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Spotlight Publications Category

“Utilizing Toray Paper as a Metal-Free, High Surface Area Electrode for Photosystem I-Driven Mediated Electron Transfer” published in Energy Technology, selected as VINSE Spotlight Publication

May. 2, 2023—Christopher Stachurski is a 2021 PhD graduate from the Department of Chemistry under the direction of Drs. David Cliffel and Kane Jennings. He is current an Assistant Research Professor at the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, MD working with Drs. Paul Trulove and David Durkin on using ionic liquids to modify biopolymers such as...

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“Photooxidative Polymerization of Pyrrole from Photosystem I Proteins” published in ACS Applied Polymer Materials, selected as VINSE Spotlight Publication

Apr. 10, 2023—Joshua Passantino is a 2022 PhD graduate from the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering under the direction of Drs. Kane Jennings and David Cliffel. He is currently the Lead Electrochemist at Nth Cycle, an electrochemically focused green metals processing technology company based in Boston, Ma. His research at Vanderbilt was focused on exploring the...

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“Compound Meta-Optics for Complete and Loss-Less Field Control” published in ACS Nano, selected as VINSE Spotlight Publication

Mar. 22, 2023—Hanyu Zheng is a fifth-year Ph.D. student in Dr. Jason Valentine’s group majoring in Electrical and Computer Engineering. His research focuses on metasurface-based devices with applications in spatial light modulation and imaging processing. Hanyu’s recent publication in ACS Nano introduced a novel method based on compound meta-optics for complete and lossless spatial light modulation. Metasurface...

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“Engineering Electromagnetic Field Distribution and Resonance Quality Factor Using Slotted Quasi-BIC Metasurfaces” published in Nano Letters, selected as VINSE Spotlight Publication

Mar. 9, 2023—Sen Yang is a fifth-year graduate student pursuing a Ph.D. in Interdisciplinary Materials Science under the direction of Dr. Justus Ndukaife. Ndukaife’s group focuses on multidisciplinary research including plasmonic and resonant dielectric nanostructures for efficient nano-optical trapping, manipulation, enhanced spectroscopy, and sensing of nanoscale objects. Sen’s recent publication in Nano Letters demonstrates an approach to...

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“Piezo1 Mechano-Activation Is Augmented by Resveratrol and Differs between Colorectal Cancer Cells of Primary and Metastatic Origin” published in Molecules, selected as VINSE spotlight publication

Feb. 21, 2023—Josh Greenlee is an NSF Graduate Research Fellow in the Michael King Laboratory where he has spent the last five-and-a-half years working toward his PhD. Josh’s research is focused on understanding mechanisms of metastasis and chemoresistance in colorectal cancer in order to identify weaknesses that can be exploited with targeted therapies.  Josh’s recent publication in...

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“Ultrafast X-ray imaging of the light-induced phase transition in VO2” published in Nature Physics, selected as Spotlight Publication

Jan. 30, 2023—Congratulations to Richard Haglund and Kent Hallman for their Nature Physics publication. This paper is the latest from a multi-year, multi-national (United States, Germany, Denmark, South Korea, France, United Kingdom) collaboration in which Vanderbilt’s part was the preparation and characterization (in conjunction with the Technical University-Berlin) of a challenging ultrathin holographic gold-vanadium dioxide “sandwich” on...

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“Diabetic hyperglycemia promotes primary tumor progression through glycation-induced tumor extracellular matrix stiffening” published in Science Advances selected as VINSE Spotlight Publication

Jan. 20, 2023—About the authors: Co-first author, Wenjun Wang is an NIH NCI F99/K00 Predoctoral Fellow in Biomedical Engineering advised by Prof. Cynthia Reinhart-King. Wenjun’s research focuses on the mechanism of tumor progression at the RNA, cell, and tissue levels via alteration of tissue mechanical properties. Co-first author, Dr. Lauren Hapach earned her Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering...

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“Tunable, ferroelectricity-inducing, spin-spiral magnetic ordering in monolayer FeOCl” published in Nano Letters selected as VINSE Spotlight Publication

Jan. 5, 2023—About the author: Deliang Bao is currently a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Physics and Astronomy under the direction of Dr. Sokrates T. Pantelides.  In recently published work, by employing density-functional-theory calculations, he demonstrated a non-collinear magnetism, namely spin spiral, in the monolayer FeOCl, which features tunability with uniaxial strain and electron/hole doping. The...

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“Nanoporous Atomically Thin Graphene Filters for Nanoscale Aerosols” published in ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces selected as VINSE Spotlight Publication

Dec. 13, 2022—About the author: Dr. Peifu Cheng is a research engineer in Dr. Piran R. Kidambi’s group in Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering Department. He researches 2D nanomaterials (such as graphene and others) for membrane applications in ionic/molecular separation, desalination, air filtration, dialysis, among others. In the recently published work, Dr. Cheng introduced precise nanoscale pores in...

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“Mid- to Far-Infrared Anisotropic Dielectric Function of HfS2 and HfSe2” published in Advanced Optical Materials, selected as a VINSE Spotlight Publication

Nov. 28, 2022—About the author: Ryan Kowalski is a fourth-year graduate student pursuing a PhD in Interdisciplinary Materials Science under the direction Dr. Josh Caldwell. Using infrared spectroscopy, the Caldwell group investigates the optical properties of semiconductor materials for optoelectronic devices. Ryan’s recent publication in Advanced Optical Materials characterizes the anisotropic dielectric functions of 2D van der...

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