UFTI Fellowship Spotlight: Kyle Ventura

Once in a while, you come across a really interesting graduate student, one that is not only academically talented, but one who can speak a second language and is musically inclined with interests in singing and dancing.

Kyle Ventura is one of those students – a first year graduate student affiliated with the UFTI. He was awarded one of the Institute’s graduate fellowships this fall, and he loves to swing dance, sing in acappella and can speak Mandarin (Chinese).

Ventura is also pursuing a Ph.D. in the Department of Materials Science Engineering (MSE). He graduated this past spring 2016 with a degree in chemical engineering from Clarkson University in Potsdam, NY and was accepted at UF this fall. Ventura says he chose UF because of the enthusiasm for research he noticed in the various faculty members and students he met while at the Spring 2015 visit organized by the HW College of Engineering.

‘One of the main things he liked was that the faculty was excited about their research,” Ventura said. “Other schools I toured did not seem as interested. Faculty here were excited to talk to me about their research.”

Ventura’s graduate adviser at UF is Dr. Gerhard Fuchs, and his research project involves developing various new treatments to further strengthen super alloys. What are super alloys? These are a type of material that is highly heat, creep and corrosion resistant. Super alloys are used in the very hot (~2200 oF!) sections of machines. Transportation applications include airplane turbines or jet engines, to name a few.

“If a turbine blade is made out of steel, and you let it run in a modern turbine for 400 to 500 hours, the turbine will fail because the steel with stretch, deform and break,” Ventura said. “A blade made from a super alloy will not deform and can withstand upwards of 7200 hours without shutdown or maintenance.”

“Airplane transportation would not be possible today were it not for super alloys,” he added.

But what was it that inspired this young and talented student to become an engineer and focus on research? Ventura explained that it was during high school in chemistry class.

“I took a chemistry class did very well in it, and the teacher told me to take his engineering class,” he said. “We built things such as spaghetti bridges and small steam engines from soda cans. These were all small engineering experiments, but they got me interested.”

As an undergraduate student, Ventura participated in the McNair program, a federally funded program designed to prepare undergraduate students for Ph.D. studies via involvement in research and other academic activities. Soon thereafter, Ventura won a Clarkson honors program fellowship and traveled to Tsinghua University in China to work on materials science research, specifically on thermoelectric materials. This is where he perfected his Mandarin.

Kyle Ventura proves that he is not only smart and inquisitive, but creative and well-rounded. Welcome  to the UFTI family!