Sahlberg Scholarship for promising chemical engineer

Since 2015, LTH annually awards a scholarship to one or more students for particularly outstanding Master's thesis. The scholarship has been made possible by a donation from Karl-Erik Sahlberg, former CEO of Perstorp AB and former Chair of the Board of LTH. The scholarship is intended to reward a talented recent graduate student at LTH with a focus on chemistry. The prize money is SEK 50,000.

For 2022, Abdallah Almashhrawi, chemical engineering, is awarded the Sahlberg Scholarship for his thesis:

"Modeling of Biomass Gasification with adaptation to Biological Methanation using Aspen Plus."

Your Master's thesis is about biomass gasification. How did you become interested in this particular topic? 

Sustainable fuels have been a hot topic since day one of our education. Being able to produce renewable fuels from biomass residues could be one of many solutions for the big day, the day we no longer have fossil fuels. The fact that this can be done from biomass residues, sawdust in this case, makes it even better as it does not compete with food production. 

Then my thesis is about computer simulation, so we can simulate a process and study how the process is affected by changing conditions. This saves both time and resources as you don't have to make changes to the real process or have a production stop. 

What challenges have you encountered during your time at LTH? 

In the beginning it was very unclear what was expected of us as students. After all, we came from secondary school where everything was much clearer and the teacher clearly showed what was expected. But over the years this became a natural part of our education, being able to plan our own time and prioritise. A quality that is very important in the business world where, as an engineer, you have to identify problems and find solutions more independently. 

The other challenge is the workload which could feel very high in some courses, especially the maths courses at the beginning. However, this challenge developed another important characteristic, and that is to be stress resistant. 

In addition to the challenges related to my studies, I also had challenges in my personal life. I had time to get married and have a son, while working part-time in a factory in Lund in parallel with my studies.

What are your plans now that you've finished your degree project and have an MSc in chemical engineering? 

Now that I've graduated, I'm working at a company in Hörby called Atos Medical, where we make products that make life easier for those with laryngectomy (laryngeal cancer). I'm part of the quality department that ensures we deliver safe products that meet medical device standards. I haven't had time to plan too many years ahead but who knows, I might return to academia at some point to start my PhD studies or move abroad and discover a completely different country!