Faculty News
Research:
Dr. Leila Farhadi (CEE) has received a one-year, $99,000 NASA grant for the project “Coupled Estimation of Evapotranspiration and Recharge from Remotely Sensed Land Surface Moisture and Temperature." Dr. Farhadi will use artificial intelligence techniques to obtain an explicit equation for evapotranspiration and recharge that can be easily comprehended and adopted by the end users (i.e., water resource managers and decision makers) to monitor and forecast regional evapotranspiration and recharge fluxes. The results of this study will facilitate the sustainable management of water resources in the Ogallala aquifer.
Dr. Roger Lang (ECE) has received a one-year $100,000 grant from NASA for the project “Modeling P&L Band Soundex Observations of the Martian Regolith.” A mission to put a satellite in orbit around Mars to sense the presence of ice/water under the Martian regolith is being considered. Dr. Lang and his students will construct an electromagnetics scattering model of the Martian regolith and underlying ice layer. They will determine at what depths an ice layer can be detected.
Dr. Danmeng Shuai (CEE) has received a two-year, $489,586 R21 grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases for the project “Vesicle-Cloaked Virus Clusters as Emerging Pathogens: Will They Challenge Current Disinfection Paradigm?” Dr. Shuai and Dr. Yun Shen (University of California, Riverside) are principal investigators for this project. Vesicle-cloaked enteric virus clusters are emerging, yet largely underexplored, environmental pathogens, and previous studies from Dr. Shuai's group have identified that these pathogens are more resistant to disinfection. The funded study will comprehensively evaluate the performance and mechanism of virus inactivation by conventional disinfectants and advance the development of new disinfectants. The research outcome of the study aims to prevent the transmission of infectious diseases and protect public health.
Dr. Pedro Silva (CEE) and project co-investigators, Dr. Samer Hamdar (CEE) and Dr. Sameh Badie (CEE), have received a three-year, $299,195 grant from the Federal Highway Administration. The primary objectives of this project, titled “Design and Detailing Guidelines for Enhanced Security and Safety of Bridges against Human-Made Hazards,” are to: 1) estimate the average daily truck traffic along a test bed site in the state of Virginia transportation system; 2) estimate the frequency and severity of heavy truck collisions and the likelihood of collisions resulting in severe damage or the collapse of bridges; 3) evaluate the resiliency of bridges against collisions resulting from heavy truck collisions; and 4) evaluate potential cascading effects resulting from these accidental non-natural multiple hazard scenarios. Results from this research will be used to develop specifications that can be used by civil engineers in assessing the vulnerability of bridges using analytical and/or experimental methods. Finally, these design tools will be validated and calibrated based on experimental data by conducting a series of physical tests of bridge columns under high impulse loads in the high bay laboratory at GW.
Publications
Dr. Andrew Cutler (MAE) collaborated with researchers at the Technical University of Darmstadt (Germany) to publish: 1) F. Zentgraf, P. Johe, M. Steinhausen, C. Hasse, M. Greifenstein, A. D. Cutler, ... and A. Dreizler, “Detailed assessment of the thermochemistry in a side-wall quenching burner by simultaneous quantitative measurement of CO2, CO and temperature using laser diagnostics,” Combustion and Flame, 111707; and 2) F. Zentgraf, P. Johe, A. D. Cutler, R. S. Barlow, B. Böhm, and A. Dreizler, “Classification of flame prehistory and quenching topology in a side-wall quenching burner at low-intensity turbulence by correlating transport effects with CO2, CO and temperature,” Combustion and Flame, 111681.
Dr. Kausik Sarkar (MAE) has published the following paper with his PhD student Abhilash Reddi Malipeddi: A. R. Malipeddy and K. Sarkar, “Shear-induced gradient diffusivity of a red blood cell suspension: effects of cell dynamics from tumbling to tank-treading,” Soft Matter, 17, 8523 - 8535.
Dr. Mona Zaghloul (ECE) and her PhD student You Zhou have published the following paper: Y. Zhou and M. Zaghloul, “Changes in Permittivity of the Piezoelectric Material PVDF as Functions of the Electrical Field and Temperature,” Materials 2021, 14(19), 5736. The article was published in the special issue Physics, Electrical and Structural Properties of Dielectric Layers.
Conferences & Presentations:
Dr. Gina Adam (ECE) gave an invited talk, titled “Manufacturability Challenges and Integration Opportunities of Oxide-based Resistive Switches,” at the E-MRS Fall meeting, Symposium L, held on September 23.
Dr. Lorena Barba (MAE) was an invited panelist for the Nature webcast “How to make your research reproducible?” The webcast streamed on September 30.
Dr. Tarek El-Ghazawi (ECE) served as general chair for ACSOS 2021: The IEEE International Conference on Autonomic Computing & Self-Organizing Systems, held September 27 – October 1. The conference was scheduled to be hosted at GW; however, it was held virtually, due to the pandemic.
On September 23, Dr. Howie Huang (ECE) and his students Ahsen Uppal and Jaeseok Choi presented their paper, “Faster Stochastic Block Partition Using Aggressive Initial Merging, Compressed Representation, and Parallelism Control,” at the IEEE High Performance Extreme Computing Conference. This work won the Champion Award for the Graph Challenge, which was held at the conference. This is the fifth award that Dr. Huang’s GraphLab has won at the Graph Challenge. Included among their previous awards are another Champion and Student Innovation Award (2018) and the Finalist and Honorable Mention (2017).
Dr. Taeyoung Lee (MAE) and his student Weixin Wang presented their paper, “Bingham-Gaussian Distribution on S^3 x R^n for Unscented Attitude Estimation,” at the IEEE Conference on Multisensor Fusion and Integration for Intelligent Systems. The conference was held September 23-25 in Karlsruhe, Germany (and online hybrid). Their paper was selected as one of 10 best papers of the conference.
Dr. Volker Sorger (ECE) will participate in the October 19 panel “AI in the Laser Industry” at the 40th Annual International Congress on Applications of Lasers and Electro-optics (ICALEO), which will be held virtually.
PhD student Wei Guo and Dr. Peng Wei (MAE) had their paper “Safety Enhancement for Deep Reinforcement Learning in Autonomous Separation Assurance” accepted to the IEEE International Conference on Intelligent Transportation Systems, which was held September 19-22. Guo traveled to Indianapolis, IN, and presented the paper at the conference.
Other News:
Dr. Michael Keidar (MAE) has been named the editor-in-chief of Springer’s newly launched Journal of Electric Propulsion. The Journal of Electric Propulsion is an international, open access, peer-reviewed journal focusing on current and emerging electric propulsion technology with wide applications to spacecraft, satellites, and probes. It aims to provide a broad forum of expertise by bringing together researchers and scientists from both academia and industry with a wide range of backgrounds in fundamental and applied aerospace science and technology. This journal is devoted to the broad and rapid dissemination of the latest advancements in the field.
Upcoming SEAS Events
GW Compass: “Navigating GW as an International Student”
Wednesday, October 6
6:00 – 7:00 pm
Panelists:
- Anabel Lopez Marill (MS, Civil Engineering, 2019) is from Cuba and is now a structural engineer at Silman
- Mohamed Abushama (MS, Electrical Engineering, 2018) is from Sudan and is now a power systems engineer at Eaton
- Ankit Raj Saxena (MS, Computer Science, 2019) is from India and is now a data scientist at Collins Aerospace
SEAS graduate student alumni will offer their advice to current international students on how to make the most of your graduate experience as an international student. Our panelists will discuss topics such as adapting to US university life and culture, tips for succeeding in your degree program, and the job search and starting your career in the US as an immigrant. This event will not be recorded, and we will offer an anonymous question portal for participants to submit questions.
EEMI Webinar: “From Vikings to Wind Turbines, Denmark’s Journey Toward Sustainability”
NEW DATE: Friday, October 15
8:00 am
The SEAS Environmental and Energy Management Institute (EEMI) will co-host a free webinar on Denmark's pioneering actions towards energy sustainability. The event will feature Dan Jørgensen, the Danish Minister of Climate, Energy, and Utilities. He will be interviewed by EEMI Visiting Scholar Ambassador András Simonyi on Denmark’s journey toward sustainability. Topics will include the European Commission’s 2021 "Fit for 55" legal framework to achieve climate goals, Denmark's pioneering role in energy transition, transatlantic climate and energy cooperation, and preparation for COP26.
BME Speaker Series: “Image-Based” Systems Biology - A New Paradigm in Cancer Research”
Speaker: Dr. Arvind Pathak, Johns Hopkins University
Wednesday, December 1
11:00 am – 12:00 pm
Lehman Auditorium (SEH, B1270)
Entrepreneurship News & Events
Hackathon: “Innovate the Future of Travel Tech - From House to Gate”
Session One (virtual): Friday, November 12 | 1:00 – 4:00 pm
Session Two (in-person): Friday, November 19 | 9:30 am – 5:45 pm (A non-mandatory reception follows, 5:45 – 7:00 pm)
Register and find more information
This two-session hackathon/design sprint is looking for solutions to improve air travelers’ assurance that they will have enough time to make their flights when starting from home, office, or anywhere. People must consider lots of travel time factors when traveling to the airport, including walking, ground transportation (bus, Metro, parking garage and walking), check-in (baggage), security clearance, and transit time to the gate. These unknowns create anxiety for passengers. This event is hosted by the GW Office of Innovation & Entrepreneurship in partnership with CirrusLabs, George Hacks, and the GW Innovation Center.
Pitch George: The annual Pitch George competition is one of GW's premier entrepreneurial initiatives organized by the GW Center for Entrepreneurial Excellence (CFEE). This “elevator pitch” competition takes place each Fall semester and allows young entrepreneurs from any GW school to present their business ideas, get valuable feedback on the viability of their business concepts, and win startup capital. The competition offers networking opportunities with entrepreneurs from the greater DC area, as well as hands-on preparation for the GW New Venture Competition.
This academic year, CFEE presents to GW’s Fall semester students, faculty, and alumni the opportunity to participate in a hybrid version of the annual “Pitch George” elevator-pitching competition. Learn more about the competition, attend a Pitch George information session, or register for the competition. Registration is due by October 23 at 11:59 pm. The competition—which consists of three rounds spread across three weeks—will be held on November 6, November 13, and November 20.
NSF I-Corps Grants for Customer Discovery and Prototype Development
The InnovateGW I-Corps Site Program, funded by the National Science Foundation, awards grants of up to $3,000 to GW students, faculty or staff members who wish to explore possible applications of their research or technology to solve problems that could lead to a broader impact in society. InnovateGW is designed to educate researchers and technologists on entrepreneurial principles and practices and to give them hands-on experience in exploring potential, real-world applications of their technologies. To be eligible for the InnovateGW I-Corps Program, you must attend one of the “Introduction to Lean Innovation” workshops that take place each month. The next workshop is scheduled for Thursday, October 14, from 7:00 to 8:30 pm. Register here to attend a workshop, and/or learn more about the I-Corps program and apply for funding.
External Events
Leadership in Our Time Webinar: “A Fireside Chat with Fiona Hill and Andras Simonyi”
Tuesday, October 19
1:15 – 2:15 pm
This event is hosted by the SEAS Environmental and Energy Institute, GW Elliott School of International Affairs, and the Security and Sustainability Forum.
RCR and Beyond
Classes meet throughout the Fall semester
Thursdays, 12:00 – 1:30 pm
Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR) @ GW and Beyond is a semester-long weekly seminar course designed to develop and strengthen ethical problem-solving skills along with cultivating sensitivity to ethical issues commonly found while conducting research. The course is open to the entire campus community, including undergraduates, graduate students, postdocs, researchers, staff and research administrators. Registration is capped at 20 participants, first come, first served. Classes are held on Thursdays, 12:00 p.m. - 1:30 p.m. throughout the semester, unless otherwise noted.