Preetam Sharma

Research Assistant Professor

Biography

August 2024 – Present
Research Assistant Professor, Department of Mechanical, Aerospace, and Biomedical Engineering, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, USA.

May 2019 – June 2024
Research/Teaching Assistant & Tennessee Fellow, Electrochemical Energy Storage and Conversion Lab, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, USA.

Aug 2017 – April 2019
Project Engineer, Advanced Combustion and Acoustics Lab, Aerospace Engineering, IIT-Kanpur, India.

July 2015  – July 2017
Research/Teaching Assistant, Advanced Combustion and Acoustics Lab, Aerospace Engineering, IIT-Kanpur, India.

Research

• Electrochemical Energy Storage and Conversion
• Next Generation Fuel Cells and Electrolyzers
• Sustainable Vehicle Power (e-Mobility)
• Batteries (Li-ion and beyond Li-ion) for Electric Aviation
• Multi-phase Flows and Transport Phenomenon
• Heat Transfer
• Fluid Mechanics

Education

Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering, 2024, The University of Tennessee, Knoxville

MS in Aerospace Engineering, 2017, Indian Institute of Technology-Kanpur (IIT-Kanpur)

BS in Aerospace Engineering, 2015, Anna University-Chennai, India

Professional Service

• Member, The Electrochemical Society (ECS), USA.
• Reviewer for The Journal of Electrochemical Society, Journal of Power Sources, International Journal of Hydrogen Energy, Energies, Molecules, Sustainability, and numerous other peer-reviewed journals in the field of electrochemical energy storage and conversion.
• Lab Convener, Advanced Combustion and Acoustics Lab, IIT-Kanpur, India.
• Senior Executive, Academics and Research Cell, Students’ Gymkhana, IIT-Kanpur, India.

Awards and Recognitions

• Outstanding Student Service Award, 2024: Awarded by the Department of Mechanical, Biomedical and Aerospace Engineering, Tickle College of Engineering, University of Tennessee, Knoxville.
• Tennessee Fellowship for Graduate Excellence (TFGE), 2019-2023: Signature graduate fellowship offered to top incoming Ph.D. and terminal-degree students at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.
• Summer Fellowship Award, 2023: Awarded by the Tickle College of Engineering, University of Tennessee, Knoxville.
• Best Oral Presentation Award in the Area: Hydrogen & Fuel Cells at the Grand Renewable Energy (GRE) 2022 International Conference, Japan.
• Elected to the membership in The Honor Society of Phi Kappa Phi, 2022.
• Hui Pih Memorial Engineering Fellowship, 2020-2021: Awarded by the Department of Mechanical, Biomedical and Aerospace Engineering, Tickle College of Engineering, University of Tennessee, Knoxville.
• Joel F. Bailey Scholarship Endowment, 2019-2020: Awarded by the Department of Mechanical, Biomedical and Aerospace Engineering, Tickle College of Engineering, University of Tennessee, Knoxville.
• Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD), Government of India (GOI) Scholarship for Master's Degree, 2015-2017: Awarded by MHRD, GOI to support Master's Degree at IIT-Kanpur.
• University Third Rank in Bachelor’s Degree at Anna University-Chennai, India.

Publications

Book Chapters

• Preetam Sharma and Vaibhav Kumar Arghode. Liquid Fuels Flameless Combustion. In Fundamentals of Low Emission Flameless Combustion and Its Applications, pages 477–503. Elsevier, 2022.

Journal Articles

• Preetam Sharma, Douglas Aaron, Pierre Boillat, Lei Cheng, Christina Johnston, and Matthew M. Mench. Correlating Catalyst Growth with Liquid Water Distribution in Polymer Electrolyte Fuel Cells. Small, 2024.
• Preetam Sharma, Lei Cheng, Douglas Aaron, Shirin Mehrazi, Jonathan Braaten, Nathan Craig, Christina Johnston, and Matthew M. Mench. Unveiling Local Aging Patterns Following Accelerated Stress Testing of High-Performance Polymer Electrolyte Fuel Cells. Small, volume 2306433. Appears in Wiley’s Hot Topic: Carbon, Graphite, and Graphene Collection, 2023.
• Preetam Sharma, Bapi Bera, Douglas Aaron, Muenir Mustafa Besli, Saravanan Kuppan, Lei Cheng, Jonathan Braaten, Nathan Craig, Sarah Stewart, Michael Metzger, Christina Johnston, and Matthew M. Mench. Spatially Resolved Heterogeneous Electrocatalyst Degradation in Polymer Electrolyte Fuel Cells Subjected to Accelerated Aging Conditions. Journal of The Electrochemical Society, volume 169, page 114506, 2022.
• Raghav Sood, Preetam Sharma, and Vaibhav Kumar Arghode. Combustion Characteristics of a Peripheral Vortex Reverse Flow Combustor With Coaxial Fuel Injection. Journal of Energy Resources Technology, volume 142, pages 052301–1, 2020.
• Preetam Sharma, Naman Jain, and Vaibhav Kumar Arghode. Investigation of a Low Emission Liquid Fueled Reverse-Cross-Flow Combustor. Journal of Energy Resources Technology, volume 141, page 102202, 2019.

Conference Proceedings

• Preetam Sharma, J.P. Owejan, O.C. Esan, G. Fields, Douglas Aaron, and Matthew M. Mench. High-Performance Fuel Cell with Integrated Flow Distribution in Porous Transport Layer for Heavy-Duty Vehicular Application. In Electrochemical Society (ECS) Meeting Abstracts PRiME. Honolulu, Hawaii, 2024.
• Preetam Sharma, J.P. Owejan, Douglas Aaron, and Matthew M. Mench. Porous Carbon Fiber Flow Fields for Heavy-Duty Polymer Electrolyte Fuel Cell (PEFC) Application. (Poster Presentation). In Gordon Research Conference (GRC) on Fuel Cells. Smithfield, Rhode Island, 2024.
• Preetam Sharma, Pierre Boillat, Lei Cheng, Douglas Aaron, Nathan Craig, Christina Johnston, and Matthew M. Mench. Water in Polymer Electrolyte Fuel Cells (PEFCs): Friend or Foe? Linking Preferential Catalyst Growth with Liquid Water Distribution in PEFCs. In Electrochemical Society (ECS) Meeting Abstracts San Francisco, California, 2024.
• Preetam Sharma, J.P. Owejan, Douglas Aaron, and Matthew M. Mench. Porous Carbon Fiber Flow Fields for Heavy-Duty Polymer Electrolyte Fuel Cell (PEFC) Application. In Electrochemical Society (ECS) Meeting Abstracts 243, number 38, pages 2255–2255. Boston, MA, 2023.
• Preetam Sharma, Lei Cheng, Shirin Mehrazi, Douglas Aaron, Jonathan Braaten, Nathan Craig, Christina Johnston, and Matthew M. Mench. Investigating the Effects of Cascading Accelerated Stress Tests (ASTs) on the Localized Electrochemical Performance Degradation in Polymer Electrolyte Fuel Cells (PEFCs). In Electrochemical Society (ECS) Meeting Abstracts 243, number 38, pages 2218–2218. Boston, MA, 2023.
• Preetam Sharma, Douglas Aaron, Lei Cheng, Jonathan Braaten, Christina Johnston, and Matthew M. Mench. Localized Electrochemical Performance Degradation in Polymer Electrolyte Fuel Cells (Poster Presentation). In Gordon Research Conference (GRC) on Fuel Cells. Smithfield, Rhode Island, 2022.
• Preetam Sharma, Douglas Aaron, Lei Cheng, Jonathan Braaten, Nathan Craig, Christina Johnston, and Matthew M. Mench. Localized Electrochemical Performance Degradation in Polymer Electrolyte Fuel Cells (PEFCs). In Electrochemical Society (ECS) Meeting Abstracts 242, number 42, pages 1571–1571. Atlanta, GA, 2022.
• Preetam Sharma, Douglas Aaron, Lei Cheng, Jonathan Braaten, Nathan Craig, Christina Johnston, and Matthew M Mench. Current, Temperature, and Pt Particle Size Growth Heterogeneities in Polymer Electrolyte Fuel Cells (PEFCs) Subjected to Accelerated Aging Conditions (Best Oral Presentation Award). In Grand Renewable Energy (GRE) 2022 International Conference. Japan, 2022.
• Preetam Sharma, Bapi Bera, Douglas Aaron, Muenir Mustafa Besli, Zachary Taie, Lei Cheng, Sarah Stewart, Saravanan Kuppan, Christina Johnston, Michael Metzger, and Matthew M. Mench. Influence of Flow Rate on Catalyst Layer Degradation in Polymer Electrolyte Fuel Cells. In Electrochemical Society (ECS) Meeting Abstracts PRiME, number 36, pages 2345–2345. Honolulu, Hawaii, 2020.
• Naman Jain, Preetam Sharma, and Vaibhav Arghode. Experimental Investigation of Liquid Jet Atomization in Non-Uniform Gaseous Cross-Flow. In Fluid Mechanics and Fluid Power Conference (FMFP 2018). Indian Institute of Technology-Bombay, India, 2018.
• Preetam Sharma and Vaibhav Arghode. Experimental Investigation of Low Emission Liquid Fuelled Reverse Cross Flow Combustor. In ASME Gas Turbine India Conference, volume 58509, page V001T04A003. Bangalore, India, 2017.

For a complete list of publications, please visit Google Scholar profile.

Invited Talks/Workshops/Consultancy

• Led a one-day workshop at FCRENEW, Knoxville, TN on the topic, "Best Practices in Polymer Electrolyte Fuel Cell Testing." Invited by Dr. Philip Stuckey (Founder of FCRENEW), 2023.
• Delivered a talk at the Robert Bosch Research and Technology Center–North America, Sunnyvale, CA on the topic, "Degradation Studies in Polymer Electrolyte Fuel Cells." Invited by Dr. Lei Cheng (Robert Bosch LLC), 2022.

Patents

• K. Arghode, Preetam Sharma, and Raghav Sood. A Peripheral Vortex Reverse Flow Combustor with Coaxial Fuel Injection (PVRF-COAX) and Method Thereof, 2020. Indian (IN) Patent No. 435784.