Nearly 70 students participate in ChemE's first capstone and design showcase

Nearly 70 Chemical Engineering students participated in the Department’s first-ever Capstone & Design Showcase in June. Students presented their research and design projects through a mini film festival and a poster session.

Students developed projects through the Industry and Community Capstone program, which pairs students and companies to tackle real-world engineering problems, and the Process Design II course, which presents students with a hypothetical challenge with real-world constraints. This year, the Process Design challenge was to imagine a retrofit for the decommissioned gas plant in Seattle’s Gas Works Park. Both the capstone program and the design course integrate the undergraduate chemical engineering curriculum into hands-on challenges. They are designed to be highly customizable to meet different learning styles and the needs of industry and community partners.

The faculty advisors for the capstone and design projects were David Beck, Lilo Pozzo, Julie Rorrer and Daniel Schwartz.

Ten ChemE alumni, faculty and industry partners served as judges of the poster competition. Four teams were the recipients of Bowen Design awards for their work and received cash prizes to be divided among the team members. The teams awarded first, second and third place are listed below. Two teams tied for third place.

Team Apple^4 – First Place

Team members from Apple^4 hold their certificate with Dept. Chair Elizabeth Nance.

Presenting team members: Alpha Arestun & Lorrie Welch
Advised by: Dr. Julie Rorrer
This Process Design II Team reimagined the gas plant infrastructure at Gas Works Park as a producer of ethanol for fuel using apple scraps.

Ultrahigh Performance Composite Material: Agentic AI for Data-Driven Formulation – Second Place

Team members from Lockheed Martin Corporation capstone team hold their certificate while standing with Dept. Chair Elizabeth Nance.

Presenting team members: Emmett Butcher, Sofia Dahlgren, Helen Feldhaus, Arjun Ram Gupta, Vera Kotova
Advised by: Dr. David Beck
Project sponsor: Lockheed Martin Corporation
This Industry Capstone Team developed an AI agent that can rapidly identify high performance materials that have strong potential for aerospace applications. These materials can then be further tested in the lab.

Automation of Chemical Ortho-Phosphate Removal at the Arlington WWTF – Third Place Tie

Team members from "Automation of Chemical Ortho-Phosphate Removal" hold their certificate and stand with Dept. Chair Elizabeth Nance.

Presenting team members: Megan Altenburg & Will Broznowski
Advised by: Dr. David Beck
Project sponsor: BHC Consultants This Industry Capstone team improved phosphorous removal at the Arlington Wastewater Treatment facility by automating the plant’s alum dosing system.

Cal-Cu-lator: Copper Concentration Calculator for Industrial Wastewater Streams – Third Place Tie

Several students from "Cal-Cu-lator" hold a certificate while standing with Department Chair Elizabeth Nance.

Presenting team members: Asiran Siu-Kwong Chaing, Jacob David Faulk, Trevor Gaffney, Kieran Heiberg, Alyssa Hicks
Advised by: Dr. David Beck
Sponsored by: Membrion
This Industry Capstone Team developed a method of real-time water quality monitoring for industrial wastewater by developing a calculator that predicts copper concentration using measurements of pH, conductivity, temperature and refractive index.

Originally published June 25, 2026