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‘VINSE Faculty News’

VINSE recognizes faculty accomplishments in annual fall faculty celebration

Sep. 15, 2021—Join in welcoming new members of our community, recognizing the accomplishments of our community, and celebrating faculty promotions. WELCOME Michael J. Valenti & Christina L. McGahan FACULTY PROMOTIONS We celebrate the recent promotions of the following faculty: Endowed Chairs Craig L. Duvall – named Cornelius Vanderbilt Chair Joshua D. Caldwell – named Flowers Family Chancellor...

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Congratulations to Justus Ndukaife & John Wilson who received a Chancellor’s Award for Research at the 2021 Fall Faculty Assembly

Aug. 30, 2021—Chancellor Daniel Diermeier, Provost and Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs Cybele Raver and Faculty Senate Chair Mark Magnuson, Louise B. McGavock Professor of Molecular Physiology and Biophysics, presented awards to 13 faculty members during the Fall Faculty Assembly on Aug. 26. The awards recognize teaching, research, service and commitment to diversity, and recipients are honored...

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Team wins competitive DOE award to advance isotope production critical for U.S. science, medicine and industry

Aug. 13, 2021—A U.S. Department of Energy $4 million initiative to advance research in isotope production includes a Vanderbilt engineering professor’s work on separation technologies and to scale up processes. The funding is part of a key federal program that produces critical isotopes otherwise unavailable or in short supply for U.S. science, medicine and industry. Piran Kidambi,...

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Lin recipient of the inaugural round of The Office of the Provost Seeding Success Grant program

Jul. 15, 2021—Congratulations to VINSE member Dr. Shihong Lin one of 15 recipients of the inaugural round of The Office of the Provost Seeding Success Grant program for his project on “Single-layer and Conductive Graphene Membrane for Electro-regulated Selective Solute Separation”.

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Engineers’ groundbreaking discovery points to a new route to create thermal superconductors

Apr. 29, 2021—The relentless increase in heat loads imposed on devices in modern technologies is driving renewed interest among engineers and materials scientists in the area of heat transfer. A key challenge is finding approaches to enhance the materials’ capability of conducting heat. Deyu Li A team of engineers led by Vanderbilt mechanical engineering Professor Deyu Li...

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Research Snapshot: New microscopy technique unveils feature that can shape applications of a class of quantum materials

Apr. 23, 2021—A team of researchers led by Oak Ridge National Laboratory microscopist Miaofang Chi and Vanderbilt theoretical physicist Sokrates Pantelides has used a new Scanning Transmission Electron Microscope technique to image the electron distribution in ionic compounds known as electrides— especially the electrons that float loosely within pockets and appear separate from the atomic network. Miaofang Chi; Sokrates Pantelides (Vanderbilt...

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A drop of rubbing alcohol and office laminator provides manufacturability boost for single atom thick membranes

Mar. 31, 2021—Vanderbilt engineers used  a drop of rubbing alcohol, an office laminator and creativity to develop scalable processes for manufacturing single atom thin membranes. Their membranes outperformed state-of-the-art commercial dialysis membranes and the approach is fully compatible with roll-to-roll manufacturing. Details of the imaginative experiment are recently published in the journal of the Royal Chemistry Society: “Scalable Synthesis...

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Photonics discovery portends dramatic efficiencies in silicon chips

Mar. 24, 2021—Researchers devised a hybrid, hyperbolic-silicon photonic waveguide platform that transmits mid-IR and near-IR light at the same time, on the same chip, demonstrating dual-band optical processing.  Illustration: Caldwell Lab A team led by Vanderbilt engineers has achieved the ability to transmit two different types of optical signals across a single chip at the same time. The...

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Leon Bellan among five engineering faculty recognized with innovative teaching awards

Mar. 17, 2021—The extraordinary, creative efforts of five engineering faculty members to adapt to their new teaching environments in Fall 2020 were recognized recently with a Teaching Innovation Award from Philippe Fauchet, Bruce and Bridgitt Evans Dean of Engineering. The honorees quickly converted their in-person classes to online formats due to the COVID-19 pandemic and made innovative,...

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