July 12, 2021

Hristijan Stojkovic ’22, an optical engineering major, worked last semester at HARDER.digital GmbH as an optical design engineer.

Dear members of the Hajim School community,

Congratulations to Hristijan Stojkovic ’22 of optical engineering, this month’s outstanding student, who recently received a 2021 Optics and Photonics Education Scholarship from SPIE, the international society for optics and photonics. Hristijan, who grew up in an orphanage in Serbia, attended United World College in Costa Rica before coming to Rochester. He is grateful for the mentoring he has received along the way.  Hristijan has certainly made the most of his opportunities to do research and get industry experience. He worked last year in Adam Sefkow’s research center at the Laboratory for Laser Energetics, was employed last semester at HARDER.digital GmbH, and this summer is a DAAD-Rise scholar studying an ultra-cold atom (Bose-Einstein Condensate) machine with a research team at Humboldt University of Berlin. His dream is to return to Serbia to start his own optics company and eventually create a school of optics there. Read more.

RESEARCH NEWS

Here’s some exciting research being done by Michael Giacomelli, assistant professor of biomedical engineering:

Nonmelanoma skin cancers (NMSC), though less lethal than melanomas, are far more prevalent, resulting in 5 million biopsies and 1.5 million surgical procedures each year in the US. Moreover, diagnosis and treatment can be overly time consuming, costly, and less accessible in some areas. For example, during the Mohs (microscopically controlled) surgery used in many cases, removed tissue must first be frozen to confirm the cancer was entirely removed, greatly increasing the time and cost of the procedure.

Michael will address these issues with support of a National Institutes of Health R37 grant. These prestigious grants provide long-term support to investigators whose “research competence and productivity are distinctly superior and who are highly likely to continue to perform in an outstanding manner.”

The grant, if renewed for a full five years, would provide up to $1.6 million to fund Michael’s efforts to enhance two-photon fluorescence microscopy (TPFM) as an alternative imaging system that would allow clinicians to see in real time whether the margins of removed NMSC tissue are “clean.” This would eliminate the need to send tissue off to be frozen first. Michael will incorporate recent advances in detector and laser technology to reduce cost, shrink size, and enhance the contrast in existing TPFM technology to make it compatible. He will also test whether TPFM could be used in diagnosing and treating a less common skin cancer for which no intra-operative imaging is currently practical. Well done, Michael!

DEADLINE EXTENDED

The deadline has been extended to this Thursday, July 15, for undergraduates to apply online for a new virtual summer workshop program in the science of extreme pressure and high energy density physics, offered through the Center for Matter at Atomic Pressures. Top applicants will earn a stipend upon successful completion of the program. There is no fee to apply or attend. Questions? Contact Natalie Antal, CMAP program administrator.

ALL THINGS HAJIM

If you haven’t done so already, please join me on the Meliora Collective in a new way to engage with our Hajim community. Our new group page – the Hajim Community Network – will support and promote connections and discussion among alumni, current students, faculty, staff, parents, and friends, all while encouraging critical thinking, creativity, ethics, and leadership.

Have great week!

Your dean,
Wendi Heinzelman