9/16/2025 Taylor Parks
Written by Taylor Parks
This past summer, MechSE Associate Professor Craig Bradshaw hosted the 9th annual International Refrigeration and Compressor Course (IRCC). The course was supported by the Air Conditioning and Refrigeration Center, for which Bradshaw is the Executive Director. This was the first time the course came to Illinois.
The IRCC is a collaboration among Illinois, Purdue University, TU Dresden, and Hochschule Karlsruhe (HKA). The latter two universities are based in eastern and western Germany, respectively.
The IRCC first started in 2016 when Purdue’s Eckhard Groll, Reilly Distinguished Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Florence E. Perry Head of Mechanical Engineering, and senior research associate Dr. Orkan Kurtulus connected with Drs. Ullrich Hesse and Christiane Thomas of TU Dresden. Groll and Hesse had known each other as PhD students in Germany.
“They thought, wouldn’t it be nice if there was a way to encourage international exposure for students that was centered around their studies in refrigeration and compressor technology,” Bradshaw said. “They devised this course with an emphasis on exposing students to ways that different cultures design and solve problems.”
The IRCC later expanded to include two additional universities—HKA and Oklahoma State University, where Bradshaw was faculty at the time. Groll had been Bradshaw’s PhD advisor.
“They approached me to see if I could find a way to participate,” Bradshaw recalled. “I did everything I could to find funding and add more students into the mix.”
With four universities, the course accommodates one instructor and five students from each. It includes two residential weeks, one in Germany in May and the second in August in the U.S.
During the first residential week, participants visit both TU Dresden and HKA as well as go on excursions in those areas. As part of that week, which includes lectures and lab practica, students are organized into German-American pairs and assigned a design project to work on throughout the summer.
“They’re given a somewhat challenging task—for example, to design an ice-skating rink in Dubai using ammonia for refrigerant,” Bradshaw said. “We give them some broad constraints and require them to lay out a system, select components, and justify their choices.”
The students then reconvene in person and submit their project deliverables during the second residential week.
Bradshaw’s first year working with the IRCC was 2020—when there was no travel due to COVID-19. OSU later hosted the U.S. residential portion in 2022, with Purdue hosting it over the next two summers. When Bradshaw transferred to Illinois, the program moved as well—allowing students, for the first time, to visit two universities during the same week.
“We met on Sunday and did a social event in West Lafayette, and then were at Purdue Monday and Tuesday, doing lectures and lab tours,” Bradshaw said. “On Wednesday, we drove to visit Creative Thermal Solutions in Urbana, which was our industry excursion for the week, and then did a campus tour [with MechSE’s Chief Academic Advisor Samridh Singh]. Thursday and Friday, we did lab tours and lectures here, and the students gave their final presentations.”
To cap off another successful IRCC, the students got to celebrate with a taste of local culture.
“Everyone went to Riggs on Friday night to celebrate the end of the course, and we handed the students their grades over a beer,” Bradshaw said.
Bradshaw looks forward to future cohorts immersing in the IRCC’s unique intercultural experience.
“I often tell students that they don’t have to go to Germany to learn refrigeration,” Bradshaw said. “But what they gain from this that they would not otherwise is a different perspective on how refrigeration and compressor technology is viewed, and how it’s taught differently from their classes.”