Research

Associated Faculty: Anseth, Bowman, Bryant, Cha, Goodwin, Kaar, Randolph, Schwartz, Shirts, Stansbury

• Materials that improve biocompatibility and functional performance.
• Polymers for drug delivery, in vivo imaging, and tissue engineering.
• Directing tissue growth for regenerating cartilage and cardiac muscle.
• Novel dental restorative materials.
• Engineering proteins for biomaterials and imaging applications.
• Dynamics of biomolecules at biomaterial interfaces.

Associated Faculty: Bowman, Cha, Chatterjee, Goodwin, Nagpal, Schwartz, Shields, Whitehead

• Novel protein nanosensors for in vitro and in vivo detection
• Smart colloids that sense and react to their surroundings.
• Biomolecule detection using liquid crystals, polymerization, or photonics.

Associated Faculty: Chatterjee, Fox, Goodwin, Kaar, Randolph, Schwartz, Shields, Shirts, Whitehead

• Sustainable biorefining of fuels, commodity chemicals, and pharmaceuticals.
• Stabilization and formulation of therapeutic proteins and vaccines.
• Improving bioreactor performance.
• Novel antimicrobials.
• Computational studies of biomolecules.

Associated Faculty: Cha, Gin, Holewinski, Medlin, Musgrave, Schwartz, Weimer

• Improved chemical reactions for renewable and sustainable energy.
• Novel biomimetic heterogeneous catalysts.
• New catalysis using atomic layer deposition (ALD).
• Enzymatic catalysis in novel solvent environments.

Associated Faculty: Chatterjee, Davis, Heinz, Hrenya, Medlin, Musgrave, Shirts

• Mathematical modeling of cellular processes for biomedical applications.
• Dynamics and interactions of particles or droplets.
• Multiscale modeling of polymers, nanomaterials, and biomolecules.
• Simulating materials for catalysis, microelectronics, data storage and biomaterials.
• Quantum simulations to discover and design molecules for the conversion and storage of energy.

Associated Faculty: Cha, Chatterjee, Davis, Fox, Gin, Goodwin, Heinz, Holewinski, Hrenya, McGehee, Medlin, Musgrave, Nagpal, Noble, Schwartz, Weimer

• Genome-engineering to improve cellulosic biofuels production.
• Designing new catalysts for selective conversions in renewable and sustainable energy applications.
• Utilizing enzymes in ionic liquids to convert biomass to biofuels.
• Quantum simulations to design molecules for the conversion and storage of energy.
• Thin film materials and membranes to obtain high-purity hydrogen for fuel cells.
• Design of solar cells and solar-thermal chemical reactors/receivers to produce high purity hydrogen.

Associated Faculty: Davis, Hrenya, Shields, Weimer

• Characterizing flow behavior of particulate matter including granular flows, gas-particle fluidization, and aerosol dynamics.
• Microphysical studies of fundamental interactions.
• Macrophysical studies of suspensions, sedimentation, filtration, aggregation, coalescence, flotation, and phase separation.

Associated Faculty: Bowman, Cha, Gin, Goodwin, Heinz, Kaar, Medlin, Musgrave, Nagpal, Randolph, Schwartz, Shields, White

• Directing proteins and polymer surfaces at interfaces to develop novel functional biomaterials.
• Improving reactions at solid surfaces for energy applications.
• Smart colloids that sense and react to their surroundings.
• Directed self-assembly of polymeric films into useful, device-oriented structures.
• Effects of chemical stimuli and external forces on interfacial organization.

Associated Faculty: Davis, Gin, Noble

• Inorganic membranes such as zeolites for gas and liquid separations.
• Molecular layer deposition (MLD) for membrane preparation.
• Room-temperature ionic liquids-based materials and films.
• Electric or light energy for increased selectivity in micro-scale devices.
• Polymer membranes.

Associated Faculty: Bowman, Cha, Gin, Goodwin, Heinz, Holewinski, Medlin, Musgrave, Nagpal, Schwartz, Shields, Weimer, White

• Nanoparticle thin film device fabrication and modeling.
• New room-temperature ionic liquids-based materials and polyelectrolyte architectures.
• Synthesizing well-defined organic-inorganic systems from nanoscale building blocks.
• Improved microfluidic devices using photopolymerizations.
• Designing and fabricating nanostructured materials using top-down and bottom-up techniques.

Associated Faculty: Anseth, Bowman, Bryant, Gin, Goodwin, Heinz, Musgrave, Randolph, Shields, Stansbury, White

• Novel monomers and photopolymerization mechanisms.
• Dental restorative materials with minimal shrinkage.
• Polymers for drug delivery, in vivo imaging, tissue engineering, labs-on-a-chip, adhesives, coatings, lithography, microelectronics, and LCDs.
• Computer simulations to study material behavior.

Associated Faculty: Chatterjee, Fox, Kaar, Randolph, Whitehead

• Genome-engineering for biofuels, pharmaceutical, and gene therapy applications.
• Rationalizing relationships between genome structure and function.
• Synthesizing protein-containing structures.
• Therapeutic protein stability, degradation, and contamination studies.
• Modular synthetic genetic devices that can achieve higher-order biological computation.