News

Tobias Popp (3rd from left) with his examination committee, the professors (from left to right) D. Brüggemann, A. Weiß (OTH Amberg-Weiden), J. Sesterhenn and A. Jess (chairman).

On July 04th, 2023, Tobias Popp M.Eng. successfully defended his PhD thesis entitled "Use of an adaptive microturbine for optimized heat recovery of an Organic Rankine Cycle in off-design operation" at the Faculty of Engineering Science at the University of Bayreuth. Mr. Popp pursued his PhD thesis jointly at the University of Bayreuth and the OTH Amberg-Weiden alike, supported by the BayWiss Joint Academic Partnership “Energy”.

From 2017 to 2019, Mr. Popp worked as project coordinator in the ETZ project "Cross-border R&I Network for Energy Efficiency and Combined Heat and Power (CHP)" at the Competence Center for Combined Heat and Power (CHP) of the OTH-AW. In March 2019, he assumed the position of research associate in the research project "TurboSmart - adaptive micro-expansion turbine for energy recovery", which was funded by the Bavarian Research Foundation. Within the framework of TurboSmart, Mr. Popp carried out extensive theoretical investigations and simulations as a CHP staff member, which he then continued in the second half of the project term as a staff member of the Department of Engineering Thermodynamics and Transport Processes at the Center of Energy Technology of the University of Bayreuth with its ORC test plant. The TurboSmart test turbine was developed, designed, built and also co-financed as an industrial project partner by DEPRAG SCHULZ GMBH u. Co. The TurboSmart project was successfully completed in February 2022. Mr. Popp submitted his PhD thesis to the Faculty of Engineering Science at the University of Bayreuth and has been working as a thermotechnology project manager at the company AGO GmbH Energie + Anlagen in Kulmbach in the development of industrial heat pumps since April 2022. We congratulate Tobias Popp and wish him all the best for the future!