2019 Scholarship Winner Feature – Christopher Kondratowicz

Drexel University Doctoral Student Receives Philadelphia STLE Scholarship

L to R: Salvatore Rea, Scholarship Committee; Awardee Christopher Kondratowicz; Tom O’Brien, Scholarship Committee

The Philadelphia Section of the STLE is pleased to award a $500 scholarship to Christopher Kondratowicz of the Stevens Institute of Technology. Kondratowicz is pursuing a joint BE and ME in Chemical Engineering. Kondratowicz has an excellent academic record, with a near 4.0 in his major courses, including a course on Sustainable Energy given in Madrid Spain. 

Working with Prof. Ronald Besser, Kondratowicz has done research on understanding and improving the interlamellar adhesion of stacked polymer layers. The work contributes to improving fuel cell architecture and performance. This work will be included in journal articles to be submitted by the group. In addition to his work at Stevens, Kondratowicz has been working at Infineum as part of the Power Transmission Fluids group. In this role, he is focusing on optimizing fluids for Continuously Variable Transmissions (CVTs). Using a block-on-ring tribometer, the group has studied the effects of friction modifiers, detergents and oil oxidation on tribofilm formation. The tribofilm compositions were analyzed by scanning electron microscopy with energy-dispersive capabilities and with x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. The results of this work will enable the group to optimize the fluid additive package to achieve high performance and fuel economy.