February 12, 2024

(University of Rochester Laboratory for Laser Energetics photo / Eugene Kowaluk)

Dear members of the Hajim School community,

Hajim researchers recently helped develop an important process at the Laboratory for Laser Energetics that could eventually help produce fusion reactions. In two studies published in Nature Physics, the authors discuss experiments to demonstrate an effective “spark plug” for direct-drive methods of inertial confinement fusion (ICF) and how the technique could be applied at a future facility.

Using the OMEGA laser system, they completed several successful attempts to fire 28 kilojoules of laser energy at small capsules filled with deuterium and tritium fuel, causing the capsules to implode and produce a plasma hot enough to initiate fusion reactions between the fuel nuclei. The team is excited by the prospect of applying direct-drive methods to lasers with more energy. While demonstrating a spark plug is an important step, OMEGA is too small to compress enough fuel to get to ignition.

“If you can eventually create the spark plug and compress fuel, direct drive has a lot of characteristics that are favorable for fusion energy compared to indirect drive,” says Varchas Gopalaswamy ’21 PhD (mechanical engineering), the LLE scientist who led one of the studies. “After scaling the OMEGA results to a few megajoules of laser energies, the fusion reactions are predicted to become self-sustaining, a condition called ‘burning plasmas.’”

Read more about the research at the News Center and in Science magazine.

3D-BIOPRINTING SYSTEM TO REPLICATE PLANT-BASED CHEMCIALS

(University of Rochester photo / J. Adam Fenster)

A multidisciplinary team of 10 undergraduates, including several biomedical engineering students, pioneered new technologies to more efficiently replicate useful chemicals found in plants, including those endangered by Earth’s changing climate. Calling themselves “Team RoSynth,” the students created an affordable 3D-printing system for optimizing production of in-demand, plant-derived drugs and pharmaceuticals.

In November, the team entered their research in the 2023 International Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) competition, an event in which student-led teams from around the globe compete to solve real-world problems using synthetic biology. Synthetic biology takes advantage of engineering to build biological parts inspired by nature. The Rochester team’s project was nominated for the Best Biomanufacturing Project and Best Hardware and was awarded a gold medal, making them the third most recognized team in the United States. The team competed against 402 teams from six continents.

Read and watch a video about their fascinating project.

ED LALOR IN A NEURO MINUTE

(University of Rochester photo / J. Adam Fenster)

The Del Monte Institute for Neuroscience recently highlighted one of our faculty members from the Department of Biomedical Engineering in their “In a Neuro Minute” series. Associate Professor Ed Lalor talks about his research, which aims to understand how the brain senses, perceives, and pays attention to things in the world. Watch the video.

USING DATA SCIENCE TO BETTER UNDERSTAND TOBACCO USER BEHAVIORS

An interdisciplinary team of students, faculty, and alumni are analyzing social media data to better understand public perception and use of different tobacco products as well as other substances using natural language processing techniques, cutting-edge deep-learning, and large language models.

Associate Professor Ajay Anand, deputy director of the Goergen Institute of Data Science, and his students have been collaborating with researchers at the Clinical & Translational Science Institute (CTSI) including Dongmei Li and Zidian Xie to leverage social media as a data source, particularly when it comes to individual and group perceptions.

“We have had multiple capstone projects where Dongmei Li and Zidian Xie’s team has participated as the sponsor-partner providing valuable data and a problem statement that students can work on over a semester to produce deep insights, leading to research publications in many instances,” Ajay says.

Read more about the collaboration on the CTSI blog.

EMBRACING DIGITAL INNOVATION IN HEALTHCARE

The UR Health Lab is the University of Rochester Medical Center’s digital innovation incubator, which brings together faculty and students from across the University to leverage technology to solve some of the most pressing problems facing patients and clinicians. On Tuesday, February 13, I’ll moderate a virtual panel about embracing digital innovation in healthcare featuring UR Health Lab co-directors Michael Hasselberg ’07N (MS), ’13N (PhD) and David Mitten ’88, ’92M (MD), ’97M (Res).

The event, part of the Huang Speaker Series in Technology and Innovation, takes place from noon to 1 p.m. Register on the alumni website.

INAUGURAL WOMEN IN TECH SPEAKER

I’m excited that a Hajim School alumna will be featured as a speaker at the inaugural Women & Diversity In Tech event on Thursday, February 15 from 7-8:30 p.m. in Wegmans Hall room 1400. The moderated discussion and open Q&A will feature Jennifer Allen ’97 (chemical engineering), ’10S MBA, senior engineering manager of program management at GE Renewable Energy as well as Manali Maity ’19S MBA, a technical solutions consultant at Google. Associate Professor Amy Lerner will moderate the event.

Register for the event on Handshake.

INTERNSHIP OPPORTUNITIES FOR HAJIM STUDENTS AT EXCELL

Students who are seeking internship opportunities may want to consider positions open at Excell. An affiliate of the University of Rochester, Excell is a venture capital fund that invests in seed stage, high-tech, high growth companies in the Upstate New York region. Excell typically invests in ventures developing novel solutions in medical devices, energy and industrial applications, materials, software, advanced manufacturing, and biotechnology.

Excell is currently seeking candidates for its venture analyst internship, which will train students in the processes and practices used by venture capital investors to review, price and close an investment, providing the student with hands-on practice and a set of tools to analyze ventures from the perspective of a VC investor. Analysts will complete a full investment cycle from pitch review to due-diligence, develop a term-sheet, and potentially close an investment in a startup. Interested applicants can email Maddie Barrett.

Have a great week!

Your dean,
Wendi Heinzelman