Poster competition win
![Ben Peed](/content/sbio_vt_edu/en/about-us/news-publications/newsletter/newsletters-2018/winter-2018/poster-competition/_jcr_content/article-image.img.jpg/1532361406142.jpg)
Mr. Benjamin Peed, a senior in Sustainable Biomaterials, earned the $300 Second Place prize in the poster competition at the 2017 International Conference on Wood Adhesives, Oct. 25, 2017 in Atlanta Georgia! Perhaps even more impressive is that Ben was the only undergraduate student among 22 competitors - the rest were graduate students and professionals. Ben presented his research (Heat Generation of Formaldehyde in Pinus taeda Wood) that was funded through;the National Science Foundation, Research Experiences for Undergraduates program;Ben’s research was requested by the industry members of the Wood-Based Composites Center (WBC), a National Science Foundation, Industry/University Cooperative Research Center. For nonstructural wood composites,as in cabinetry for example, regulations for allowable formaldehyde emissions have been tightened such that the natural formaldehyde in wood can play a role in regulation compliance. Ben said, “I learned that when wood is heated- like it is during hot-pressing- I learned that wood generates formaldehyde; and I learned how to measure it accurately.” Ben added, “I have to thank my co-authors, Niloofar Shivyari and Mohammad Tasooji for helping me.” Shivyari and Tasooji are Ph.D. students in Macromolecular Science & Engineering, working with Dr. Chip Frazier, Professor in Sustainable Biomaterials and Director of the WBC. When asked what he will do with the prize money, Ben replied with a smile, “Well...Dr. Frazier made a few suggestions, or I mean he repeated one suggestion over and over; but I think I will wait for some other suggestions.”