Ruiqing Shen
Oklahoma State University, OK·Engineering
Fires are changing. Lithium-ion batteries and wildland fires resist ordinary water, especially in dry rural areas with little water to spare.
- Fields
Engineering
Materials Science
Chemistry
- Topics
fire safety
fire suppression
hydrogels
- Grants
- 2 known grants, through Dec 2027
What they work on
- Optimize thermo-responsive hydrogel formulations, gels that hold water and respond to heat, for thermal resistance, surface adhesion and cooling power as water-efficient fire suppressants.
- Evaluate hydrogel performance in bench-scale tests simulating wildland fires and lithium-ion battery fires, and probe how each formulation component affects suppression mechanisms.
- Synthesize polylactic acid (PLA) nanocomposite filaments, plant-based plastic loaded with nanoparticles, and print samples by fused filament fabrication (FFF) with structural characterization.
- Measure ignition and combustion of 3D-printed PLA nanocomposites under controlled fire conditions to learn how layering, voids and infill density change heat and mass transfer.
More about the research
Meanwhile, 3D-printed plastic parts are becoming common, but many printing plastics catch fire easily. Both projects ask how materials behave when heat meets fuel. One develops better fire-fighting agents. The other works out how printed plastics ignite and burn.
Why it matters
Water-efficient gels could give firefighters better tools against lithium-ion battery fires and wildfires, particularly in drought-prone and rural communities with limited water. Understanding how printed bioplastics burn could guide affordable flame-retardant materials, making 3D-printed products safer for the people who make and use them.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
EPSCoR Research Fellows: NSF: Advancing Hydrogel-Based Fire Suppression Through Collaborative Material Development and Performance Validation
NSF · Jan 2026 – Dec 2027
ERI: Experimental Investigation of Heat/Mass Transfer Associated with Ignition and Combustion of Biopolymer Nanocomposites in 3D Printing to Improve Their Fire Safety
NSF · Oct 2024 – Aug 2027
Closest labs
Ola Rashwan
Pennsylvania State University, PA·Engineering
Test whether adding a dispersion agent stops silver nanoparticles from clumping inside PAEK polymer filament, and improves extrusion into filament with a consistent diameter.
Yiliang Liao
Iowa State University, IA·Engineering
Determine how the evolving, uneven thermal environment of a hot liquid support bath controls polymer diffusion and interlayer fusion in embedded printing, using deep-neural-network molecular dynamics, phase-field modeling, and experiments.
Trisha Andrew
University of Massachusetts, MA·Chemistry
Grow thick, conductive chloride-storing polymer electrodes by oxidative chemical vapor deposition and test whether they achieve high volumetric chloride storage capacity.
The school
Oklahoma State University: 15 labs on PI Pages, $254M a year on research, 238 research doctorates a year.
Reach out
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