May 6-12, 2019

Dr. Michael Keidar (MAE) is the principal investigator on a newly-awarded Air Force Office of Scientific Research grant titled “Exploring New Concepts Towards Multi-Mode Low-Power Robust Electric Propulsion.” This three-year, $360,000 project focuses on novel ideas for satellite micropropulsion.

A multidisciplinary team involving CCAS, SEAS, and the School of Nursing has been awarded a one-year, $50,000 research project from the Clinical and Translational Science Institute at Children’s National (CTSI-CN). The project is titled “Early Detection of Autism with Automated Social Cognition & Imitation Screener.” Dr. Francys Subiaul is the principal investigator, and Dr. Chung Hyuk Park (BME) is a co-investigator on the project as a technical lead. The award was made under the CTSI-CN Discovery Pilot Award Program.

Dr. Payman Dehghanian (ECE) and his doctoral student Bo Wang have published this book chapter: P. Dehghanian, B. Wang, and M. Tasdighi. “New Protection Schemes in Smarter Power Grids with Higher Penetration of Renewable Energy Systems,” in Pathways to a Smarter Power System, Elsevier Academic Press, pp. 317-342, 2019, ISBN: 978-0-081-02592-5.

Dr. Joost Santos (EMSE) has co-authored this book with his colleagues from the Philippines: R. R. Tan, K. B. Aviso, M. A. B. Promentilla, K. D. S. Yu, and J. R. Santos. Input-Output Models for Sustainable Industrial Systems: Implementation Using LINGO (Lecture Notes in Management and Industrial Engineering), 1st edition, 2019. The book is available on Amazon.

Dr. Poorvi Vora (CS) recently authored the article “How the world's largest democracy casts its ballots" for The Conversation. It discusses India's voting technology.

On April 30, Dr. Sameh Badie (CEE) delivered a 90-minute webinar to the National Academies of Science. The webinar discussed the outcomes of the recently completed research project conducted at GW and sponsored by the National Cooperative Highway Research Program (NCHRP), Research Report 895: Simplified Full Depth Precast Concrete Deck Panel Systems. The seminar covered the new advances of full depth precast concrete deck panels for highway bridges and current needs for bridge construction projects. The webinar was attended by 332 people from 219 sites from the US Department of Transportation (DOT), the Federal Highway Administration, state DOTs, consulting firms, and academia. The webinar was very well received, with 97 percent of the attendees stating they were satisfied or very satisfied. Dr. Pedro Silva (CEE) served as the webinar moderator.

Dr. Shelly Heller (CS) attended the computer-supported education conference CSEDU 2019, held May 2-4 in Crete, Greece. Her paper, “Reach to Teach: Preparing Cybersecurity Experts as Adjunct Community College Faculty,” is co-authored by Drs. Lance Hoffman (CS) and Costis Toregas (CS). The paper is the result of work done under a US Department of Defense grant.

Dr. Megan Leftwich (MAE) served as a panelist for the National Science Foundation-supported “Science of Aquaman” panel, which was held April 26 as part of Washington DC’s AwesomeCon. AwesomeCon is a local comic convention that draws more than 70,000 attendees to the Walter E. Washington Convention Center. The NSF panels at the event are devoted to explaining the real science behind science fiction and superheroes and getting the general public excited about scientific research. Dr. Leftwich, who studies the swimming techniques of sea lions for applications to the design of underwater vehicles, was invited to discuss the bio-inspired technologies that come from this study.

Dr. Joost Santos (EMSE) served as the program chair of the IEEE Systems and Information Design Symposium, held April 26 at the University of Virginia, in Charlottesville, VA. The authors and participants of this conference are students and faculty from the following institutions: Tshwane University of Technology (South Africa), United States Air Force Academy, Federal University of Jatai (Brazil), Uttara University (Bangladesh), State University of New York at Binghamton, Purdue University, James Madison University, Sweet-Briar College, Aga Khan University (Pakistan), University of Zambia (Zambia), Queen Mary University of London (Great Britain), University of Massachusetts-Lowell, University of Massachusetts-Amherst, University of Virginia, George Mason University, and GW.

BME undergraduate Christianne Chua has been named a 2019 Barry T. Goldwater Scholar, the highest national-level award for outstanding undergraduate researchers in STEM. Christianne is the only SEAS student (and one of three GW students) to receive this prestigious award. Her research is in the field of cardiac optogenetics in Dr. Emilia Entcheva’s (BME) laboratory; she was trained by and worked closely with doctoral students Julie Han and Weizhen Li.

Five EMSE student teams participated in and presented research papers at the IEEE Systems and Information Design Symposium, held April 26 at the University of Virginia, in Charlottesville VA. All of their papers will be published by the IEEE as peer-reviewed conference proceedings. Papers 1-4 below resulted from the year-long EMSE undergraduate senior design course taught by Drs. Joseph Barbera (EMSE), Thomas Mazzuchi (EMSE), and Joost Santos (EMSE).