Engineering

Rice scientists use blood test to track gene expression in the brain

Rice-engineered synthetic serum marker can track gene expression in the brain noninvasively, using blood tests.

Rice bioengineering curriculum cultivates human-centered approach to medical design

A five-year grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) will support the development of an innovative undergraduate bioengineering curriculum component intended to cultivate inclusive design principles for Rice students contemplating a career as medical practitioners or medical technology innovators.

’Tis the season of giving . . . and engineering

The holiday season kicked off early this year for a Rice staff member who received a welcome and much-needed gift from a team of freshman engineering students.

For this emergent class of materials, ‘solutions are the problem’

Rice materials scientists developed a fast, low-cost, scalable method to make covalent organic frameworks (COFs), a class of crystalline polymers whose tunable molecular structure, large surface area and porosity could be useful in energy applications, semiconductor devices, sensors, filtration systems and drug delivery.

Electronic pathways may enhance collective atomic vibrations’ magnetism

A new study from Rice’s RAMBO laboratory and collaborators suggests the magnetism of phonons, collective atomic vibrations, is enhanced by electronic pathways.

Rice-Hamburg U. of Technology launch research collaboration

Rice chemical engineer Walter Chapman is spearheading a collaboration with the Hamburg University of Technology’s SMART Reactors Collaborative Research Center, which aims to develop solutions in support of a transition from fossil fuel to renewables-based economic and production chains through innovative reactor design and development.

Chance twists ordered carbon nanotubes into ‘tornado films’

Rice scientists in the lab of Junichiro Kono have developed two new methods to create ordered carbon nanotube films with either a left- or right-handed chiral pattern.

Rice faculty among 2023 PATHS-UP Seed Fund award winners

Spurred by the first Digital Health Workshop held at Rice in August, 10 clinician-engineering teams have been selected as PATHS-UP Seed Fund award winners for projects that explore promising new directions for advancing digital health solutions with several Rice faculty members among awardees.

Rice to host National Society of Black Engineers’ Fresh Start event

Rice University will host the National Society of Black Engineers Houston Professional Chapter’s Fresh Start event this week, expecting a record number of participants. The Dec. 9 event at Rice’s Ley Student Center aims to engage third- through 12th-grade students in interactive workshops that creatively explore the various disciplines in the field of engineering.

More than 700 Rice Owls graduate Dec. 5

Amid a sea of academic regalia, undergraduate, graduate and doctoral Owls concluded the latest chapter of their respective life stories and embarked on the next at the 2023 Rice University December commencement ceremony in Tudor Fieldhouse Dec. 5.

Rice engineers tackle hard-to-map class of materials

Rice materials scientist Yimo Han and collaborators mapped the structural features of a 2D ferroelectric material made of tin and selenium atoms using a new technique that can be applied to other 2D van der Waals ferroelectrics, unlocking their potential for use in electronics and other applications.

Rice’s Pedro Alvarez wins Chinese Chemical Society’s Outstanding Achievement Award

Pedro Alvarez, the George R. Brown Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Rice, received an Outstanding Achievement Award from the Chinese Chemical Society for his “long-term systematic contributions in basic research and technology development in the field of environmental chemistry.”

Kavli Exploration Award backs Rice-led sustainable carbon materials research

An international team of scientists led by Rice’s Matteo Pasquali has won a $4.1 million grant to optimize carbon nanotube synthesis. The award is a joint effort by The Kavli Foundation, with a $1.9 million Exploration Award in Nanoscience for Sustainability, and Rice’s Carbon Hub, which contributed an additional $2.2 million.

Rice receives $2.5M grant to support inclusive STEM education

The Howard Hughes Medical Institute awarded Rice University with $2.5 million spanning over five years as part of its Driving Change initiative designed to connect research universities that are working to build inclusive learning environments for students in science, technology, engineering and mathematics. 

Grant backs research on teaching networks to make better decisions

Rice’s Santiago Segarra and Ashutosh Sabharwal have won a grant from the DEVCOM Army Research Laboratory to develop a machine learning framework that improves military communication networks’ decision-making processes. The research could also help inform applications such as self-driving vehicles and cyber intrusion detection.