News Items Archives
Nick Kotov and his group have won a NASA Nanotech Briefs Nano 50 Award for their work on Ultrastrong Layered Polymer Nanocomposites. Nanotech Briefs is a digital newsletter on nanotechnology. Nick received the award for the group at a ceremony in November. (2008)
Suljo Linic is a recipient of the 2008 DuPont Young Professor award. Initiated in 1968, the DuPont award provides research support for three years. The award is awarded annually to 10–15 investigators worldwide, across multiple scientific disciplines. (2008)
Sharon Glotzer will receive the 2008 Charles M. A. Stine Award from the American Institute of Chemical Engineers for her work in pioneering simulations of glass-forming liquids and self-assembled nanomaterials, and for her leadership and service to the materials community.(2008)
Dr. Levi Thompson is engrossed in one of the most socially important realms of engineering: finding ways to generate clean energy and reduce polluting emissions from autos and other products. He's a leader in the development of hydrogen fuel cell technology. And his work in catalysis could lead to solutions for our most pressing problems—energy, health care, and water. (2008)
Read the full story in Michigan Today.
(Image: Chemical Engineering professor Levi Thompson pictured with a microfuel cell.)
A computer simulation performed by Aaron Keys and Dr. Sharon Glotzer has given new insights into how this unique class of solids forms. Quasicrystals incorporate clusters of atoms as they are, without rearranging them as regular crystals do. Crystals form when liquids freeze into solids. (2007)
The research findings were published in the December 6, 2007 of Physical Review Letters.
Their research is featured in the January 15 issue of Langmuir.
Nick Kotov, graduate student Paul Podsiadlo, and other U-M researchers created a composite plastic that’s as strong as steel but lighter and transparent. It’s made of layers of clay nanosheets and a water-soluble polymer that shares chemistry with white glue. Kotov and his collaborators are authors of a paper on this composite material published in the October 5, 2007 edition of Science. (2007)
Read full story from U-M News Service
UPDATE: This discovery made the list of Wired magazine's Top 10 Scientific Breakthroughs for 2007
The Department of Chemical Engineering is proud to announce that Professor H. Scott Fogler was elected the national president of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE). Scott will serve as president-elect from January 1, 2008 - December 31, 2008, and as president, January 1, 2009 - December 31, 2009. We know he will continue to be proactive to move AIChE forward. (2007)
Results of work done by chemical engineering graduate student Weixian Shi and his advisor, Ron Larson were published in the June 2007 issue of Biochemical and Biophysical Research Communications. Mr. Shi and Dr. Larson found that using atomic force microscopy (AFM), allowed them to discover RecA-single-stranded DNA (RecA-ssDNA) filaments, in the presence of single-stranded DNA-binding (SSB) protein, mostly organized into left-handed bundles. This finding differs from the previously reported disordered aggregates formed when SSB is excluded from the reaction. In addition, they observed both left-and right-handedness on bundles of two filaments." (2007)
Suljo Linic has been selected to receive this year's departmental excellence award for outstanding research, service, and teaching. He will be honored at the 2008 College Dinner Dance. Congratulations Professor Linic! (2007)
Recent advances in nano-biotechnology are leading to the design of functional probes that are able to self-orient relative to a cell surface, thereby encoding-and ultimately revealing-useful biological information. Many methods have been reported on the fabrication of anisotropic particles, such as Janus particles--two-sided particles with different material compositions in each side. Jeorg Lahann and two researchers from his group, Mutsumi Yoshida and Kyung-Ho Roh, have pursued an alternative route toward the design and synthesis of polymer-based nanoparticles with two or multiple distinct phases, using electrified co-jetting. (2007)
The team's findings are the cover article the the May 8 issue of Langmuir.
Ralph T. Yang has been selected to receive a 2006-2007 University of Michigan Distinguished Faculty Achievement Award. The award honors senior faculty who have consistently demonstrated outstanding achievements in the areas of scholarly research and/or creative endeavors, teaching and mentoring of students and junior faculty, service and a variety of other activities which have brought distinction to themselves and to the University. (2007)
Sharon C. Glotzer has been selected to receive a 2006-2007 Faculty Recognition Award from the University of Michigan. The award is intended for faculty in the earlier phase of their careers who have demonstrated sub-stantive contributions to the University through significant achievements in scholarly research and/or creative endeavors; excellence as a teacher, advisor and mentor; and distinguished participation in the service activities of the University. (2007)
A surprising discovery at the University of Michigan about how nanoparticles self-assemble into structures that resemble viruses gives scientists key insight into how common disease producing viruses might form in our bodies. This new understanding brings researchers closer to making synthetic virus-like particles in the lab that could be used to help stop viruses from replicating, or could be used as stealth viruses to deliver drugs.
Using computer simulations, chemical engineering PhD student Ting Chen, research associate Zhenli Zhang, and Professor Sharon Glotzer self-assembled tiny particles into precise, convex shapes. (2007)
The team's findings are published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science.
("A precise packing sequence for self-assembled convex structures," Chen, et al, PNAS, January 16, 2007, 104, 3, pp. 717-722.)
Professor Phillip Savage received a College of Engineering Education Excellence Award in recognition of his outstanding classroom teaching, his work with undergraduate students in research, his excellent graduate mentoring, his integration of research into classroom teaching, and his service related to education.(2007)
Polymers, large molecules comprised of chains of repeating structures, are used in everything from the coatings on walls of ships and pipes to reduce flow drag to gene therapy. (Image courtesy of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences) But long polymer chains are subject to breakage, called scission, and a new study conducted by Michael Solomon, Steven Ceccio, from the Department of Mechanical Engineering and Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering, and former ChE doctoral student, Siva Vanapalli, shows that as it turns out, much of what scientists previously thought about why polymers break when subjected to strong flows, such as waves crashing against a ship's bow, was wrong. (2006)
Their research results appeared in a recent issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. (From U-M News Service)
"Universal scaling for polymer chain scission in turbulence," Vanapalli, S. A. , S. L. Ceccio, and M. J. Solomon, PNAS 2006 103: 16617-16618.
How to direct and control the self-assembly of nanoparticles is a fundamental question in nanotechnology. Sharon Glotzer and Nicholas Kotov have discovered a way to make nanocrystals in a fluid spontaneously assemble into free-floating sheets the same way some protein structures form in living organisms.
A paper on the findings co-authored by Kotov, Glotzer, and their students and postdoctoral researchers, will appear in the journal Science, on Oct. 13. (2006)
>>Read full article by Laura Bailey at U–M News Service
Joerg Lahann and his graduate student, David Peng, are developing a device to test breath for the presence of metabolites associated with breast cancer. The cornerstone of the device, and what makes it possible, is the switchable surface technology first developed in Lahann’s lab while a post doctoral student at MIT. (2006)
>> Read entire U-M News Service story
Also, see the Lahann Group web page for up-to-date information about their research