Coal and iron ore are the major raw materials for steel making. Variety of surfactants are used during beneficiation of these raw materials. Many type of synthetic surfactants such as cationic, anionic and non-ionic surfactants are used in coal and iron ore beneficiation. However, the major challenge for beneficiation processes is to develop a biodegradable surfactant for coal and iron ore floatation. So, we are searching for a suitable biodegradable surfactant for coal and iron ore beneficiation to make the process more environment friendly. ( Mentor: Mr Mohammed Naveed Azad, E-Mail: mohammed.azad@tatasteel.com)

Iron ore slimes (<150μm) are being discarded as waste during mining and processing of iron ores. The major mineral found in the slimes are hematite, goethite, quartz, alumina, mica, etc and these can be segregated by flotation, magnetic separation and chemical leaching methods. The slimes consist of appreciable amount of natural occurring goethite nanoparticles which can be used for heavy metal absorption. It is also possible to extract different phases of goethite nanoparticles, particularly beta β phase which can be used as thermic nanofluid. So, we invite ideas to develop suitable methods for extraction or development of new generation material for nanofluids such as n-butanol-based nanofluid containing nanowire-shaped β-FeOOH from iron ore slimes. ( Mentor: Dr Supriya Sarkar, E-Mail: s.sarkar1@tatasteel.com)

High carbon ferroalloys like ferrochrome or ferromanganese contain about 7-8 wt % carbon dissolved in the form of carbide of Fe, Mn and Si. The heavy requirement of low and medium carbon ferro alloys requirement for steel industries and the increasing sustainability norms enforcing requirement for finding new ways to refine/ segregate these high carbon fractions by applying novel physical or chemical processes. Primary challenge of this concept is to design a process/ unit which will be able to refine/segregate these alloys to get desired low or medium carbon alloys from high carbon ferro alloys. ( Mentor: Dr Arijit Biswas, E-Mail: arijit.biswas@tatasteel.com)

LD slag is process waste generated during steel production. It has very limited uses and presence of heavy and trace metal concentration in it is a challenge for development of new products. It is viable to reduce the level of heavy metals like Pb, Cd, As, Co, Hg including the Chromium (Cr) up to desired level. However, we are searching a suitable method which can further reduce the chromium content in the products such as soil conditioner below 100 ppm by means of masking / keeping it in the solution at pH 7.0 in the trivalent form, so that it can be removed out of the system through bleeding. The possible solution can be an economical masking agent to keep the chromium in the solution and can be withdrawn from the slurry after filtration or to find a reagent which can make volatile compound with chromium at elevated temperature in sulphuric acid solution. ( Mentor: Dr Shrenivas Ashrit, E-Mail: shrenivas@tatasteel.com)

Cooling tower is required in almost all type of process industries right from metal to pharmaceutical and chemical industries. It is also often observed that the cooling towers consume significant amount energy than what they are designed to be. A probable reason might be due to the fact that the cooling towers are not operated within the optimum range of flow rates of hot water and ambient air input to the cooling tower. If such flow rates are operated optimally then significant amount of energy can be saved. We are searching for a methodology/algorithm to develop an advanced nonlinear control system based intelligent model to find the optimized operating conditions for cooling tower which can give us the predictive behaviour of cooling tower for subsequent control operation. ( Mentor: Dr Pinakpani Biswas, E-Mail: biswaspinakin@tatasteel.com)

Surface aesthetic is a critical attribute for automotive steel panels. Almost 30% of skin panel steel sheet is being rejected during its final inspection. Putting a lot of efforts, a few incremental improvements have been made in this area. Ideas are invited for building suitable algorithm to correlate occurrence and severity(intensity) of surface defects with corresponding production process data; so that a smart system for prediction and correction of surface defects can be developed. ( Mentor: Dr Nemai Chandra Gorain, E-Mail: nemai@tatasteel.com)

Steel has various applications depending upon its physical properties. Most of these properties are controlled by thermo-mechanical processing which has some limitation and advantages. It is known that the properties of steel can be modified by some other methods also such as ultrasound and electro-pulses. The vibrations induced by these methods create or annihilate defects in iron lattice and modify the microstructure of steel and impart changes in properties of steel sheets. Such methods can be used to locally change the steel properties without any special thermomechanical processing to increase local formability, strength and fatigue life of steel components without altering the bulk properties. So, proposals are invited about innovative methods to modify the steel microstructures to improve the steel properties. ( Mentor: Dr Sourabh Chatterjee, E-Mail: sourabhchatterjee@tatasteel.com)

During cold rolling process, surface of a steel strip is covered with cold-rolling emulsions oils mainly consisting of mineral oils, esters, emulsifiers, additives or antioxidizing agents. Further, metal or carbon particles and cracked hydrocarbons contaminate the surface. Average values of residues after cold rolling of sheet material are 500 to 1000 mg/m³ emulsion oil and 50 to 200 mg/m³ iron fines. The steel strip surface is cleaned in Electrolytic Cleaning Line(ECL) to reduce oil content and iron fines. The electrolytic cleaning solution contains silicate compound that deposits about 2 nm of silicate layer on steel surface. This silicate film is desired for heat treatment of steel by batch annealing process. However, a thicker silicate layer causes problem in phosphate coating (before painting at automotive line) and therefore its optimum thickness is necessary. The silicate layer is generally measure by Auger Electron spectroscopy or XPS. We are looking for some innovative way to measure the silicate layer. The Scanning Kelvin probe (SKP) could be one such technique by which we can indirectly access the silicate layer and the surface cleanness. We are searching for innovative methods to examine the silicate deposition kinetic and the silicate layer film. ( Mentor: Dr Arun Kumar Singh, E-Mail: arun.singh7@tatasteel.com)

Welding of dissimilar alloys or metals such as steel and aluminium is needed for various kinds of applications. There could be various ways to improve it, however addition of carbon nanoparticles can help to improve the weld properties for similar and dissimilar steel and aluminium joints. It can increase strength and toughness of the welds due to grain refinement. We invite proposals to develop a process to find the right size of nanoparticles and establishing the application procedure. ( Mentor: Dr Kanwer Singh Arora, E-Mail: kanwer.arora@tatasteel.com)

Iron and Steel Industry has undergone numerous changes over the decades on process, product and services front. With advent of new technologies such as AI, internet of things, 3D Printing, sensors, digital intervention, the steel industry is anticipating disruptive changes. We are inviting you to propose an idea, value proposition on technology front that could make a change in steel industry. The idea may come from a different industry or an interdisciplinary stream with a potential of value creation in steel industry on product quality, process efficiency, industrial safety, process automation, enhancing customer experience, new product design (from steel), energy conservation fronts. ( Mentor: Mr Munish Sudan, E-Mail: munish.sudan@tatasteel.com)