Engineering Kudos
Thirteen Nebraska Engineering faculty named NSRI Fellows
Thirteen faculty from the College of Engineering were among the 49 researchers from across the University of Nebraska system who were selected to the 2022 National Strategic Research Institute (NSRI) Fellows cohort. They join the more than 70 NSRI fellows who were chosen to the inaugural cohort in May 2021.
The 2022 Fellows from the College of Engineering are:
- Christos Argyropoulos, Electrical and Computer Engineering
- Sina Balkir, Electrical and Computer Engineering
- Mehmet Can Vuran, School of Computing
- George Gogos, Mechanical and Materials Engineering
- Andrew Harms, Electrical and Computer Engineering
- Michael Hempel, Electrical and Computer Engineering
- Qing Hui, Electrical and Computer Engineering
- Xu Li, Civil and Environmental Engineering
- Eric Markvicka, Mechanical and Materials Engineering
- Carl Nelson, Mechanical and Materials Engineering
- Angela Pannier, Biological Systems Engineering
- Yi Qian, Electrical and Computer Engineering
- Byrav Ramamurthy, School of Computing
Durham School team wins multiple awards at AEI International Student Design Competition
A team of architectural engineering students from the Durham School of Architectural Engineering and Construction took home multiple honors at the recent Architectural Engineering Institute's International Student Design Competition held April 7 in Arlington, Texas.
Nebraska's Team Nexus finished second in Building Integration, the competition's top award, and won in Electrical. The team was also second in Mechanical and Structural competitions. Additionally, the team also was honored for Outstanding Achievement in Innovation for Building Performance Enhancement.
Advised by Clarence Waters, professor in the Durham School, the student team included:
- Isabel Anderson, Team Leader (Integration, Electrical)
- Izzy Brown (Integration, Electrical)
- Emily Ritzdorf (Integration, Electrical)
- Alec Eiseman (Integration, Electrical)
- Caleb Krouse (Integration, Structural)
- Jenna Reynard (Integration, Structural)
- Jackson Cordell (Integration, Mechanical)
- Grace Stirling (Integration, Mechanical)
- Josh Palakapilly (Integration, Mechanical)
Engineers Without Borders chapter earns two Student Impact Awards
The University of Nebraska-Lincoln chapter of Engineers Without Borders (EWB) was honored with two Student Impact Awards - the Diversity and Inclusion Award and the Student Organization Philanthropy/Service Award - at a reception April 14 at the Nebraska East Union.
EWB, a Recognized Student Organization (RSO) in the College of Engineering, was also nominated in six other categories - including Program of the Year, Outstanding Commitment to Recruitment, and Outstanding Student Organization - and individual nominations for Laurel Wagner (Outstanding Student Organization Member), Uziel Ramos (Outstanding Student Organization Officer), Isabelle Koehler (Outstanding Student Organization President).
Elizabeth "Libby" Jones, Holling Family Distinguished Engineering Educator and professor of civil and environmental engineering, is the faculty advisor for ESB.
The Student Impact Awards, presented annually by the Office of Student Affairs' Student Leadership, Involvement and Community Engagement, celebrate the outstanding contributions to the university community by the more than 550 RSOs and their leaders. This year's nominees included 19 organizations and 23 individuals.
Sarah Altman earns Goldwater Scholarship
Sarah Altman, a junior in biological systems engineering, has earned a Goldwater Scholarship to support her pursuit of a research career.
Altman is among 417 college sophomores and juniors nationally who were awarded 2022 Goldwater Scholarships from a pool of 1,242 natural science, engineering and mathematics students nominated by 433 academic institutions.
The scholarship, which honors the late Sen. Barry Goldwater was designed to foster and encourage outstanding students to pursue research careers in the natural sciences, engineering and mathematics. The scholarship provides up to $7,500 per year for educational expenses and is the pre-eminent undergraduate award of its type in these fields.
A La Vista native, Altman has conducted research through Nebraska's Undergraduate Creative Activities and Research Experiences (UCARE) program and the National Institutes of Health's INBRE Scholars program. Her work includes laboratory experiences with Nebraska Engineering's Jung Yul Lim (breast cancer metastasis) and with Shi-Hua Xiang at the Nebraska Center for Virology (treatments against RNA viruses) and Maneesh Jain at the University of Nebraska Medical Center (vaccines for pancreatic cancer).
Altman said she is excited about the opportunity to advance cancer immunotherapy.
"(The field) is so new and rapidly expanding, so I really do have an opportunity, especially with the help of the Goldwater Scholarship, to be at the forefront and work with technologies as they are being developed and improved," she said.
Altman, who is also a member of the University Honors Program, hopes to earn a doctoral degree in biomedical engineering and work in genetic engineering and biomaterials—applying that knowledge to cancer immunotherapy technologies. She said she wants to work at a university, teaching students, conducting research and perhaps patenting some technologies.
Alexis Horton earns Patti Grace Smith Fellowship in aerospace
Alexis Horton, a first-year student in mechanical and materials engineering, is one of 39 undergraduate students from colleges and universities across the United States who have been selected as recipients of the Patti Grace Smith Fellowship.
The Patti Grace Smith Fellowship is an award-winning program that connects the nation's leading aerospace companies with talented Black students. Each member of the program's Class of 2022 has earned a challenging summer internship in the aerospace field, in addition to receiving a scholarship worth thousands of dollars, a pair of personalized mentors, and more.
Horton, who is from Omaha, Nebraska, has earned a summer internship with Northrop Grumman.
Tian Zhang selected as ASCE Distinguished Member
Tian Zhang, professor of civil and environmental engineering, has been selected by the American Society of Civil Engineers as a Distinguished Member, the association's highest honor.
The ASCE website says a Distinguished Member “is a person who has attained eminence in some branch of engineering or in the arts and sciences related thereto, including the fields of engineering education and construction."
Jian Wang receives TMS MPMD Distinguished Scientist/Engineer Award
Jian Wang, professor of mechanical and materials engineering, has been selected as the recipient of the 2022 The Minerals, Metals & Materials Society (TMS) MPMD Distinguished Scientist/Engineer Award. The award was presented at the TMS 2022 Annual Meeting & Exhibition, which was held Feb. 27-March 3 in Anaheim, California.
"This is a highly prestigious award which recognizes my efforts in understanding structure-properties relations of structural materials," Wang said. "This award will continuously encourage and inspire me to conduct the cutting-edge research in the field of materials science and engineering, and serve our society."
The Distinguished Scientist/Engineer Award recognizes an individual who has made a long-lasting contribution to the design, syntheses, processing, and performance of engineering materials, with significant industrial applications.
The award citation states that Wang was selected for "Excellent contributions to revealing the defects-microstructures-properties relations of metals using multiscale theoretical, experimental, and numerical approaches, especially for interface science & engineering and deformation twinning."
MME researchers publish paper outlining printing process for liquid metal droplets
The "On Demand Programming of Liquid Metal-Composite Microstructures Through Direct Ink Write 3D Printing" is outlined in a paper co-authored Eric Markvicka, assistant professor of mechanical and materials engineering, and Aaron Haake, senior in mechanical and materials engineering and published in the March 30 edition of the journal Advanced Materials.
Working in Markvicka's Smart Materials & Robotics Lab, the team developed a process of creating soft, elastically deformable composites with liquid metal (LM) droplets that can enable new generations of soft electronics, robotics, and reconfigurable structures. These printed materials are soft, higly deformable, and can be made locally insulating or electrically conductive using a single ink by controlling process conditions.
Markvicka's team demonstrated these capabilities by embedding elongated LM droplets in a soft heat sink, which rapidly dissipates heat from high-power LEDs.
These programmable microstructures can enable new composite paradigms for emerging technologies that demand mechanical compliance with multifunctional response.
Previously, techniques to control local composite microstructure, which ultimately governs material properties and performance, were lacking. Markvicka's team developed a direct ink writing technique to program LM microstructure (i.e., shape, orientation, and connectivity) on demand through elastomer composites. This is in constrast to inks with rigid particles that have fixed shapes and sizes.
The new technique enables filaments, films and 3D structures with unique LM microstructures that are generated on demand and locked in during printing. This includes smooth and discrete transitions from spherical to needle-like droplets, curvilinear microstructures, geometrically complex embedded inclusion patterns, and connected LM pathways.
The other co-authors on the paper were Michael Bartlett, Gwyneth Schloer and Ravi Tutika from the Soft Materials and Structures Lab at Virginia Tech.
Two MME students, one alum receive NSF Graduate Research Fellowships
Aaron Haake, a senior in mechanical and materials engineering, and Mark Nail, a mechanical and materials engineering alum, were among the seven current or former University of Nebraska-Lincoln students chosen to receive National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP) awards. MME alum Cole Dempsey was chosen as one of two from UNL to receive honorable mention recognition.
Haake will graduate in May 2022 and is working in the Smart Materials & Robotics Lab with advisor Eric Markvicka, assistant professor of mechanical and materials engineering. Nail is a graduate student at the University of Michigan, and Dempsey is a graduate student at Vanderbilt University.
The GRFP awards are one of the most prestigious graduate fellowships awarded in the United States. The award provides a three-year annual stipend of $34,000 and a $12,000 cost-of-education allowance for tuition and fees that is paid to the university. Additionally, the GRFP provides opportunities for international research and professional development and the freedom to conduct their research at any accredited U.S. institution of graduate education.
The GRFP is the oldest American fellowship program that directly supports students in various STEM fields. Since 1952, a year after President Truman signed legislation establishing the NSF, the GRFP awarded its first fellowships. It has since funded more than 50,000 fellowships out of more than 500,000 applicants.
George Morcous selected as PCI Fellow
George Morcous, professor in The Durham School of Architectural Engineering and Construction, has been honored by the Precast/Prestressed Concrete Institute as a PCI Fellow. The award was presented at the annual PCI Convention, held March 1-5 in Kansas City, Missouri.
Morcous was honored for his teaching and research, which focuses on ultra-high-performance concrete, precast concrete bridge systems and connections, and large-diameter prestressing strands.
The PCI Fellow award recognizes an individual who has embraced the values of the Institute and has provided continuous outstanding contributions to the precast concrete industry. Service to the industry may be considered in the areas of education, research, design, marketing, management, or operations. This individual will have also demonstrated exceptional service to PCI.