Dr. Hethnawi is a Postdoctoral fellow in Chemical and Petroleum Engineering at the University of Calgary. As a researcher, he has exceptional achievements in terms of the number of prestigious peer-reviewed articles, research awards, and industrially oriented projects. His research activities include fabricating and tailoring designs of nanoparticles for diverse fields of applications, such as wastewater treatment, enhancing oil recovery, drag reduction, drug delivery, and food processing industries. In the past few years, he worked heavily on developing new classes of eco-friendly and highly effective nanomaterials to clean up the real wastewater that is tremendously generated from the oil and gas industries, such as steam-assisted gravity drainage (SAGD) produced water, oil sand process-affected water, and oil spills. The key area of research is focusing on using environmentally friendly and multifunctional nanomaterials for the simultaneous removal of various contaminants including suspended solids, emulsified oil, dissolved organics, silica, and heavy metals from oil sands produced water. Additionally, he has done intensive work on producing different families of functionalized and non-functionalized silicate, zeolite, and iron-based nanomaterials that have shown outstanding performance in the removal of heavy metals, highly toxic pharmaceutical compounds, dyes, and total organic carbon from various industrial effluents. Interestingly, Hethnawi and his team members have developed an innovative process combining sand-bed filtration and adsorption for the removal of organic and inorganic contaminants from wastewater. To the best of his knowledge, his nanomaterials can be synergistically integrated with many currently applied primary, secondary, and even advanced water and wastewater treatment processes. As an outcome, Dr. Hethnawi received around twenty-five invitations to present his work at number of international conferences and Symposiums inside and outside Canada. As an instructor, Dr. Hethnawi has outstanding records in teaching many courses in the fields of chemical, environmental, separation processes, process design, effluent treatment processes, and natural gas processing technologies. Currently, he worked as an instructor and co-instructor for many undergraduates (i.e., fluid dynamics, heat transfer, separation processes, and thermodynamics) and graduate-level courses (i.e., wastewater issues for the oil and gas industries and natural gas processing principles).
Dr. Saleh Baakeem is a Post-Doctoral Fellow (PDF) at the Dr. Nassar Group for Nanotechnology Research at the Chemical and Petroleum Engineering Department at the University of Calgary (UofC). Dr. Baakeem has strong experience in experimental and numerical approaches. In his current appointment, his research focuses on Asphalt emulsion, drag reduction phenomenon, wax deposition, sonochemical reactors, Nano-SAGD, etc. Before joining Dr. Nassar's group, his interest was in the numerical and theoretical study of single- and multi-phase flow, heat transfer, evaporation, HVAC systems, power plants, and geothermal power systems. In addition to that, he is a former sessional instructor for the grad course "Energy and Environment (ENEN 671)" at UofC and a former tutor instructor for several mechanical engineering courses at UofC and KSU.
Dr. Kotaybah Hashlamoun is a postdoctoral fellow at the Chemical and Petroleum Engineering Department at the University of Calgary (UofC). In his current research, he tests and models the drag reduction phenomenon of polymer additives in linear and rotational flow geometries. Before joining Dr. Nassar's group for nanotechnology, Kotaybah obtained his Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering from UofC, where he performed an experimental and theoretical study on the fluid permeability and molecular diffusion of particles in articular cartilage to further understand the mechanical degradation of the tissue. In addition to his research, Kotaybah enjoys teaching and tutoring. He is a former sessional instructor for BMEN 381 (Mechanics I) and a former tutor instructor for several biomedical and mechanical engineering courses.
Dr. Fereshteh Meshkani is Research Associate. She got her Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering form University of Kashan. Dr. Meshkani current research focuses on synthesize and characterize different families of nanomaterials, focusing more on their size, shape, and surface chemistry.
I am a Cum-laude Chemical Engineer, M.Sc., Ph.D.in Chemical Engineering graduated from Universidad Industrial de Santander-UIS (Bucaramanga, Colombia). Currently, I am ascribed as a postdoctoral associate at the University of Calgary, under the supervision of Professor Nashaat Nassar. Since my bachelor's, I have been working on evaluating non-conventional magnetic flow assurance technologies. Within the framework of the development of my research trajectory, I have gathered experience in areas such as ferrohydrodynamics, rheology, magnetorheology, viscoelastic modeling for structural analysis, synthesis/formulation of ferrofluids, characterization techniques, as well as teaching expertise as a teaching/research assistant and co-supervisor of undergraduate and master students. My Ph.D. thesis was framed on the study of magnetorheological behavior and magnetic-induced microstructure of heavy crude oils and ferrofluids mixtures and was carried out under the supervision of Prof. Arlex Chaves Guerrero (UIS), Prof. Francisco Sánchez (UNLP), and Prof. Nashaat Nassar (UCalgary).
Ahmed Mehairi is a motivated and accomplished researcher and engineer with a robust background in chemical engineering and a specialization in nanoparticle applications for cement-based systems, geopolymers, foam stability, drilling fluids, and enhanced oil recovery. He has also been involved in other research initiatives including waste plastic recycling, production of core-shell biocidal particles, water treatment, and chemical compatibility studies. Ahmed has a strong aptitude for learning and tackling challenging projects. He holds PhD and BSc degrees in chemical engineering from the University of Calgary and currently working as a postdoctoral fellow in Dr. Nassar’s research group. His PhD dissertation focused on the innovative use of nanoparticles to enhance the mechanical properties and microstructure of oil well cement slurry and stabilize CO2/N2 aqueous foams for lightweight foamed concrete production. Ahmed has also a well-rounded industry experience working on a broad range of projects in the areas of operations, optimization, energy consulting, and project engineering. Having held various roles in the industry, his experience has ranged from GHG emissions estimations to supporting the execution of major projects like a $1.3 billion cogeneration project. Ahmed has also worked in natural gas processing and process safety. He is experienced in using different modelling software packages to model process equipment and reaction kinetics. In addition to Ahmed’s research and industry experience, his teaching roles at the University of Calgary have included serving as a teaching assistant for several engineering and science courses, where he supervised student projects, facilitated classroom discussions, demonstrated experimental procedures, and ensured the safe conduct of laboratory sessions. Ahmed's multifaceted experience in academia and industry, combined with his innovative research capabilities, highlights his focus on sustainability and scalability in all his research endeavours.
