August 9, 2021

A pulsed laser beam (green) strikes a solid immersed in liquid, triggering a sequence of events that create uniform nanoparticles with controlled properties. (Illustration courtesy of Astrid Müller)

Dear members of the Hajim School community,

When COVID-19 created down time for her research lab last year, Astrid Müller, assistant professor of chemical engineering, asked three of her PhD students —Ryland Forsythe, Connor Cox, and Madeleine Wilsey–to do a thorough literature search for information about the pulsed lasers in liquids technique the students will be using in her lab.

They reviewed nearly 600 previous papers, resulting in the lab’s own paper in Chemistry Reviews. This is the most comprehensive, up-to-date survey of the technology, and it has been getting lots of attention–more than 2,500 downloads since its publication on June 2! Here’s why:

Directing a pulsed laser at a solid material immersed in liquid creates nanoparticles with remarkably uniform properties that can be easily fine-tuned by adjusting the laser pulses and the chemical compositions of the solid and surrounding fluid. Whole arrays of these carefully tuned nanoparticles can be prepared in a week, and then compared and tested for use as catalysts–far more quickly than would be required with traditional wet lab techniques.

Chemical catalysts are the change agents behind the production of just about everything we use in our daily lives. So a technology that can speed up the process of finding catalysts and new applications is of crucial importance–especially in addressing pressing challenges in sustainability and green energy, which is a focus of the Müller lab. Well done, Astrid, Ryland, Connor, and Madeleine! A video and more information can be found here.

STUDIO X

Our University’s much anticipated Studio X is nearing completion, thanks to a generous gift from Evans Lam ’83, ‘84S (MBA) and his wife Susanna, which kick-started a fund-raising campaign.  Nearly 100 donors have given so far, Matt Cook writes in a background story for Tower Talk. Construction is currently on pace to be completed by the start of the Fall semester with plans for a “soft opening” during Meliora 2021 and a formal opening and dedication when the space assumes its formal name in Spring 2022.

This is going to be a great place for students and faculty to engage in immersive technologies. To contribute to the Evans Lam Challenge or otherwise support Studio X, contact Pamela Jackson, senior director of advancement for the River Campus Libraries at pamela.jackson@rochester.edu. For more information on Studio X, contact director Emily Sherwood at esherwood@library.rochester.edu.

RESEARCH AWARDS

Nick Vamivakas, professor of quantum optics and quantum physics and AS&E dean of graduate education and postdoctoral affairs, is part of an exciting multidisciplinary collaboration. The team has received a grant of $1.95 million over three years as part of a $73 million initiative, funded by the US Department of Energy, to advance quantum science and technology.

The project, headed by Todd Krauss, chair of the Department of Chemistry, is focused on light-matter interfaces. The goal is more robust quantum states that could yield exponentially faster computers, extremely responsive chemical or biological sensors, as well as more secure communication systems.

Pengfei Huo, assistant professor of chemistry, and Steven Cundiff, professor of physics at the University of Michigan, are also part of the team. This is exactly the kind of multidisciplinary collaboration we need in order to advance an area of research important to our University. Read more.

Paul Mitchell, PhD student in the Auditory Neuroscience Lab of Laurel Carney, the Marylou Ingram Professor of Biomedical Engineering, has received a Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Award individual fellowship–totaling $92,000 over two years–from the National Institutes of Health. He will study “The Impact of Sensitivity to Fast Spectrotemporal Chirps on Speech Encoding in the Mammalian Inferior Colliculus.” His goal is to provide new information about one of the many complex features of human speech.

This is important because understanding speech in background noise continues to be a major problem for a growing number of people who experience hearing loss because of age or exposure to dangerous noise levels. It is of paramount importance to learn all we can about the multitude of complex sound features associated with speech, including fast spectrotemporal chirps. Recent studies have shown that the inferior colliculus–a part of the midbrain that serves as a main auditory center in mammals–has a particular sensitivity to the direction and velocity of these chirps, which are found in speech sounds such as vowels.

The goals of Paul’s proposal are to:

• more precisely define the sensitivity in the mammalian central auditory system to fast chirps using physiological experiments,
• design a computational model of the inferior colliculus that accurately reflects chirp sensitivity, and
• assess the extent to which chirp sensitivity plays a role in human speech coding.

“This research has public health implications because its findings may represent an additional cue used for speech coding that may factor into the development of next-generation hearing aids,” Paul says. Learn more here.  Also, Paul describes his research in this video.

HACKATHON

Here’s an opportunity for undergraduates, graduate students, and postdocs to test their ability to make predictions from high dimensional biomedical data. The University of Rochester Biomedical Data Science Hackathon, to be held online Aug. 17-22, invites University students and trainees at any skill level to work individually or in teams of up to four people. Prizes will be given for better than random predictions, and cash prizes will be awarded for first and second place. Register here by noon next Monday, Aug. 16. Questions can be directed to: andrew_mcdavid@urmc.rochester.edu,
matthew_mccall@urmc.rochester.edu, or alarracu@bio.rochester.edu.

This event is sponsored by the Goergen Institute for Data Science Working Group in Life Sciences and Biomedical Data Science and by the National Science Foundation.

Have a great week!

Your dean,
Wendi Heinzelman