EDUCATION Ph.D. Chemical Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2011 B.S. Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2006 BIO Ryan Lively was born in 1984. He spent approximately 16 years in Gainesville, FL and attended almost every home football game at The Swamp. He enrolled at Georgia Tech in 2002 as an eager Chemical Engineering student and has been a Yellow Jacket at heart ever since. During his studies at Georgia Tech, Ryan worked on research projects as diverse as ab initio quantum mechanical methods to estimate molecular binding energies, fresh Georgia peach preservation, composite spinneret design, dual-layer hollow fiber membrane spinning, and sorbent-loaded fiber spinning. Ryan introduced a rapid temperature swing adsorption (RTSA) approach for post-combustion CO2 capture, which was successfully demonstrated by adapting knowledge developed in membrane science to design unique nanoscale composite adsorbent/heat exchangers. After his Ph.D. (awarded in 2010), he spent almost 3 years as a post-doctoral research engineer at Algenol Biofuels, where he published 25 papers and filed two U.S. patent applications. His work at Algenol focused on developing en He is now the Thomas C. DeLoach Professor in the School of Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology. His current research seeks to revolutionize fluid separation processes critical to the global energy and carbon infrastructure. He has a specific focus on membrane- and adsorbent-based science and technology to address some of the most difficult chemical separations. His group’s research activities range from fundamental material science and discovery to translational engineering applications focusing on making and testing separation devices. Ryan has received a variety of awards for his research efforts including the 2020 Allan P. Colburn Award from AIChE, and the 2022 Curtis W. McGraw Award from ASEE. He is currently an Editor for the Journal of Membrane Science and is the Secretary of the North American Membrane Society. He is the Director of the Center for Understanding & Controlling Accelerated and Gradual Evolution of Materials for Energy (UNCAGE-ME), an Energy Frontier Research Center of the US Department of Energy. He has over 190 publications in the field of separations including articles in Science, Nature and other impactful venues.

Our research group focuses on the creation of novel adsorbent and membrane materials that can provide low-energy solutions to some of the world’s most challenging and important separations. Beyond making materials, we focus on developing these materials into scalable, modular devices that can be challenged with realistic feeds in our facilities or at collaborator’s facilities. Our ultimate objective is to translate enabling materials from the lab into devices that can then be sent out into the field. Separating molecules is and always will be a hallmark of modern society – whether applied to conventional refining, biorefining, or futuristic “e-refining”, all of these systems (and many more) will rely upon advanced low energy, low carbon separation technologies that are waiting to be discovered.

Fiber Sorbents – A Versatile Platform for Sorption-Based Gas Separations João Marreiros, Yuxiang Wang, MinGyu Song, William J. Koros, Matthew J. Realff, Christopher W. Jones, Ryan P. Lively, Acc. Mater. Res., 2024. https://doi.org/10.1021/accountsmr.4c00201 Fractionation of complex aromatic hydrocarbon mixtures using membrane cascades hybridized with distillation Young Joo Lee, Hye Youn Jang, Bennett D. Marshall, Mohammed Abutaqiya, Neel Rangnekar, Nicholas C. Bruno, M.G. Finn, Ryan P. Lively, Chem. Eng. J., 2024. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cej.2024.158170 Techno-Economic Analysis of a Carbon Molecular Sieve-Based Xylene Isomer Purification Process Conrad J. Roos, Hammed A. Balogun, Ryan P. Lively, Ind. Eng. Chem. Res., 2024. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.iecr.4c02180 Humidity Effects on Sub-Ambient Direct Air Capture of CO2 with Amine Functionalized Mg-Al LDHs and MMOs Guanhe Rim, Mingyu Song, Laura Proaño, Omid Ghaffari Nik, Surya Parker, Ryan P. Lively, Christopher W. Jones, ACS EST Engg., 2024. https://doi.org/10.1021/acsestengg.4c00503 Open and FAIR data for nanofiltration in organic media: A unified approach Simon Van Buggenhout, et al. J. Membr. Sci., 2024. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.memsci.2024.123356 A transition in diffusion behaviors of organic liquid mixtures in dense polymer membranes Young Joo Lee, Ryan P. Lively, J. Membr. Sci., 2024. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.memsci.2024.123346 Exploitation of Pore Structure for Increased CO2 Selectivity in Type 3 Porous Liquids Matthew J. Hurlock, Lu Lu, Akriti Sarswat, Chao-Wen Chang, Jessica M. Rimsza, David S. Sholl, Ryan P. Lively, Tina M. Nenoff, ACS Appl. Mater. Interfaces., 2024. https://doi.org/10.1021/acsami.4c09811 Polymer-Sorbent Direct Air Capture Contactors with Complex Geometries 3D-Printed via Templated Phase Inversion Seo-Yul Kim, Hannah E. Holmes, Yuxiang Wang, Simon C. Weston, Ryan P. Lively, Adv. Funct. Mater., 2024. https://doi.org/10.1002/adfm.202410356 Design of functional and sustainable polymers assisted by artificial intelligence Huan Tran, Rishi Gurnani, Chiho Kim, Ghanshyam Pilania, Ha-Kyung Kwon, Ryan P. Lively, Rampi Ramprasad, Nat. Rev. Mater., 2024. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41578-024-00708-8 Gas permeability, diffusivity, and solubility in polymers: Simulation-experiment data fusion and multi-task machine learning Brandon K. Phan, Kuan-Hsuan Shen, Rishi Gurnani, Huan Tran, Ryan Lively, Rampi Ramprasad, npj Comput. Mater., 2024. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41524-024-01373-9 Carbon and oxygen recycling strategies in CO2-to-sustainable synthetic fuel production: Recycling route, techno-economics and carbon intensity Jinsu Kim, Yanhui Yuan, Yi Ren, Benjamin A. McCool, Ryan P. Lively, Matthew J. Realff, Energy Convers. Manag., 2024. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enconman.2024.118877 CO2 Uptake and Stability Enhancement in Vinyltrimethoxysilane-Treated SBA-15 Solid Amine-Based Sorbents Anthony Vallace, Zachary S. Campbell, Hyun June Moon, William J. Koros, Christopher W. Jones, Ryan P. Lively, Small, 2024. https://doi.org/10.1002/smll.202401422 Towards carbon neutral scientific societies: a case study with the International Adsorption Society Anne Streb, David Danaci, Ryan Lively, Philip Llewellyn, Akihiko Matsumoto, Marco Mazzotti, Ronny Pini, Benoit Coasne, Adsorption, 2024. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10450-024-00494-3 Electrocatalysis in Solid Oxide Fuel Cells and Electrolyzers Inyoung Jang, Juliana S.A. Carneiro, Joshua O. Crawford, Yoon Jin Cho, Sahanaz Parvin, Diego A. Gonzalez-Casamachin, Jonas Baltrusaitis, Ryan P. Lively, Eranda Nikolla, Chem. Rev., 2024. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.chemrev.4c00008 Tuning Sorbent Properties to Reduce the Cost of Direct Air Capture Hannah E. Holmes, Sayan Banerjee, Anthony Vallace, Ryan P. Lively, Christopher W. Jones and Matthew J. Realff, Energy Environ. Sci., 2024. https://doi.org/10.1039/D4EE00616J Investigating the Effect of Trace Levels of Manganese Ions During Solvothermal Synthesis of Massey University Framework-16 on CO2 Uptake Capacity Akriti Sarswat, John Bacsa, Ankana Roy, Joao Marreiros, M. G. Finn, David S. Sholl, Ryan P. Lively, Chem. Mater., 2024. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.chemmater.4c00137 Membrane separation of cyclic siloxanes from silicone fluid Hammed A. Balogun, Jair M. Cowie-Williams, Yi Ren, Reza Panah, Dimitris Katsoulis, Jay Rose, Akriti Sarswat, Krista S. Walton, William J. Koros, Ryan P. Lively, J. Membr. Sci., 2024. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.memsci.2024.122833 Guanidine-Functionalized PIM-1 as a High-Capacity Polymeric Sorbent for CO2 Capture Ankana Roy, Hannah E. Holmes, Lisa Saunders Baugh, David C. Calabro, Johannes Leisen, Saona Seth, Yi Ren, Simon C. Weston, Ryan P. Lively, M.G. Finn, Chem. Mater., 2024. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.chemmater.3c03311 Water management and heat integration in direct air capture systems Hannah E. Holmes, Matthew J. Realff, Ryan P. Lively, Nat. Chem. Eng., 2024. https://doi.org/10.1038/s44286-024-00032-6 Alumina Incorporation in Self-Supported Poly(ethylenimine) Sorbents for Direct Air Capture Pavithra Narayanan, Pranav Guntupalli, Ryan P. Lively, Christopher W. Jones, Chem & Bio Engineering, 2024. https://doi.org/10.1021/cbe.3c00079 Solid-state crosslinking of thin film composite membranes for organic solvent reverse osmosis separations Yacine Feliachi, Ankana Roy, Yi Ren, M.G. Finn, Ryan P. Lively, J. Membr. Sci., 2024. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.memsci.2024.122462 Cold Temperature Direct Air CO2 Capture with Amine-Loaded Metal–Organic Framework Monoliths Yuxiang Wang, Guanhe Rim, MinGyu Song, Hannah E. Holmes, Christopher W. Jones, Ryan P. Lively, ACS Appl. Mater. Interfaces, 2023. https://doi.org/10.1021/acsami.3c13528 Amine-functionalized MIL-101(Cr) fibers for direct air capture at cold temperatures using rapid temperature vacuum swing adsorption MinGyu Song, Guanhe Rim, Yuxiang Wang, Isaiah Borne, Christopher W. Jones, Ryan P. Lively, Chem. Eng. J., 2023. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cej.2023.147135 Optimum relative humidity enhances CO2 uptake in diamine-appended M2(dobpdc) Hannah E. Holmes, Shreya Ghosh, Chunyi Li, Jayashree Kalyanaraman, Matthew J. Realff, Simon C. Weston, Ryan P. Lively, Chem. Eng. J., 2023. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cej.2023.147119 Engineering organic solvent reverse osmosis in hybrid AlOxHy / polymer of intrinsic microporosity 1 (PIM-1) membranes using vapor phase infiltration Yi Ren, Benjamin C. Jean, Woo Jin Jang, Akriti Sarswat, Young Joo Lee, Emily K. McGuinness, Kshitij Dhavala, Mark D. Losego, Ryan P. Lively, J. Membr. Sci. Lett., 2023. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.memlet.2023.100064 Solution-processable polytriazoles from spirocyclic monomers for membrane-based hydrocarbon separations Nicholas C. Bruno, Ronita Mathias, Young Joo Lee, Guanghui Zhu, Yun-Ho Ahn, Neel D. Rangnekar, J. R. Johnson, Scott Hoy, Irene Bechis, Andrew Tarzia, Kim E. Jelfs, Benjamin A. McCool, Ryan Lively & M. G. Finn, Nat. Mater., 2023. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41563-023-01682-2 Structure–Transport Relationships of Water–Organic Solvent Co-transport in Carbon Molecular Sieve (CMS) Membranes Young Hee Yoon, Yi Ren, Akriti Sarswat, Suhyun Kim, Ryan P. Lively, Ind. Eng. Chem. Res., 2023. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.iecr.3c02519 Organic solvent reverse osmosis separations of hydrocarbon-alcohol mixtures using matrimid membranes Bennett D. Marshall, J.R. Johnson, Young Joo Lee, David Moser, Ryan P. Lively, J. Membr. Sci., 2023. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.memsci.2023.122168 Dynamic study of direct CO2 capture from indoor air using poly(ethylenimine)-impregnated fiber sorbents Fanhe Kong, Guanhe Rim, Pranjali Priyadarshini, MinGyu Song, Matthew J. Realff, Ryan P. Lively, Christopher W. Jones, Sustain. Energy Fuels, 2023. https://doi.org/10.1039/D3SE00618B Improved numerical methods for simulating complex mixture transport across asymmetric polymer membranes using a Maxwell-Stefan model Dylan J. Weber, Ronita Mathias, Ryan P. Lively, Joseph K. Scott, J. Membr. Sci., 2023. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.memsci.2023.121995 Evaluating degradation of CO2 adsorbents in flue gas from bioenergy with carbon capture and storage Hannah E. Holmes, Robert D. Schreck, Pavithra Narayanan, Shreya Ghosh, Wenting Sun, Matthew J. Realff, Ryan P. Lively, Sustain. Energy Fuels, 2023. https://doi.org/10.1039/D3SE00823A Data-driven predictions of complex organic mixture permeation in polymer membranes Young Joo Lee, Lihua Chen, Janhavi Nistane, Hye Youn Jang, Dylan J. Weber, Joseph K. Scott, Neel D. Rangnekar, Bennett D. Marshall, Wenjun Li, J. R. Johnson, Nicholas C. Bruno, M. G. Finn, Rampi Ramprasad & Ryan P. Lively, Nat. Commun., 2023. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-023-40257-2 Solvent and thermally stable polymeric membranes for liquid molecular separations: Recent advances, challenges, and perspectives Sandra L. Aristizabal, Ryan P. Lively, Suzana P. Nunes, J. Membr. Sci., 2023. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.memsci.2023.121972 Kinetic model describing self-limiting CO2 diffusion in supported amine adsorbents Anthony Vallace, Yi Ren, Christopher W. Jones, Ryan P. Lively, Chem. Eng. J., 2023. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cej.2023.144838 Thermodynamic Evidence for Type II Porous Liquids Isaiah Borne, Kartik Saigal, Christopher W. Jones, and Ryan P. Lively, Ind. Eng. Chem. Res., 2023. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.iecr.3c01201 Evaluation of the Permeation of Syngas and Its Components through a Synthesized Matrimid Asymmetric Hollow-Fiber Membrane Diana C. Calvo, Hye Youn Jang, Yi Ren, Omar Arafa, Ryan P. Lively, Bruce E. Rittmann, and Cesar I. Torres, Environ. Sci. Technol. Lett., 2023. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.estlett.3c00346