P.K., Satyanand, U.S., Lu, F.K., Emanuel, G., and Svihel, B.T., “Development of Corona Discharge Apparatus for Supersonic Flow,” AIAA Paper 2003-6925, 2003.