It’s not glamorous. It’s not trendy. In fact, it’s downright grubby. But the work that a Georgia Tech researcher and his students are doing is improving campus sustainability, one pound of food waste at a time. 

“I am pleased to be able to recognize all of this hard work,” said Dean Vivek Sarkar during the ceremony.

One student, two staff members, and four faculty members were nominated by their SCP peers and received awards for their achievements over the past year. 

Student Solves Real World Problems

Yibin Yang (Ph.D. CS 2025) was awarded a 2025 Dissertation Award for his thesis on zero-knowledge proofs in real-world problems. SCP Professor and Senior Associate Chair Vlad Kolesnikov advised Yang and acknowledged that Yang’s work advances the field of cryptography. 

Yang contributed to the advancement of zero-knowledge proofs and multi-party computations, while also building toolchains that are faster and more usable than existing systems. His work earned a distinguished paper award at the 2023 ACM CCS, and he also served as an RSAC Security Scholar.

Staff Lead the Way

In the staff category, Mary Helen Hayes was awarded the Outstanding Staff Leadership Award, and Gina Anderson received the Ruthie Book Outstanding Staff Team Member Award.

The Outstanding Staff Leadership Award is given to a full-time administrative staff member in recognition of an outstanding record of leadership that has resulted in a significant positive impact on the College of Computing, the Institute, or the computing community. Hayes was nominated by four faculty and staff members for this award for her steady presence in SCP since she began her role as director of research operations in 2024. 

The Ruthie Book Outstanding Staff Team Member Award is presented to a staff member in recognition of their outstanding performance in honor of Ruthie Book, who exemplified excellence in her work. Anderson was nominated by SCP faculty and staff for her outstanding leadership and mentorship.

Both received praise for their hard work from the college as well as from their supervisor, Senior Academic Officer Jan Morian. 

“I am so incredibly proud of our staff in the School of Cybersecurity and Privacy who won awards this year at the College of Computing Annual Awards ceremony,” she said.

“Mary Helen Hayes and Regina Anderson are truly outstanding staff members who exemplify Georgia Tech’s values. Their leadership has contributed substantially to the success of the school.”

Cybersecurity Faculty Net Four Awards

The College of Computing also recognized four SCP faculty members for excellence in teaching and research during the college’s annual award ceremony. 

Assistant Professor Teodora Baluta received the Junior Faculty Teaching Award for developing a new graduate-level course that brought together generative artificial intelligence (AI) security, adversarial machine learning, cryptography, and differential privacy. Her nominator, SCP Associate Professor Vassilis Zikas, said the course bridged a critical gap in a rapidly evolving area of computing. 

For his role in leading Team Atlanta to victory in the DARPA AI Cyber Challenge, Professor Taesoo Kim received the Outstanding Senior Faculty Research Award. His nominator, Regents Professor Wenke Lee, praised the team’s performance, which not only won the competition but also beat the combined score of all other competitors. The AI developed by Team Atlanta is now open sourced with the Open Source Security Foundation. 

Associate Professor Frank Li received the Junior Faculty Research Award for establishing world-class research BEES Lab at Georgia Tech. One of his nominators, Associate Professor Saman Zonouz, put Li’s name forward for his work empirically evaluating and improving internet security and privacy from an operational standpoint. 

Finally, Associate Professor Brendan Saltaformaggio received the Mid-Career Faculty Research Award. Zikas nominated him for establishing internationally recognized research in cybersecurity forensics, malware analysis, AI security, and software supply chain security. Saltaformaggio’s research highlights include the discovery of over $2 billion in stolen funds on the Ethereum blockchain. 

"We know SCP faculty conduct highly impactful research that is of the highest quality,” said SCP Interim Chair Mustaque Ahamad. “Our faculty receiving research awards at all levels recognizes this and shows how we are working to realize SCP’s vision of creating security for everyone and everything."

The Academy recognizes leaders across fields of study who have addressed humanity’s greatest challenges while also gathering knowledge to advance learning and the public good. This year’s class of 252 honorees was elected in academia, the arts, industry, journalism, philanthropy, policy, research, and science.  

García is one of nine honorees in the “Engineering and Technology” division. His research — both in the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering where he serves as Regents’ Professor and in the Parker H. Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience where he is the executive director — aligns with the Academy’s service-minded mission.  

“I am inspired to find engineering solutions to serious health conditions to help people,” he said. “As a kid, I developed a musculoskeletal condition that required biomaterial devices to treat. Although imperfect, this treatment allowed me to lead a normal life.” 

Moved by his personal experience, García’s research centers on cellular and tissue engineering, which integrate biological and engineering principles to restore organ function lost to injury or disease. By studying how cells interact with the materials around them, he and his team have engineered biomaterials for the controlled delivery of therapeutic proteins and cells that enhance tissue regeneration, which could speed the healing process for patients.  

His future work will integrate biomaterials with lab‑grown replicas of human organs, known as organoids, that can be used to identify new therapies for a variety of human diseases. These organoids, though smaller and simpler than true organs, can mimic key functions that may help García and his team to find better ways to repair damaged tissues. 

García has spent the past 27 years at Georgia Tech and carries on the legacy of another Academy member — the Petit Institute’s founding executive director Robert Nerem, who was inducted in 1998. García credits his success to the support of his loved ones and the Yellow Jacket community.  

“I am deeply honored and humbled,” he said. “This award is only possible by the unending love and support of family, friends and mentors, my phenomenal past and present trainees, fantastic collaborators, and awesome ecosystem at Georgia Tech.” 

The Academy was chartered in 1780 during the American Revolution by a group that included John Adams and John Hancock. It was established to recognize accomplished individuals and engage them in addressing the greatest challenges facing the young republic. 

Membership has broadened over the years to celebrate excellence in a variety of fields. Honorees have included poet Robert Frost, musician John Legend, and chef José Andrés, who was given this year’s Ivan Allen Jr. Prize for Social Courage.  

García and the rest of this year’s class, which includes actor Jodie Foster, will be inducted in October.  

Students, faculty, and researchers from Georgia Tech and Kennesaw State University gathered on April 8 for a joint workshop between Georgia Tech's NSF Sustainable Development of Smart Medical Devices (SUSMED) program and KSU's Mobility for Everyone (MOVE) Center. The full-day event explored how sustainable design, mobility science, and health technologies are converging to shape the next generation of medical devices.  

Now, the team is working with the Linux Foundation and the Open Source Security Foundation (OpenSSF) to ensure that its breakthrough doesn’t remain confined to a competition environment. The team’s new initiative, OSS-CRS, aims to standardize and operationalize cyber reasoning systems (CRSs) for real-world use.

“The AI Cyber Challenge pushed the boundaries of autonomous software security, with seven teams developing systems capable of finding and remediating vulnerabilities at scale,” said Andrew Chin, a Georgia Tech Ph.D. student and lead on the OSS-CRS program. 

“However, after the competition’s conclusion, it has been difficult to apply these advancements to the open-source community due to infrastructure incompatibilities and the lack of long-term maintenance for the open-sourced CRS implementations.”

To address this gap, Georgia Tech’s Systems Software Lab (SSLab), directed by Professor Taesoo Kim, is leading the development of OSS-CRS, which provides both a common framework for CRS development and the infrastructure needed to deploy these systems seamlessly across open-source projects.

As part of this effort, the team has ported its competition-winning system, Atlantis, into the OSS-CRS framework. The move makes it compatible with laptops and other everyday machines with flexible resource and budget configurations.

Interoperability is also central to the framework’s design. Atlantis can be combined with other CRSs to improve performance, including systems developed by fellow AIxCC finalists and newer agentic, command-line-based tools. This modular approach reflects a key lesson the team learned from the competition: collaboration between systems can outperform any single solution.

OSS-CRS has been accepted as a sandbox project within OpenSSF’s AI/ML Security Working Group, a milestone that brings added technical guidance and community support to the project. This includes:

• Access to mentorship
• Dedicated working group meetings
• Broader visibility through industry events, publications, and outreach efforts

The collaboration will also foster stronger connections with open-source maintainers, helping streamline vulnerability disclosure and remediation workflows.

The paper, The Borderlands of Foldability: Lessons from Simplified Proteins, is a meta-analysis of six decades of protein research and reveals that ancient proteins may have been far more complicated and dynamic than previously thought. 

Recently published in the journal Trends in Chemistry, the study includes Georgia Tech researchers Lynn Kamerlin, professor in the School of Chemistry and Biochemistry and Georgia Research Alliance Vasser-Woolley Chair in Molecular Design, and Quantitative Biosciences Ph.D. candidate Alfie-Louise Brownless.

Co-authors also include Institute of Science Tokyo graduate student Koh Seya and Liam M. Longo, who serves as a specially appointed associate professor at Science Tokyo and as an affiliate research scientist at the Blue Marble Space Institute of Science.

The research has implications ranging from the origins of life and the search for life in the universe to cutting-edge medical innovation. “One of the biggest unanswered questions in science is how life first began,” says Kamerlin, who is a corresponding author of the study. “Understanding how the first protein-like molecules formed and what the earliest proteins may have been like is a key part of that puzzle.”

“Proteins power our bodies — and all life on Earth,” she adds. “Simply put, the evolution of proteins is the reason that we’re able to have this conversation at all.”

A Protein Folding Paradox

If proteins are the scaffolding of life, amino acids are the components that make up that scaffolding. “Today, an average protein is constructed from a chain of about 300 amino acids, involving 20 different types of amino acids,” Kamerlin shares. Proteins fold when these chains twist into a specific 3-dimensional shape, creating structures critical for biology.

However, while these folds are essential, exactly how a protein knows which way to fold remains a mystery. “We know that proteins didn’t just fold randomly,” Kamerlin shares, “because randomly trying all possible configurations would take a protein longer than the age of the universe.”

It’s a cornerstone problem in biological science called “Levinthal’s Paradox,” and highlights a fundamental mystery: Proteins fold incredibly quickly into very specific combinations — but like a sheet of paper spontaneously folding into an origami swan, researchers don’t know how proteins “choose” the folds they make.

“We can predict what a protein will look like, but can’t tell you how it got there,” Kamerlin adds. “That’s what we’re interested in exploring: how small early proteins developed into the complex proteins that support every living thing on today’s Earth.”

Simple Letters, Sophisticated Structures

Early proteins likely had access to just half of today’s amino acids. “About 10-12 amino acids were likely available on early Earth,” Kamerlin says. Like writing a story with just the letters “A” through “L,” researchers assumed that the ‘vocabulary’ proteins could build from such a limited amino acid alphabet would also be constrained.

“There is a language to protein folding,” Kamerlin explains. “That language is hidden in their structures. Our research is in trying to understand the rules — the grammar and vocabulary that dictate a protein fold.” 

The grammar they discovered was surprising: with a combination of creative techniques and environmental support, complex structures can arise from limited amino acid alphabets. 

“We found that it is possible to develop complex folds with very simple tools — and certain environments, like salty ones, can help support that,” Kamerlin shares. “Early proteins could also cross-link and associate, interacting like LEGO blocks to create more complex structures.”

Pioneering Proteins

Now, the team is conducting research in environments that could mimic conditions on early Earth — aiming to discover more about how these regions could have given rise to today’s complex proteins. “This aspect of our research also ties into the amazing space research happening at Georgia Tech,” Kamerlin says. “While we’re interested in understanding early life on Earth, our work could help inform where best to look for evidence of life beyond our planet.”

Kamerlin specializes in creating computer models that simulate possible scenarios – creating an opportunity to quickly and efficiently test many theories. The most compelling of these can then be tested by her collaborator and co-author at Science Tokyo, Liam Longo, in lab experiments. 

Protein folding is also at the forefront of medical innovation, ranging from diagnostic tools to cancer treatments and neurodegenerative diseases. “In the broader scope, we’re interested in discovering what we can design, what we can stress test, and what we can reconstruct with AI and other computational tools,” Kamerlin says. “Because if you can understand how proteins fold, you gain the ability to design them.”

Funding: NASA, the Human Frontier Science Program, and the Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.trechm.2026.03.001

They would normally get this in their natural habitats while foraging for food and staying alert to predators that might target calves.

However, the four elephants reside at Zoo Atlanta, so they don’t have to worry about these things.

That’s why zoo caretakers are always on the lookout for better ways to help their elephants exercise their brains.

The caretakers at Zoo Atlanta found one when they met Arianna Mastali, a Ph.D. student in Georgia Tech’s School of Interactive Computing. Mastali designed an audio enrichment wall to help stimulate Zoo Atlanta’s elephants.

Many zoos build concrete enrichment walls to foster elephant problem-solving and critical thinking. The walls usually have holes for the elephants to reach through with their trunks as they search for food, treats, or playful objects on the other side.

Mastali enhanced Zoo Atlanta’s enrichment wall by adding an interactive audio component. A nearby speaker system emits distinctive low-frequency tones when an elephant sticks its trunk into a hole.

“They’re intelligent creatures that require a lot of complexity in their habitat,” Mastali said. “We wanted to add to that complexity while giving them more control.”

Experimenting in the Wild

Mastali’s system uses cameras and computer vision to detect when an elephant’s trunk is inside a hole and then sends a signal to the speakers to play a sound.

Mastali is a member of the Georgia Tech Animal Lab, directed by School of IC professor Melody Jackson. The lab often uses sensing technology to enhance animal wellness.

Mastali said she tried incorporating sensing devices into her project several times. She constructed an insert made of PVC pipe and attached a sensor to its base that used infrared beams to detect the elephant’s trunk.

However, she said it was difficult to account for the elephants’ strength. Their trunks would break the insert after a day or two. 

She pivoted toward computer vision to remove the risk of damage and keep the enrichment wall as close to natural as possible. 

“A big lesson we learned was that using existing materials the elephants are already familiar with was the best way to do things, and it simplified our design process,” she said.

Shane Rosse, a student in Georgia Tech’s Online Master of Science in Computer Science (OMSCS) program, assisted Mastali with the computer vision component.

Enhancing Environmental Enrichment

Mastali observed the elephants’ behavior at the wall seven days before and seven days after the installation of the audio enrichment system.

The number of times the elephants approached the wall after installation increased by 176%, and time spent at the wall increased by 71%

“We weren’t sure at first if they would care that much, so it was great to see how much time they spent at the wall, especially our less dominant females,” said Kirby Miller, senior elephant caretaker at Zoo Atlanta. “They seem to like it the most.”

Miller said the elephants used to only approach the wall when they knew there was food behind it. That started to change after the audio enrichment system was installed.

“We would be off somewhere else, and we’d hear the speaker playing the sounds, and we knew there wasn’t any food back there,” Miller said. “Tara had her trunk in one of the holes, just listening to the sound. That let us know they do like it, and they’re very curious about it.”

Miller said because elephants have sharp memories and acute senses of hearing and smell, their habitats must be designed with that in mind.

Zoo Atlanta’s African Savanna elephant habitat was redesigned in 2019. In addition to the enrichment wall, it includes a bathing pond, two waterfalls, and swing boom devices that hold hay for elephants to eat as they would in the wild.

Miller said elephants sheltered at any zoo or conservation would benefit from enrichment devices enhanced by technology.

“I think anything they can participate in that gives them choice and control is great for all zoo elephants,” she said. “It depends on the elephants, but with our elephants, they can hear much higher frequencies than we can. That noise isn’t that loud for us, but for them, they’re feeling that noise, and they can hear much more, which makes it more stimulating for them.”

Georgia Tech researchers have created a new AI model for decision-focused learning (DFL), called Diffusion-DFL. Recent tests showed it makes more accurate decisions than current approaches.

Along with optimizing industrial output, Diffusion-DFL lowers costs and reduces risk. Experiments also showed it performs across different fields. 

Diffusion-DFL doesn’t just surpass current methods; it also predicts more accurately as problem sizes grow. The model requires less computing power despite these high-performance marks, making it more accessible to smaller enterprises.

Diffusion-DFL runs on diffusion models, the same technology that powers DALL-E and other AI image generators. It is the first DFL framework based on diffusion models.

“Anyone who makes high-stakes decisions under uncertainty, including supply chain managers, energy operators, and financial planners, benefits from Diffusion-DFL,” said Zihao Zhao, a Georgia Tech Ph.D. student who led the project. 

“Instead of optimizing around a single forecast, the model evaluates many possible scenarios, so decisions account for real-world risk and become more robust.”

[Related: GT @ ICLR 2026]

To test Diffusion-DFL, the team ran experiments based on real-world settings, including:

• Factory manufacturing to meet product demand
• Power grid scheduling to meet energy demand
• Stock market portfolio optimization

In each case, Diffusion-DFL made more accurate decisions than current methods. It also performed better as problems became larger and more complex. These results confirm the model’s ability to make important decisions in real-world scenarios with noisy data and uncertainty.

The experiments also show that Diffusion-DFL is practical, not just accurate. Training diffusion models is expensive, so the team developed a way to reduce memory use. This cut training costs by more than 99.7%. As a result, Diffusion-DFL can reach more researchers and practitioners.

“Our score-function estimator cuts GPU memory from over 60 gigabytes to 0.13 with almost no loss in decision quality, reducing the requirement for massive computing resources,” Zhao said. “I hope this expands Diffusion-DFL into other domains, like healthcare, where decisions must be made quickly under complex uncertainty."

Beyond decision-making applications, Diffusion-DFL marks a shift in DFL techniques and in the broader use of generative AI models. 

In supply chain management, planners estimate future demand before deciding how much product to stock. In this DFL problem, engineers align ML models with predetermined decision objectives, like minimizing risk or reducing costs. 

One flaw of DFL methods is that they optimize around a single, deterministic prediction in an uncertain future.

Diffusion-DFL takes a different approach. Instead of making a single guess, it determines a range of possible outcomes. This leads to decisions based on many likely scenarios, rather than on a single assumed future.

To do this, the framework uses diffusion models. These generative AI models create high-quality data from images, text, and audio. 

The forward diffusion process involves adding noise to data until it becomes pure noise. Models trained via forward diffusion can reverse diffusion. This means they can start with noisy data and then produce meaningful insights from training examples. 

Real-world data is often noisy and uncertain. Traditional DFL methods struggle in these conditions, but diffusion models are designed to handle them.

Because of this, Diffusion-DFL can explore many possible outcomes and choose better actions. Like image-generation AI, the model works well with complex data from different sources. This enables its use across different industries.

“Diffusion models have achieved significant success in generative AI and image synthesis, but our work shows their potential extends far beyond that,” said Kai Wang, an assistant professor in the School of Computational Science and Engineering (CSE).

“What makes Diffusion-DFL unique is that the specific downstream application guides how the model learns to handle uncertainty.

“Whether we are scheduling energy for power grids, balancing risk in financial portfolios, or developing early warning systems in healthcare, we can explicitly train these highly expressive models to navigate the unique complexities of each domain.”

Zhao and Wang collaborated with Caltech Ph.D. candidate Christopher Yeh and Harvard University postdoctoral fellow Lingkai Kong on Diffusion-DFL. Kong earned his Ph.D. in CSE from Georgia Tech in 2024.

Wang will present Diffusion-DFL on behalf of the group at the upcoming International Conference on Learning Representations (ICLR 2026). Occurring April 23-27 in Rio de Janeiro, ICLR is one of the world’s most prestigious conferences dedicated to artificial intelligence research.

“ICLR is the perfect stage for Diffusion-DFL because it brings together the exact community that needs to see the bridge between generative modeling and high-stakes decision-making for real-world applications,” Wang said.

“Presenting Diffusion-DFL allows us to challenge the traditional training framework of diffusion models. It’s about sparking a broader conversation on how we can align the training objectives of generative AI directly with actual, downstream decision-making needs.”

In a new research article, “Help or Hindrance? The Role of Familiarity in Product Development Teams,” Ramachandran and his co-authors Necati Tereyagoglu and Murat Unal, show the crucial role familiarity plays in team dynamics.

“Every creative organization deals with a fundamental tension,” Ramachandran said. “People love working with teammates they know well, but innovation often depends on fresh perspectives.”

There is a lot to be said about familiarity. Famously, it breeds contempt. Previous studies have shown that repeat collaboration helps teams execute smoothly. But smooth operations don’t always translate to commercial success. Ramachandran’s research shows that it can breed a different kind of trouble — an environment free from friction, debate, and novelty. Those conditions may be comfortable, but they don’t help creativity thrive. Video game development, it turns out, provides the perfect setting for productive tension.

“Video games require both bold creative ideas and flawless execution,” Ramachandran shared. “They blend art, engineering, storytelling, and software into a single product. We were curious about how familiarity impacts team dynamics within this industry. When does it help and when does it quietly get in the way?”

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In December, The Conversation hosted a webinar on AI’s revolutionary role in drug discovery and development.

Science and technology editor Eric Smalley interviewed Jeffrey Skolnick, eminent scholar in computational systems biology at Georgia Institute of Technology, and Benjamin P. Brown, assistant professor of pharmacology at Vanderbilt University.

Skolnick has developed AI-based approaches to predict protein structure and function that may help with drug discovery and finding off-label uses of existing drugs. Brown’s lab works on creating new computer models that make drug discovery faster and more reliable. Below is a condensed and edited version of the interview.

Let’s start with the big picture. How is AI changing biomedical research and drug discovery, and what is the potential we are talking about?

Skolnick: The upside, potentially, is very large. One of the frustrating things about drug discovery is that, in spite of the fact that the people doing it are extraordinarily intelligent and have done an extraordinarily good job, the success rate is very low. About 1 in 5 drugs will have negative health effects that outweigh its benefits. Of the ones that pass, roughly half don’t work.

In drug development, there are several key issues: Can you predict which target is driving a particular disease? Once this target is identified, how can you guarantee the drug is going to work and isn’t simultaneously going to kill you?

These are outstanding problems in drug discovery in which AI can play an important, though not 100% guaranteed, role. Unlike us, AI can look at basically all available knowledge. On a good day it makes strong and true connections called “insights,” and on a bad day it does what is called “hallucinating” and sees things that are weak and probably false.

At the end of the day, many diseases do not have a cure. Most diseases are maintained, such as high cholesterol or autoimmune conditions. A treatment for cancer might buy you five years, and now you’re in Stage 4 and you’ve exhausted all the standard care drugs. AI can play a role to suggest alternatives where there are none.

Let’s give some basic definitions here. When we use the word drug, we’re talking about a wide range of therapies. Can you explain the range – we’ve got small molecule drugs, biologics, gene therapies, cell therapies.

Brown: We have fairly large molecules in our bodies called proteins. They are like machines that carry out specific functions and interact with one another. Oftentimes, when we’re trying to treat disease, we’re trying to alter functions of specific proteins. Many drugs, like aspirin and Tylenol, are small molecules that can fit into a protein and change its function. Fundamentally, drugs don’t have to just interact with proteins, but this is a major way in which our current repertoire of medications work.

There are also proteins that act like drugs, such as antibodies. When you receive a vaccine for a virus, your body is basically given instructions on how to develop antibodies. These antibodies will target some part of that virus. Your body is creating these big molecules, much bigger than aspirin, to go and interact with foreign proteins in a different way. Gene therapy is a larger step beyond that.

So these modalities – molecule, protein, antibody or gene – are very different types of molecules. They have different scales and rules, so the way you approach designing and discovering them various widely.

Can you briefly explain artificial neural networks, and what the “deep” in deep learning means?

Skolnick: AlphaFold, developed by DeepMind, involved understanding how neural networks worked. They built a network with a lot of inputs, which are stimuli, and outputs with different weights, similar to how your brain actually works. These simple connections, or neurons, have reinforcement learning.

They also created sophisticated neural networks, such as transformers, which do specific things like a special-purpose tool that can learn, and they added a mechanism called “attention,” which amplifies critical details. Super neural networks with transformers is what we call deep learning. These now have literally billions, if not trillions, of parameters.

Essentially, these machines can learn higher order correlations between events, meaning the patterns of conditional interactions that depend on the properties of multiple things simultaneously. In these higher order correlations, AI has the potential to see previously unknown things that are embedded in petabytes (a unit of data equivalent to half of the contents of all U.S. academic research libraries of biological data.

AlphaFold, which predicts three-dimensional, bioactive forms of a protein, has millions of sequences and a couple of hundred thousand structures. It can tell you, based on a particular pattern, what small molecule to design that sticks to a protein to induce some kind of structural shift.

How is this technology being used in biomedical research to understand molecular dynamics or, essentially, the biological processes involved in health and disease?

Brown: In 2013, there was a Nobel Prize for molecular dynamics simulations, computational tools that help you understand the motions of molecules as they move according to physics. There’s a huge body of scientific research built around those ideas.

AI and deep learning are large right now, but it’s worth mentioning that for the last decade and a half, people have been using much smaller machine learning algorithms to help design drugs. A lot of the ideas, such as [using machine learning for virtual screening], are not new and have been in practice for a while.

With AlphaFold’s technologies to help people design proteins and predict their structure, we’ve changed how we think about a lot of these problems. We have this new repertoire of approaches to build ideas around and to start thinking about drug discovery.

From 20 years ago to now, what has today’s AI technology done in terms of scale of change in this process?

Skolnick: A lot of diseases, like cancers, are caused by a collection of malfunctioning proteins. AI now allows us to start to think conceptually about how these diseases are organized and related to each other.

Diseases tend to co-occur. For example, if you have hyperthyroidism, you’re very likely to develop Alzheimer’s. Kind of weird, right? We can look at pieces, but AI can look at all the information, integrate the collective behavior and then identify common drivers. This allows you to construct disease interrelationships which offer the possibility of broad spectrum treatments that could treat whole collections of diseases rather than narrow-spectrum treatments.

Relatedly, AI also can help us understand disease trajectories. Diseases that tend to co-occur often present themselves consecutively. You have disease 1, it gives you disease 2, then gives you disease 3. This suggests that if you go back to the root with disease 1, you may be able to stop a whole bunch of stuff. You can’t analyze millions of trajectories and millions of data without a tool, so you couldn’t do this before.

This holds a lot of promise, but one also must be careful not to overpromise. It will help, it will accelerate, but it is not a substitute yet for real experiments, real clinical validation and trials.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

“A small vial of genetically engineered cells can contain multiple millions of dollars’ worth of intellectual property and require several years of work to develop,” said Corey Wilson, a professor in Georgia Tech’s School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering (ChBE). “Accordingly, the protection of high-value engineered cell lines has become critically important to the biotechnology industry.”

Wilson and his research team have published their findings in Science Advances demonstrating the effectiveness of their new biological security technology, known as GeneLock™, in protecting high-value engineered cell lines.

GeneLock is a cybersecurity-inspired technology that protects valuable genetic material directly at the DNA level. To demonstrate its strength, Wilson’s team conducted what they describe as a first-of-its-kind biohackathon, detailed in the new paper, to simulate unauthorized access. 

“GeneLock greatly improves our ability to protect high-value engineered cell lines by expanding security from the lab environment to the genetic level,” Wilson said.

Economic Impact

What are the stakes? Estimates place the global market for high-value genetic materials at more than $1.5 trillion, projected to reach $8 trillion by 2035. The use of these materials ranges from advanced medicines and proprietary research enzymes to specialty chemicals and sustainable materials.

Currently, the protection of high-value cell lines depends on physical safeguards such as restricted lab access and secure facilities, Wilson explained.

“The key weakness of physical security measures is once circumvented, there are typically no measures in place to protect valuable cells from theft, abuse, or unauthorized use,” Wilson said. 

“Once a sample leaves the building, the DNA it carries typically remains fully functional. This is like placing an unlocked cellphone in a desk drawer. Anyone who gains access to the drawer can view sensitive content on the phone­­­­­­­—or in this case will have full access to the valuable cell line.”

Genetic Passcode Protection

The GeneLock biological security technology developed by Wilson and his team places a passcode on engineered cells, akin to those used on ATM machines and protected cellphones.

Instead of leaving a valuable gene in readable form, the team scrambles the DNA sequence of interest. The scrambled genetic asset remains in a nonfunctional state unless the living cell where it resides receives the correct sequence of chemical inputs. Those inputs act as a molecular passcode.

“Only the right combination, delivered in the right order, rearranges the DNA into a working form,” Wilson said.

Biohackathon Security Test

To evaluate the technology, the researchers organized a blue team and a red team in what they describe as an ethical biohackathon. The blue team designed the encrypted DNA sequence, while the red team was challenged to discover the correct chemical passcode through experimentation in a gray box exercise, meaning the red team had partial knowledge of the system but did not have access to the internal designs. 

“This approach for testing security strength is commonly used in cybersecurity,” Wilson explained. 

The blue team engineered the system inside Escherichia coli, or E. coli, a bacterium widely used in biotechnology. The protected asset was a fluorescent protein gene selected as a measurable stand-in for commercially valuable targets. When the correct chemical sequence was applied, the fluorescence turned on. Without the correct passcode, the gene remained scrambled and the cells could not fluoresce green. 

“In practice, most DNA sequences produce valuable proteins or chemicals that are essentially invisible to the human eye, requiring specialized devices or experiments to observe,” Wilson said. “If the biohackathon were conducted with a standard commercially valuable target, the penetration testing would have taken more than 10 times longer to complete, years instead of months.”

The biohackathon results showed a dramatic reduction in risk. GeneLock reduced the probability of unlocking the genetic asset by random search to about 1 in 85,000 (a 0.001% chance), assuming the unauthorized user had access to the required chemical inputs.

Without access to those inputs, “the likelihood of success by chance becomes effectively negligible,” said Dowan Kim (Georgia Tech PhD 2024), co-lead author of the study.

Commercial Uses and What’s Next 

Although the researchers used a non-commercial fluorescent protein as a test case, the implications extend much further. Many biotechnology companies rely on proprietary engineered strains. New England Biolabs, for example, produces more than 265 non-disclosed enzymes in E. coli, each representing a high-value cell line. 

Protein-based drugs are also manufactured in living cells, and proprietary metabolic pathways are used to produce specialty chemicals, bioplastics, and high-value ingredients. 

“In each case, the genetic blueprint inside the cell represents intellectual property that can be protected by our technology,” said Ishita Kumar, a PhD candidate in ChBE and co-lead author of the study.

While the team’s current focus is on protecting intellectual property in the form of high-value cells, future iterations aim to strengthen biological security more broadly. 

“We are currently developing protection measures to mitigate unauthorized use or release of sensitive cell lines that can be potentially hazardous to human health or the environment,” Wilson said.

“As it stands, GeneLock represents an important shift in biological security, enabling, for the first time, protection of valuable cells at the genetic level, even after physical security measures have been bypassed,” he added. 

The work is already moving toward commercialization. The team filed a provisional patent application with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office in February 2026 and is forming a company to deploy the technology.

This research was funded by a grant from the National Science Foundation.

CITATION:

Dowan Kim, Ishita Kumar, Mohamed Hassan, Luisa F. Barraza-Vergara, Christopher A. Voigt, and Corey J. Wilson, “Protecting cells at the genetic level and simulating unauthorized access via a biohackathon,” Science Advances, 2026.

Georgia Tech researchers are making AI easier to understand through their work on Transformer Explainer. The free, online tool shows non-experts how ChatGPT, Claude, and other large language models (LLMs) process language. 

Transformer Explainer is easy to use and runs on any web browser. It quickly went viral after its debut, reaching 150,000 users in its first three months. More than 563,000 people worldwide have used the tool so far.

Global interest in Transformer Explainer continues when the team presents the tool at the 2026 Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI 2026). CHI, the world’s most prestigious conference on human-computer interaction, will take place in Barcelona, April 13-17.

[Related: GT @ CHI 2026]

“There are moments when LLMs can seem almost like a person with their own will and personality, and that misperception has real consequences. For example, there have been cases where teenagers have made poor decisions based on conversations with LLMs,” said Ph.D. student Aeree Cho.

“Understanding that an LLM is fundamentally a model that predicts the probability distribution of the next token helps users avoid taking its outputs as absolute. What you put in shapes what comes out, and that understanding helps people engage with AI more carefully and critically.”

A transformer is a neural network architecture that changes data input sequence into an output. Text, audio, and images are forms of processed data, which is why transformers are common in generative AI models. They do this by learning context and tracking mathematical relationships between sequence components.

Transformer Explainer demystifies how transformers work. The platform uses visualization and interaction to show, step by step, how text flows through a model and produces predictions.

Using this approach, Transformer Explainer impacts the AI landscape in four main ways:

• It counters hype and misconceptions surrounding AI by showing how transformers work.
• It improves AI literacy among users by removing technical barriers and lowering the entry for learning about AI.
• It expands AI education by helping instructors teach AI mechanisms without extensive setup or computing resources.
• It influences future development of AI tools and educational techniques by providing a blueprint for interpretable AI systems.

“When I first learned about transformers, I felt overwhelmed. A transformer model has many parts, each with its own complex math. Existing resources typically present all this information at once, making it difficult to see how everything fits together,” said Grace Kim, a dual B.S./M.S. computer science student. 

“By leveraging interactive visualization, we use levels of abstraction to first show the big picture of the entire model. Then users click into individual parts to reveal the underlying details and math. This way, Transformer Explainer makes learning far less intimidating.”

Many users don’t know what transformers are or how they work. The Georgia Tech team found that people often misunderstand AI. Some label AI with human-like characteristics, such as creativity. Others even describe it as working like magic.

Furthermore, barriers make it hard for students interested in transformers to start learning. Tutorials tend to be too technical and overwhelm beginners with math and code. While visualization tools exist, these often target more advanced AI experts.

Transformer Explainer overcomes these obstacles through its interactive, user-focused platform. It runs a familiar GPT model directly in any web browser, requiring no installation or special hardware. 

Users can enter their own text and watch the model predict the next word in real time. Sankey-style diagrams show how information moves through embeddings, attention heads, and transformer blocks.

The platform also lets users switch between high-level concepts and detailed math. By adjusting temperature settings, users can see how randomness affects predictions. This reveals how probabilities drive AI outputs, rather than creativity.

“Millions of people around the world interact with transformer-driven AI. We believe that it is crucial to bridge the gap between day-to-day user experience and the models' technical reality, ensuring these tools are not misinterpreted as human-like or seen as sentient,” said Ph.D. student Alex Karpekov. 

“Explaining the architecture helps users recognize that language generated by models is a product of computation, leading to a more grounded engagement with the technology.” 

Cho, Karpekov, and Kim led the development of Transformer Explainer. Ph.D. students Alec Helbling, Seongmin Lee, Ben Hoover, and alumni Zijie (Jay) Wang (Ph.D. ML-CSE 2024) and Minsuk Kahng (Ph.D. CS-CSE 2019) assisted on the project. 

Professor Polo Chau supervised the group and their work. His lab focuses on data science, human-centered AI, and visualization for social good.

Acceptance at CHI 2026 stems from the team winning the best poster award at the 2024 IEEE Visualization Conference. This recognition from one of the top venues in visualization research highlights Transformer Explainer’s effectiveness in teaching how transformers work.

“Transformer Explainer has reached over half a million learners worldwide,” said Chau, a faculty member in the School of Computational Science and Engineering. 

“I'm thrilled to see it extend Georgia Tech's mission of expanding access to higher education, now to anyone with a web browser.”

To help find answers, researchers at the Institute for Neuroscience, Neurotechnology, and Society (INNS) are using math, data, and AI to unlock the secrets of thought. Together they are helping turn the brain’s raw electrical “noise” into real insights about how people think, move, and perceive the world.

Fair warning: Prepare your neurons for the complexity of this brain research ahead.

Building AI Like a Brain

What if artificial neurons in AI programs were arranged as they are in the brain?

AI programs would then help us understand why the brain is organized the way it is. This neuro-AI synthesis would also work faster, use less energy, and be easier to interpret. Creating such systems is the goal of Apurva Ratan Murty, an assistant professor of Psychology who is creating topographic AI models like the one above of three domains — vision, audition, and language inspired by the brain. In the near future, he predicts doctors might be able to use these patterns to predict the effects of brain lesions and other disorders. “We’re not there yet,” he says. “But our work brings us significantly closer to that future than ever before.”

Computing Thought and Movement

How cats walk keeps Chethan Pandarinath on his toes. This biomedical engineer uses sensors to analyze how two sets of feline leg muscles — flexors and extensors — are controlled by the spinal cord. Understanding how that happens could help patients partially paralyzed from spinal cord injuries, strokes, or progressive neuro-degenerative diseases get back on their feet again. “My lab is using AI tools that allow us to turn complex spinal cord activity data into something we can interpret. It tells us there’s a simple underlying structure behind the complex activity patterns,” says the associate professor.

Revealing the Brain’s Spike Patterns

“The brain is like a symphony conductor,” says Simon Sponberg. “Individual instruments have some independent control, but most of the music comes from the brain’s precise coordination of notes among the different players in the body.” This physics professor studies the fantastically fast-beating wings of the hummingbird-sized hawk moth (Manduca sexta). Its agile flight movement comes as a result of spikes in electrical activity in 10 muscles. Sponberg found something that surprised him — the brain focuses less on creating the number of spikes than in orchestrating their precise patterns over time. To Sponberg, every millisecond matters. “We are just beginning to understand how the nervous system first acquires precisely timed spiking patterns during development,” he says.

Predicting Decisions Through Statistics

Put a mouse in a maze with food far away, and it will learn to find it. But life for mice — and people — isn’t so simple. Sometimes they want to explore, only want water, or just want to go home. What’s more, animals make decisions based on their history, not just on how they feel at the moment. To dig deeper into the decision-making process, Anqi Wu, an assistant professor in the School of Computational Science and Engineering, is giving mice more options. By using a new computational framework called SWIRL (Switching Inverse Reinforcement Learning), her findings have outperformed models that fail to take historical behavior into account. “We’re seeking to understand not only animal behavior but also human behavior to gain insight into the human decision-making process over a long period of time,” she says.

Modeling the Mind’s Wiring With Math

Connectivity shapes cognition in the cerebral cortex, a layered structure in the brain. The visual cortex, in particular, processes visual data from the retina relayed through the Lateral Geniculate Nucleus (LGN) in the thalamus, and directs it to the correct cognitive domain in the brain. How it does this is the mystery that computational neuroscientist Hannah Choi wants to solve. “The big question I’m interested in is how network connectivity patterns in the architecture of the LGN are related to computations,” says this assistant math professor. To find answers, she shows mice repeated image patterns such as flower-cat-dog-house and then disrupts the pattern. The goal? To grasp how the thalamus’s nonlinear dynamical system works. If scientists and doctors better understand how brain regions are wired together, such knowledge could lead to better disease treatment.

This story was originally published through the Georgia Tech Alumni Magazine. Read the original publication here.

A Spark of Curiosity

In 2017, faculty conversations began circulating about a new kind of capstone experience, one driven by student discovery and entrepreneurial thinking rather than predetermined client requirements. The idea intrigued Omojokun.

“I remember thinking, this is really different from anything I’ve ever taught,” he said.

In his previous courses, Omojokun took pride in providing the structured, rigorous framework students needed to master complex concepts. While those interactions were dynamic, the curriculum required a specific, focused trajectory. CREATE-X offered a different kind of challenge: the "X" of the program, representing undefined, endless potential.

“CREATE-X is full of unknowns. You don’t know what industry the students are diving into, what roadblocks they’ll run into and navigate out of, or what small- to large-scale successes they’ll achieve throughout the semester. It really had my blood pumping,” he said. As someone who loves the challenge of academia, it was an invigorating way to help the next generation apply what they’ve learned in a new context.

Omojokun co-taught the first CREATE-X Capstone section with College of Computing students in fall 2018 alongside Craig Forest, associate director of the Invention Studio. While the initial computer science cohort was small, the experience was immediately powerful.

“It was humble beginnings but deeply eye-opening,” he said.

In this new environment, students weren't just solving problems; they were seeking them and sometimes pivoting. Traditional client-driven capstones offer students invaluable experiences in delivering high-quality products, responding to clients’ often evolving needs, and adhering to professional standards. CREATE-X added a layer of venture-validation, requiring students to identify a gap in the market and build something with commercial viability.

As the semesters continued, CREATE-X grew from a program with an interesting capstone course Omojokun enthusiastically co-taught to a professional inflection point for him. He found himself talking about it frequently, with colleagues, with students, even with prospective undergraduates who may not see a capstone for years.

He began encouraging prospective and incoming students to take CREATE-X pathways. 

“I would tell students, down to first-year students, when you get that opportunity to engage with CREATE-X, take it. You don’t even have to wait until capstone, as there are multiple pathways; in fact, Startup Lab has no prerequisites. Whatever path you take, you’ll remember it for years to come. Whether you officially take a problem solution to market or not, the entrepreneurial confidence gained is priceless.”

Spreading CREATE-X Into the College of Computing

By 2020, when the first Jim Pope Faculty Fellowship cohort opened, applying felt natural. He had already become an unofficial ambassador for CREATE-X, helping students navigate options, promoting programs in classes, and rallying colleagues to engage.

“It was an opportunity to become more connected to this thing that I felt was changing the game on campus,” he said. “It cemented my affiliation with CREATE-X.”

The fellowship gave name and weight to the work he was already doing, while also expanding what was possible.

The Jim Pope Faculty Fellowship provides faculty with $15,000 in discretionary funding, which can support a one-semester break from teaching, along with structured training in evidence‑based entrepreneurship, dedicated mentorship, and the opportunity to work closely with students launching startups.

The fellowship also equips faculty to become entrepreneurial instructors and mentors through the CREATE‑X ecosystem, giving them tools to integrate entrepreneurship into their coursework and curricula. Each cohort of fellows is trained to embed entrepreneurial methods, develop new innovation‑focused assignments, and serve as advisors within programs like Startup Lab, Idea‑to‑Prototype, and Startup Launch.

For faculty across Georgia Tech, the fellowship offers something rare: institutional backing, resources, and formal recognition for bringing entrepreneurship into their teaching and shaping how students learn to become problem‑solvers.

Omojokun said he sees CREATE-X as the apex of applying technical fundamentals. 

As part of the fellowship, Omojokun brought the program’s ethos into his courses, even a foundational course like CS 1331: Introduction to Object Oriented Programming, where he created a CREATE-X–branded final project. Students built a “problem database” application as their final homework assignment, cataloging real issues they encountered in daily life, assessing their skills to solve them, evaluating markets and metrics, and then deciding potential pathways forward.

“It’s an innovation diary,” he said. “A tool that can get them closer to thinking like a founder.”

The response from students, including many non-computing majors who take his section each semester, has been overwhelmingly positive. While the project is challenging, the open-ended nature and real-world relevance motivate deeper engagement. 

“When students believe their work will solve a meaningful problem for a meaningful population, they bring passion to it,” he said. “They start observing the world differently.”

The more Omojokun saw, the deeper his enthusiasm grew.

Shaping the College of Computing

Even as he stepped into the role of inaugural chair of the School of Computing Instruction in 2022, CREATE-X remained at the forefront of Omojokun’s conversations. Interest in the program continued to grow significantly. Students stopped him in the hallways to talk about their ideas. Faculty reached out to ask about mentorship opportunities. And he continued championing the program in the many settings he entered.

“It turns out that the most engaged group of students in CREATE-X is computing undergraduates,” Omojokun said. “I wanted to make sure that high involvement continued, no matter what size we are,” he said.

Over time, Omojokun strengthened the partnership between the College of Computing and CREATE-X, weaving entrepreneurship deeper into the College's curricular fabric.

Last January, Omojokun was appointed as the associate dean for Undergraduate Education in the College of Computing. One of his priorities was highlighting CREATE-X’s curricular impact. In coordination with key stakeholders — including Kelly Ann Fitzpatrick (computing), Craig Forest (mechanical engineering), and Raul Saxena (CREATE-X) — he nominated the program for the ABET Innovation Award.  The award honors programs that challenge the status quo in technical education and demonstrate a measurable impact on student learning in ABET-accredited disciplines, such as natural sciences, computing, engineering, and engineering technology. CREATE-X won.

The CREATE-X Advantage With Faculty 

When faculty are considering something like the Jim Pope Fellowship, Omojokun said the biggest barrier he hears about from them is time. With courses that can enroll 300 students per section and extensive responsibilities beyond the classroom, time is a scarce resource.
He could relate. 

“There are always lots of things on my physical and virtual desktop. I always warn people before they enter my office,” he said.

However, Omojokun argued that participating in the fellowship program was time well spent because it helps them rediscover the most exciting parts of teaching.

“It’s worth the time. One of the goals of teaching is to see students passionate about what they’re learning, and CREATE-X makes that happen consistently,” he said. 

The Future With Technology

As AI reshapes industries, Omojokun believes that CREATE-X equips students to navigate the unknown and forge new paths as existing ones shift, providing a versatile skill set that transfers to employment, potentially self-employment, and beyond. 

“There’s a lot of uncertainty with AI in the workspace, but CREATE-X gives students the confidence and skills to succeed at whatever comes,” he said. “We are putting students through this process of finding a problem that’s meaningful and matters to the world; mastering that allows them to lead in any environment.”

Applications Now Open: Become a Jim Pope Faculty Fellow

The 2026 Jim Pope Faculty Fellowship is now accepting applications. For faculty who want to explore integrating entrepreneurship into their teaching, mentoring student founders, and helping shape a culture of innovation across campus, this fellowship offers resources and a supported pathway to begin. Faculty from all disciplines are encouraged to apply to the Jim Pope Fellowship. Priority deadline: July 1; final deadline: Aug. 11.

Today, he is the chief executive officer of Andson Biotech, a growing biotools startup he co-founded with Andrei Fedorov, associate chair for graduate studies and the Rae S. and Frank H. Neely Chair at the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering. The company is commercializing a breakthrough technology Chilmonczyk developed during his doctoral research that simplifies the development and production of cell and gene therapies.

Read the full story on the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering website.

Georgia Tech students will once again take part in a national competition that connects them directly with automotive industry leaders to develop the next generation of mobility innovations. 

Coca-Cola, a neighbor to Georgia Tech since 1920, expects to sell a building and adjacent land in a transaction valued at $31.3 million. The company chose to work directly with Georgia Tech on the planned transaction, reflecting the long-standing relationship between the two organizations and a shared commitment to Atlanta’s continued growth and innovation.

The expected sale includes a two-story brick building, part of Coca-Cola’s holdings since 1988, and an adjoining two-acre park along North Avenue. 

“This strategic addition to our core campus will support our growth in enrollment and research activity for years to come,” said Georgia Tech President Ángel Cabrera. “I appreciate our long relationship with The Coca-Cola Company that allowed us to pursue this opportunity as we continue to invest in our campus, our neighborhood, and Atlanta’s innovation ecosystem.”  

James Quincey, Coca-Cola’s executive chair and Georgia Tech’s 2020 Commencement speaker, said the company wanted the property to continue contributing to Atlanta’s innovation ecosystem.

“When we decided this space was no longer needed for our corporate campus, our goal was to work with Georgia Tech, as this site offers a great opportunity for them to expand,” Quincey said. “Coca-Cola has a long legacy of involvement and partnership with Georgia Tech, and we are excited to see them redevelop this important area in Atlanta.”

Georgia Tech will evaluate how the property can best support academic, research, and student needs as part of its long-term campus planning efforts. The acquisition represents a strategic step in ensuring Georgia Tech has the space needed to educate future leaders and advance research that strengthens Georgia’s economy.

About Georgia Tech

The Georgia Institute of Technology, or Georgia Tech, is one of the top public research universities in the U.S., developing leaders who advance technology and improve the human condition.

The Institute offers business, computing, design, engineering, liberal arts, and sciences degrees, as well as professional development and K-12 programs for fostering success at every stage of life. Its more than 56,000 undergraduate and graduate students represent 54 U.S. states and territories and more than 146 countries. They study at the main campus in Atlanta, at instructional sites around the world, and through distance and online learning.

As a leading technological university, Georgia Tech is an engine of economic development for Georgia, the Southeast, and the nation, conducting more than $1 billion in research annually for government, industry, and society.

About The Coca-Cola Company

The Coca-Cola Company (NYSE: KO) is a total beverage company with products sold in more than 200 countries and territories. Our company’s purpose is to refresh the world and make a difference. We sell multiple billion-dollar brands across several beverage categories worldwide. Our portfolio of sparkling soft drink brands includes Coca-Cola, Sprite, and Fanta. Our water, sports, coffee, and tea brands include Dasani, smartwater, vitaminwater, Topo Chico, BODYARMOR, Powerade, Costa, Georgia, Fuze Tea, Gold Peak, and Ayataka. Our juice, value-added dairy, and plant-based beverage brands include Minute Maid, Simply, innocent, Del Valle, fairlife, and Santa Clara. We’re constantly transforming our portfolio, from reducing sugar in our drinks to bringing innovative new products to market. We seek to positively impact people’s lives, communities, and the planet through water replenishment, packaging recycling, sustainable sourcing practices, and carbon emissions reductions across our value chain. Together with our bottling partners, we employ more than 700,000 people, helping bring economic opportunity to local communities worldwide. Learn more at www.coca-colacompany.com and follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

This is the third time the class has been offered, but the first to include an extended community-based learning experience. 

“The students were able to see firsthand how concepts discussed in the classroom translated into real infrastructure decisions shaping vulnerable coastal communities,” says Robel, an associate professor in the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences.

In previous years, the course relied on guest speakers, often remote, to provide real-world insights. Robel and Macedo, an associate professor in the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, advocated for this year’s field trip to give students direct exposure to how the concepts taught in class are used in coastal communities.  

“Places like Savannah, Tybee Island, and Charleston aren’t planning for a distant future; they’re making real infrastructure decisions right now,” explains Robel.

Coastal case studies

On Tybee Island, city leaders and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers staff discussed with students how to balance tourism, environmental protection, and shoreline preservation. Site visits highlighted tide gates and living shorelines as flood mitigation strategies. 

Then, in Savannah, students met with city staff to explore challenges facing historic, low-lying cities and visited the Pin Point Heritage Museum where Gullah-Geechee community leaders spoke about the cultural, environmental, and equity dimensions of flood planning. 

The trip concluded in Charleston with discussions led by the city’s chief resilience officer and tours of the Low Battery Seawall and a neighborhood pump station, illustrating how flood infrastructure can serve both functional and public-facing roles. Students also visited JMT, the engineering firm behind several of the projects studied, where engineers discussed design trade-offs and career paths in coastal and municipal infrastructure.

Regional risks, real responses

“The regional context is especially important because Georgia Tech graduates are heavily concentrated in the Southeast, and many go on to careers designing, managing, or approving infrastructure projects in coastal communities,” says Robel. “With a more concentrated vulnerability to sea-level rise in the Southeast than any other part of the United States, the most potential flooding is likely to occur here in the Atlantic Southeast and Gulf Coast.”

He adds that “if we’re educating the scientists, engineers, and decision-makers who will be working in these communities, they must understand the practicalities of flood resilience and how to make informed decisions based on the best current science.”

Although the idea for the field experience had been years in the making, it became feasible only recently with support from an internal grant on sustainability education and community-based learning administered by the Center for Sustainable Communities Research and Education. Robel also emphasized the importance of long-standing relationships with coastal communities and governments in making the trip a success.

“We reached a point where we had both the resources and the relationships to make the experience meaningful,” he shares.

Career context

The students met professionals from a wide range of career paths, including federal and local government agencies, private engineering firms, and municipal stormwater departments. 

“A major goal of the trip was giving students the chance to see what career paths in coastal resilience really look like,” says Robel. “Those conversations helped students understand not just the technical work, but also the financing, politics, and community concerns that shape infrastructure decisions — parts of the job that are harder to capture in the classroom.”

Students enjoyed the opportunity to get real-world context:

“This trip made me reconsider my post-graduation plans. I used to think the geology industry was just oil and gas, but this trip showed me different ways I can apply my skills to help the environment as well as local communities in their efforts to adapt to sea-level rise concerns,” says Mandala Pham, a Ph.D. student studying geophysics.

“The most valuable part of the experience was observing sea-level rise mitigation infrastructure in-person, and the trip was a great experience overall to make new friends and gain valuable experiences,” adds Alexander Brison, a fourth-year environmental engineering major.

By grounding classroom concepts in real places and real decisions, the Spring Break field experience reinforced the course’s goal: preparing students to engage thoughtfully with the challenges coastal communities are already facing.

The two‑day event took place Feb. 4 – 5, coinciding with the Critical Minerals Ministerial hosted by U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 4, which brought together more than 50 nations to strengthen and diversify global critical mineral supply chains. During this ministerial, U.K. Minister Seema Malhotra and U.S. Under Secretary of State Jacob Helberg signed a Critical Minerals Memorandum of Understanding, strengthening bilateral cooperation between the United States and the United Kingdom on critical mineral supply chains. 

These broad efforts are supported by White House Executive Order 14363, which defines the Genesis Mission and aims to accelerate scientific discovery through AI. The order identifies critical minerals supply chain resilience as a national security imperative.

In Atlanta, these themes were brought to life in real time. The GEMs-4 workshop brought together researchers, policymakers, national labs, industry leaders, and workforce organizations from both the U.S. and the U.K. to address shared challenges in technology translation, permitting, investment, and talent development. 

The state of Georgia’s integrated ecosystem, linking research universities, legacy industries, technical colleges, national labs, and public‑private partnerships, served as a case study. Presenters highlighted how existing industrial assets in the Southeast are being incorporated into emerging clean energy and critical minerals supply chains, offering a model for other regions seeking to build capabilities around extraction, processing, and manufacturing.

A U.K. member of Parliament representing Cornwall, where the U.K. has lithium reserves and deep critical mineral expertise, joined the convening, as well as representatives from the U.K. Critical Mineral Association, Camborne School of Mines, and the University of Kent. Together, they explored opportunities and challenges, from a fundamental science to a commercialization perspective grounded in real-world experience. 

The alignment between the ministerial in Washington and the expertise present in Atlanta demonstrated the value of state-level engagement and how national agreements translate into practical collaboration on the ground. 

“The Southeast has the research depth, industrial footprint, and collaborative spirit needed to lead in critical minerals innovation,” said Yuanzhi Tang, Georgia Power Professor in the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, executive director of the Strategic Energy Institute, and founding director of the Center for Critical Mineral Solutions at Georgia Tech. “GEMs‑4 showed what’s possible when universities, industry, and government partners align around shared priorities.” 

Day one featured strategic dialogue on critical mineral resources, innovation pathways, and partnership models. A recurring theme was the co-production of critical minerals alongside major mineral commodities. “Many critical minerals are produced as byproducts of larger mining operations, making it essential to integrate recovery strategies into existing mineral industries rather than developing entirely new extraction systems,” noted Crawford Elliott, professor of geosciences at Georgia State University.

Day two transitioned to field‑based learning, led by Paul Schroeder, professor of geology at the University of Georgia. Participants visited active operations to better understand how regional industrial strengths can support national and international supply chain goals. Schroeder said, “Connecting people to the long-standing mineral extraction economy at the mining and plant sites, where the work gets done with an amazingly skilled workforce, underscores the unique role of Georgia’s place‑based capacity in advancing national and transatlantic supply chain goals.”

Organizers emphasized that resilient supply chains rely on regional capabilities built over time through university collaboration, industry partnerships, and community engagement. With three years of inter‑university coordination now underpinning the GEMS platform, the 2026 workshop demonstrated how the Southeast is contributing actionable models for U.S.-U.K. cooperation.

“Ecosystem-building at this scale requires participation from every part of the value chain, and we are encouraged by the model GEMs presents,” said Rachel Galloway, Consul General at British Consulate General Atlanta. “The collaboration across universities, industry, and government is exactly what enables long‑term impact on both sides of the Atlantic.”

Through focused dialogue and partnership-building, the symposium strengthened transatlantic collaboration, highlighted regional strengths, and accelerated innovation and translation across the critical minerals value chain, from resource characterization and processing to recycling, manufacturing, and deployment.

For more information about the GEMS initiative, visit: https://gems.research.gatech.edu/.

Artificial intelligence has been touted as the most transformative technology of our time. With only a few years of mainstream use, it’s changed how we work and communicate, generated billions of dollars in investments, and sparked global debate. But according to leading neuroethics expert Karen Rommelfanger, the race isn’t over yet. 

“Can you think of a more transformative technology than one that intervenes with the fundamental organ that drives your experience in the world?” 

That fundamental organ is the brain.  

Technologies interfacing directly with the brain have been reserved for treating severe injury or disease for decades. Now, neurotechnology is expanding into brain-responsive wearables meant to enhance, augment, and monitor everyday life. As these technologies accelerate and AI is incorporated, the question is no longer if neurotechnology will transform society, but how — and who will shape the boundaries. 

These are some of the questions on which Karen Rommelfanger has built her career. Trained as a biomedical researcher and neuroscientist, Rommelfanger went on to found the Institute for Neuroethics, the world’s first think and do tank devoted entirely to neuroethics, public engagement, and policy implementation.  

“The brain is special; it’s central to who we are,” says Rommelfanger, who was also an inaugural recipient of the Dana Foundation Neuroscience and Society Award. “And that means when you intervene with the brain, there are unique responsibilities. The field of neuroethics addresses things like: How do you ensure mental privacy? How do you protect free will? How do you ensure that people have the power to be narrators of their own lives and their cognitive experience?” 

Now, Rommelfanger is joining Georgia Tech’s Institute for Neuroscience, Neurotechnology, and Society (INNS) as a professor of the practice, where she will work to further embed neuroethics into Georgia Tech’s research and technology development ecosystem. 

“Georgia Tech is producing the next generation of neurotechnologists, and Karen’s expertise will help ensure we’re preparing them to think about societal impact as deeply as they think about the technical and scientific aspects of their work,” says Christopher Rozell, executive director of INNS. “Her leadership strengthens the Institute in exactly the way this moment in neurotechnology demands.”  

“Georgia Tech has many, many ways that it leads in the technology ecosystem. But one of the powerful, unique ways it can lead is through neurotechnology,” says Rommelfanger. “I hope that the INNS, given its unique mandate for neuroscience, neurotechnology, and society, can be a lighthouse for these types of conversations.” 

Neuroethics by Design 

Read the full story. »

Though this scholarship is typically given to 50 exceptional incoming first-year students, a select few second- and third-year students are chosen to receive the honor for exemplifying the program’s pillars of scholarship, leadership, progress, and service.

“Annie and Madeline are exemplary campus leaders and will be able to build on their progress and service with the support of the Stamps Program. We are thrilled for the contributions they bring to the environmental science community,” says Linda Green, principal academic professional and interim director of the Environmental Sciences (ENVS) program.

About Annie Lin

Lin is a second-year ENVS major conducting undergraduate research on methane and natural gas in the Glass Research Group. Previous research highlights include quantifying microplastics in Georgia’s coastal water and working with a student group to publish the first publicly available data on microplastics pollution in the Chattahoochee River.

“I hope to build a career in environmental policy and justice — developing and implementing scientific, holistic, and equitable solutions to environmental issues and bridging the gaps between research, policy, and communities,” says Lin.

She is a student coordinator for Georgia Tech’s Center for Sustainable Communities Research and Education and the Georgia Tech student engagement and network coordinator for the United Nations Regional Centre of Expertise Greater Atlanta.

Why environmental science? 

“I was born and raised in Atlanta and grew up close to the Chattahoochee River,” explains Lin. “In high school, I was very involved with Chattahoochee Riverkeeper, including an 11-mile, eight-hour paddling cleanup; field and lab work to track bacterial contamination caused by sewage spills; and speaking to state legislators about environmental bills. These experiences taught me the importance of helping make the necessary systemic changes to address environmental issues.”

About Madeline Weller 

Weller is a second-year ENVS major working in the Tang Research Group, characterizing rare earth elements from Georgia kaolinite clay minerals for renewable energy applications. She also works on the Georgia Tech Methane Vertically Integrated Project to pioneer local methane measurements and in Georgia Tech’s Office of Sustainability to further sustainability efforts and outreach with Solar Stewards.

“Through experiences with Solar Stewards, I saw firsthand how community and rooftop solar can impact people, reducing their energy burden…,” says Weller. "Being at Georgia Tech has provided me with the resources and courage to act on my passion for achieving sustainability through energy equity, ensuring everybody has access to reliable and affordable electricity."

Outside of research, she is a member of Energy Club @ GT; Sigma Gamma Epsilon, the national honor society for the Earth Sciences;  Association of Environmental Engineers and Scientists; Photography @ GT; and Runnin’ Wreck.

Why environmental science?

“I chose environmental science because I was inspired to use my science skills to help find a solution to environmental issues, including climate change,” she explains. “Improving environmental conditions is not just important for biodiversity and ecosystems, but essential for human health and the longevity of future generations.”

The programming style relies on using generative artificial intelligence (AI) to create software code using tools like Claude, Gemini, and GitHub Copilot. According to graduate research assistant Hanqing Zhao of the Systems Software & Security Lab (SSLab), no one had been tracking these common vulnerabilities and exposures before the launch of their Vibe Security Radar.

“The vulnerabilities we found lead to breaches,” he said. “Everyone is using these tools now. We need a feedback loop to identify which tools, which patterns, and which workflows create the most risk.”

The radar extensively scans public vulnerability databases, finds the error for each vulnerability, and then examines the code’s history to find who introduced the bug. If they discover an AI tool's signature, the radar flags it. 

Of the 74 confirmed cases uncovered so far by the tool, 14 are critical risks, and 25 are high. These vulnerabilities include command injection, authentication bypass, and server-side request forgery. Zhao explained that since AI models tend to repeat the same mistakes, an attacker would need to find these bugs just once. 

“Millions of developers using the same models means the same bugs showing up across different projects,” he said. “Find one pattern in one AI codebase, you can scan for it across thousands of repositories.”

Despite its success, the team has only scratched the surface of the problem. The radar can trace metadata like co-author tags, bot emails, and other known tool signatures, but it can't identify an issue if these markers have been removed. 

The next step is behavioral detection. AI-written code has patterns in how it names variables, structures functions, and handles errors. 

“We're building models that can identify AI code from the code itself, no metadata needed,” said Zhao. “That opens up a lot of cases we currently can't touch.”

The team is also improving its verification pipeline and expanding its sources to include more vulnerability databases. The goal is to get a more complete picture of AI-introduced vulnerabilities across open source, not just the ones that happen to leave signatures behind. 

As more programmers rely on vibe coding, Zhao warns that it still needs to be reviewed as thoroughly as any other project. 

“The whole point of vibe coding is not reading it afterward, I know,” he said. “But if you're shipping AI output to production, review it the way you'd review a junior developer's pull request. Especially anything around input handling and authentication.”

When prompting AI, SSLab also recommends providing more detailed instructions to get it closer to production-ready. There are also tools to check the code for vulnerabilities after  code it has been generated. Not double-checking could lead to a catastrophe. 

“The attack surface keeps growing,” said Zhao. “More people running AI agents locally means the attacker doesn't need to break into the company infrastructure. They just need one vulnerability in a model context protocol server that someone installed and never reviewed.”

One reason the attack surfaces are expanding rapidly is AI’s evolution. In the second half of 2025, the Vibe Security Radar found about 18 cases across seven months. Then, in the first three months of 2026, it identified 56. March 2026 alone had 35, more than all of 2025 combined. 

Many tools, like Claude, are now more autonomous, allowing developers to write entire features, create files, and even make architecture decisions. 

“When an agent builds something without authentication, that's not a typo,” said Zhao. “It's a design flaw baked in from the start. Claude Code and Copilot together account for most of what we detect, but that's partly because they leave the clearest signatures.”

As during previous editions, this year’s conference featured more than two dozen scientists, engineers, policy experts, and thought leaders from Georgia Tech and beyond, illustrating how collaboration across fields – from science and engineering to public policy and international affairs – helps to advance strategic research priorities. 

“Frontiers is about discovery and connections across disciplines and generations,” says Susan Lozier, dean of the College of Sciences and Betsy Middleton and John Clark Sutherland Chair. “This edition provided an inspiring glimpse into the future of space exploration and the many ways Georgia Tech is contributing to research and missions seeking answers to what lies beyond our planet.” 

Commitment to Space

Space research is a key institutional priority at Georgia Tech, which is home to numerous academic and research programs in planetary sciences, robotics, mission design, space policy, and other areas. 

The recently established Space Research Institute (SRI) serves as the central hub connecting the broad range of space-related research across campus. Led by Jud Ready, who also serves as principal research engineer at the Georgia Tech Research Institute, SRI has expanded support for space research and commercialization through initiatives such as the CreationsVC Space Fellows Program and Centers, Programs, and Initiatives seed grant program.

SRI’s efforts are in line with Georgia Tech’s long-standing contribution to space exploration. Hundreds of Yellow Jacket alumni work in the space sector, including several graduates who are playing key roles in the Artemis program. To date, more than a dozen Georgia Tech alumni have traveled to space.

Exploring the Final Frontier

The conference featured a series of panels and discussions led by faculty and researchers from the Colleges of Sciences and Engineering as well as the Ivan Allen College of Liberal Arts. 

Sessions explored how researchers are studying the processes and conditions that support planetary habitability, seeking to answer one of humanity’s greatest questions: Does life exist beyond Earth? Speakers also examined how analog fieldwork in Earth’s extreme environments can inform space exploration, and how space research, in turn, can deepen our understanding of our own world.

Additional conversations centered on building better space missions through improved understanding of team and individual resilience, data collection, navigation, and the development of advanced technologies like the robots developed through the NASA LASSIE Project. 

Frontiers also highlighted Georgia Tech’s commitment to preparing the next generation of space scientists, engineers, and leaders. Student training and engagement were recurring themes throughout the day, with speakers emphasizing opportunities for student-led and student-run missions and research. A panel of Georgia Tech alumni shared their own STEM career journeys, challenging the idea of “one right path” to success — and acknowledging the resources and opportunities available at the Institute. 

A highlight of the conference was a fireside chat with Atlanta-native, retired U.S. Army Colonel and NASA Astronaut R. Shane Kimbrough (M.S. Operations Research 1998). Kimbrough, who spent a total of 388 days in space and performed nine spacewalks across three missions, reflected on his career and the evolution of spaceflight. He emphasized the expanding role of public-private and international partnerships in advancing ambitious goals, such as creating a permanent human outpost on the Moon. 

Policy and Public

The conference also explored how policy influences space discovery and innovation, with discussions touching on such issues as space security, access, governance, sustainability — and the influence of technology and science fiction on public perception and policy. 

Panelists described current policy frameworks governing outer space as struggling to keep pace with rapidly advancing technologies and expanding activities. According to these experts, increasing tensions among commercial, research, and recreational uses of space call for greater coordination among private and government entities to balance competing priorities while maximizing opportunities for innovation and exploration. 

The conference was punctuated by a networking lunch connecting attendees with Atlanta’s public astronomy community – including partners at several universities and the Georgia Tech Astronomy Club, which set up telescopes for attendees to safely observe the sun. Later that evening, the Georgia Tech Observatory hosted its Public Night, welcoming the broader Atlanta community to campus for telescope views of Jupiter, the Orion Nebula, and other celestial bodies. 

The Observatory Night was a fitting conclusion to a full day focused on Georgia Tech’s commitment and contributions to inspiring future generations of space explorers through research, education, and outreach. 

Experience the Frontiers conference in pictures on the College of Sciences’ Flickr account.

A research team led by Yuhang Hu, associate professor in the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering and the School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, has created a new material designed to do exactly that. In a new study published in Advanced Materials, Hu and her collaborators describe a groundbreaking class of “living” polymers that can grow, shrink, heal, and even regenerate long after fabrication.

Their work combines advances in chemistry, mechanics, and materials design into a polymer platform that could reshape how engineered products are built, maintained, and recycled.

Read the full story on the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering website.

A team of researchers led by Ankur Singh, the Carl Ring Family Professor in the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering and professor in the Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering at Georgia Tech and Emory University, has been awarded up to $6 million from the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) of the U.S. Department of Defense to accelerate the development of medical countermeasures (MCMs) against deadly biological threats that endanger public health, national security, and warfighters.

DTRA’s mission is to provide solutions that enable the Department of Defense, the U.S. government, and international partners to deter strategic threats. A key priority is advancing new or improved MCMs that can be deployed before or after exposure to biological or chemical agents.

Singh’s multi-year project, Systematic Human Immune Engineering for Lethal Disease (SHIELD) Countermeasures, aims to create a threat-agnostic platform that transforms how respiratory pathogens and toxins are studied. The platform is designed to speed up the discovery, development, and production of immune-based countermeasures.

Read the full story on the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering website.

The award, named for the Iowa-based nonprofit’s founder, recognizes midcareer scientists and engineers for research impact, mentoring, scientific-community activities, and commitment to communicating science and technology. It will be formally presented to Erickson in May on the Georgia Tech campus.

Read the full story on the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering website.

“It was frustrating, but it showed me how many people were being left out of the digital world,” Espinosa said. “In Colombia, only about two out of 10 people have a credit card. Cash is the main form of payment, but everything online requires digital access.”

That gap sparked the idea that would evolve into Loto Punto, a fintech startup building self-service kiosks to bridge the physical and digital worlds for unbanked communities. 

From a Single Problem to a Scalable Platform

Espinosa began his startup as an online platform for buying lottery tickets. He saw that customers didn’t trust the idea of a digital receipt because they were used to a printout, so he pivoted to a kiosk similar to the ones in U.S. grocery stores. Customers could walk up, insert cash, and print a lottery ticket instantly. 
“It worked, but it had a ceiling,” Espinosa said. “It only served people buying lottery tickets. We knew it wouldn’t scale.”

To address this, he expanded the kiosks to handle mobile phone top-ups, bill payments, and basic banking services. Then, in 2024, the company incorporated advanced technologies such as biometric recognition and blockchain. Stellar Blockchain, first a partner, later became an investor of the startup, which helped Loto Punto to enable low-cost, real-time digital transactions and remittances. 

Now, users can convert physical cash into digital value or withdraw cash from digital wallets through a single machine.

A Global Solo Founder

Espinosa is the sole founder of Loto Punto, supported now by a 10‑person team of highly specialized engineers, designers, and manufacturing experts. He is currently pursuing his master’s degree in computer science at Georgia Tech while leading the company through its next chapter as part of the CREATE-X Startup Launch Spring 2026 cohort. 

Finding CREATE-X and Finding a Community

Espinosa learned about CREATE-X during his first semester at Georgia Tech. In 2024, CREATE-X widened its Startup Launch program to include a spring cohort to give founders, particularly graduating seniors, another chance to go all-in on developing their startup.

Espinosa admits he didn’t expect much when he first learned about the program.

“I didn’t know universities had programs like this. In Colombia, we don’t have accelerators embedded inside universities with venture support and dedicated staff,” he said. “So, I assumed CREATE X would be small, maybe one office helping a few students.”

What Espinosa found was different.

“They’re leveraging every resource that Georgia Tech offers. They can help with any challenge by tapping the doors of the network they already have established,“ he said. “It’s an ecosystem.”

As a part of the Startup Launch program, CREATE-X brings in founders from its ecosystem to speak to participants and give them actionable insights — founders who have raised funds, been acquired, and have had other successes as entrepreneurs. 

“That’s different,” Espinosa said. “They’ve brought successful founders who have walked the talk. It’s different to interact with somebody who was already successful in doing what you’re doing.”

Testing, Measuring, and Learning Through Startup Launch

Even as a remote participant, Espinosa has connected well with his mentor, who meets with him weekly, and his mini-batch. During the program, startup teams are grouped together. They share their strategies, successes, and struggles as they develop throughout the program. Teams have weekly sprints where they focus on one or two activities and then measure those activities, which Espinosa said is helpful for maintaining focus and actually executing on ideas.

“If you, as an entrepreneur, start thinking of the whole world of activities that you must do to get somewhere with your startup, you won’t start,” he said. “By creating attainable goals, step by step, that’s how it compounds to reach bigger goals. But, you have to begin with something.”
Teams are also encouraged to take calculated risks.

“CREATE-X gives us a safe environment to test ideas,” Espinosa said. “As an entrepreneur, it’s a lonely road, but having someone who has been in your shoes before, it makes you brave to try things.”

One of the first major tests he shared with the cohort was an ad campaign timed around the Super Bowl. In Startup Launch, Espinosa learned how to structure the experiment: defining KPIs, iterating audiences, and evaluating performance compared to industry benchmarks.

“We got around 45,000 views and above-average click-through rates,” he said. “But the biggest lesson was that brand awareness alone can’t be our only marketing strategy.”

Espinosa said his mentor helped open doors for him and kept him accountable, and the program itself kept him from being overwhelmed by all that a founder has to do.

“In Startup Launch, you see how different approaches fit different phases,” he said. “They’re creating a path to grow and execute on your goals as a founder.”

Why Now Is the Easiest Time to Build

Espinosa also emphasized that the tools to build and test ideas have never been more accessible.

“When I started, we didn’t have AI. You had to do everything by hand. It was harder, and it took more resources,” he said. “Right now, it’s a matter of prompting. In one hour, you can file for a grant. Before, it took at least a week to get your documents together.”

He said the ability to test quickly and learn has also become inexpensive.

“You don’t need millions of dollars to do this,” Espinosa said. “It's very cheap to fail, right? If that doesn't work, you can just try again in the morning.”

Above all, Espinosa encouraged budding founders to take advantage of the opportunities around them.

“As a founder, you must tap every door that you have available to you. You have to explore different paths,” he said. “Some of those are networking, some are physical space, some are interest. Get your hands on every single resource that comes your way.”

Looking Ahead: The Future of Payments

As he thinks about where the finance world is going, Espinosa said the payments industry is rapidly converging toward blockchain, stablecoins, and faster, frictionless user experiences.

“We’re seeing a lot of movement around stablecoins. We’re seeing resource flow from one country to another. We believe things are converging to leverage blockchain and driving down the cost of moving money,“ he said. “That’s how we see the future of our industry.”

Meet Loto Punto and the Spring Cohort at Startup Launch Showcase

Espinosa will travel to Atlanta for the first time in May to present Loto Punto at the CREATE-X Spring Startup Launch Showcase, where the public can meet founders and see their ventures firsthand. The event will be held in The Biltmore Ballrooms on Thursday, May 21, from 5 to 7 p.m.

The showcase will feature dozens of startups built by Georgia Tech students and alumni. Tickets are free but limited. Register for the showcase today to grab your spot.
 

“The topic of the Suddath Symposium changes every year, which allows the Georgia Tech research community to annually learn about recent advances on a specific topic from across the immense fields of bioengineering and bioscience,” said Nicholas Hud, Regents’ Professor in the School of Chemistry and Biochemistry and Associate Director of IBB.

The symposium also included presentation of the 2026 Suddath Award, which recognizes outstanding graduate research. This year’s award was presented to Myeongsoo Kim, a Ph.D. candidate in the Bioengineering Graduate Program, for his work at the intersection of cell engineering, cancer treatment, and biomedical imaging. The award is presented each year by members of the Suddath family, including Vincent Suddath, grandson of Bud and a current freshman at Georgia Tech majoring in mathematics.

The symposium and award honor the legacy of F. L. “Bud” Suddath and his lasting contributions to the Institute and the wider Georgia Tech research community.

“Bud was influential in promoting the growth of bioscience research at Georgia Tech, efforts that helped establish IBB in the 1990s,” Hud said. “Bud’s research interests were at the forefront of structural biology, a field that laid the foundation for much of what we know today about biology at the molecular level. It’s fitting that we honor Bud’s contributions by annually providing the Georgia Tech community with the opportunity to learn about research on a timely topic within the biological sciences.”

Symposium co-chairs Tara Deans and Mark Styczynski said that in addition to upholding the legacy of Bud Suddath, the event also provides a unique setting and opportunity for both established researchers and trainees to interact over the course of the two day event. The intimate format of the symposium, which is limited to approximately 100 attendees, and the annual selection of a different interdisciplinary topic sets it apart from other symposia.

“The Suddath Symposium is an amazing opportunity to bring multiple world-class researchers right to our trainees’ front door, to hear about their work and connect with them in a small setting that you can’t really find at most conferences,” said Styczynski, who is a professor in the School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering. “We are really grateful to IBB and the Suddath family for supporting this unique event.”

Deans, who is an associate professor in the Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering, highlighted how this year’s theme reflects a broader shift in the field.

“This year’s focus on biomedical applications of synthetic biology highlights a major inflection point in the field: the transition from proof-of-concept systems to human health-relevant technologies,” she said. “The theme also reflects increasing convergence across disciplines; synthetic biology is no longer operating in isolation, but it is deeply intertwined with immunology, machine learning, diagnostics, and clinical translation. Addressing real-world biomedical problems requires this kind of integration, and the symposium captured that shift very clearly.”

The Suddath Symposium annually serves as a cornerstone event for Georgia Tech’s bioengineering and bioscience community — connecting researchers, honoring scientific legacy, and spotlighting the next generation of scientific innovation.

On April 2, Georgia Tech launched its new Institute for Technology and Civic Leadership with a symposium built around a simple idea. Society benefits when people are willing to listen, especially to those who disagree with them. 

“Attending the 75th Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting is both an honor and a responsibility: a chance to represent my academic community which focuses on the study of elusive particles called neutrinos while learning from those who have shaped the field,” says Papadopoulou, who will join Georgia Tech as a School of Physics assistant professor in August 2026. “I hope to come away with a deeper understanding of how transformative ideas emerge and how to cultivate the kind of leadership and vision needed to guide future large-scale scientific efforts that will unravel some of the mysteries of the universe.”

Papadopoulou obtained her Ph.D. in experimental physics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. As part of her research, she analyzed neutrino data collected by the MicroBooNE detector at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in Illinois and electron scattering data from the Jefferson Lab in Virginia. 

In 2022, she joined Argonne National Laboratory as a Maria Goeppert Mayer Fellow, continuing her research as a member of the MicroBooNE, Short-Baseline Near Detector, Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment, and Jefferson Lab’s Electrons-For-Neutrinos collaborations. Her work focuses on testing the performance of simulation predictions against existing and new neutrino and electron data sets. 

Papadopoulou currently serves as a J. Robert Oppenheimer Fellow at Los Alamos National Laboratory where she is working to better understand neutrino interactions.

“The effects move slowly and appear in places people do not connect to energy,” said Tibor Besedes, professor in the School of Economics. “Oil and natural gas are part of the cost structure for an enormous range of goods.”

About 20% of global oil and liquefied natural gas flows through the waterway linking the Persian Gulf to world markets. When that flow is constrained, the impact ripples outward across industries most people never associate with an energy crisis.

“In complex supply chains, a disruption in one critical link, even if only briefly, can cascade through the system, well beyond the initial event,” says Pinar Keskinocak, chair and professor in the H. Milton Stewart School of Industrial and Systems Engineering. “As delays persist and compound, interconnected systems often take a long time to recover, rebalance, and return to normal.”

Price Pressures That Arrive Quietly

Early effects are already visible. 

Jet fuel availability is tightening, and diesel prices are rising across Asia. China has ordered refineries to stop exporting fuel, creating shortages that are increasing shipping costs for U.S. imports, from consumer electronics to pharmaceuticals.

The strait is also a key corridor for naphtha, a feedstock used to produce plastics, packaging, solvents, textiles, and pharmaceutical components. Roughly 85% of Middle Eastern polyethylene exports move through the strait. 

“Consumers won't see the effect of this quickly,” Besedes says, “but the longer the strait is closed, the higher the cost will be of all of these products naphtha is used for.”

Aluminum is equally exposed. 

“Smelters require sustained, low-cost energy,” said Chris Gaffney, a professor of the practice in the Stewart School. “The Middle East accounted for roughly 21% of U.S. unwrought aluminum imports in 2025. When energy prices spike or supply is constrained, capacity is reduced or shut down, and those decisions are difficult and slow to reverse.”

Fertilizer is one of the clearest examples of delayed inflation. Natural gas is essential for its production, and Persian Gulf states account for one-third of global urea exports and half of global sulfur exports. Urea prices at the New Orleans import hub have already climbed sharply.

“We won't see the effects quickly, but rather in six to 12 months, depending on the crop and its cycle,” Besedes says. “Without or with less fertilizer, crop yields will decrease, resulting in higher prices.”

Why Hormuz Is Different From Other Chokepoints

On top of all those factors, the strait closure presents a uniquely dangerous vulnerability. 

“Unlike a port strike or canal blockage, there is no meaningful way to reroute volume,” says Gaffney. “If it is disrupted, flow is constrained rather than redirected.” Pipeline alternatives replace only a fraction of the 20 million barrels per day that normally transit the strait.

“Choke point vulnerability arises when a large portion of flow depends on a route that is hard to substitute,” said Mathieu Dahan, associate professor in the Stewart School. “Hormuz has no scalable alternatives with sufficient capacity.” 

Alan Erera, senior associate chair in the Stewart School expanded on Dahan’s point, noting that strait disruptions raise costs across manufacturing and distribution.

“Ships are rerouted onto longer paths, which drives up fuel and labor costs, ties up vessels and containers for longer periods, and ultimately raises inventory costs for shippers because capital is locked up while goods are still in transit,” Erera said.

When Geopolitics Meets Global Supply Chains

Additionally, the strait closure raises the risk of wartime miscalculation. 

“We haven’t seen a disruption on this scale since the tanker wars of the late 1980s,” said Larry Rubin, associate professor in the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs. Gulf states' dependence on the strait constrains both regional actors and U.S. strategy, raising risks around crisis decision-making.

Rubin also points to a dimension most coverage has missed entirely. “One thing that has been overlooked by many commentators is the fact that the Iranian people have probably been hit the hardest economically,” he says. “They were already in a challenging situation. The Iranian economy won't recover quickly after the war.”

Resilience Has a Short Memory

Meanwhile, for the United States, “The Strategic Petroleum Reserve provides a buffer, and domestic energy production has improved resilience,” says Gaffney. “But the gap remains between enabling capacity and sustaining resilience. Policy can support infrastructure, but it cannot ensure private sector participants invest in resilience when cost pressures rise.”

For policymakers and industry leaders, the disruption reinforces a familiar pattern. "The supply chain remains optimized for efficiency rather than resilience, in part due to the high investment costs required to build flexibility," says Dahan. 

Gaffney added that resilience does improve after disruption, but that “it erodes over time if not actively maintained.”

Even if the strait reopens, higher costs and slow restart timelines mean the system will not snap back. Experts suggest that when headlines have moved on from this disruption, it will still be shaping prices across the economy. 

The approaches of over a dozen quantum computing companies are now being evaluated through the Quantum Benchmarking Initiative (QBI), a project of the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). According to the agency, QBI “aims to rigorously verify and validate whether any quantum computing approach can achieve utility-scale operation – meaning its computational value exceeds its cost – by the year 2033.”
 

Supporting the effort, a 40-person interdisciplinary research team from the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) has joined the test and evaluation component of QBI, providing unbiased subject-matter experts to work with 13 other research organizations in evaluating the R&D plans of participating quantum computer companies. Through this collaboration, the GTRI team is working with more than 400 other third-party experts on the project.
 

Read the complete article on the GTRI news site

TokenSmith is a citation-supported large language model (LLM) tutor that can be hosted locally on a user’s personal computer. The tutor only provides answers based on course materials, such as the textbook or lecture slides.  

Associate Professor Joy Arulraj began the project with support from the Bill Kent Family Foundation AI in Higher Education Faculty Fellowship last year. The fellowship, led by Georgia Tech’s Center for 21st Century Universities, supports faculty projects exploring innovative and ethical uses of AI in teaching.   

Arulraj has enlisted assistant professors Kexin Rong and Steve Mussmann to help build TokenSmith.  

Mussmann said TokenSmith is a synergistic blend of a database system and a machine learning system. The model stores textbooks, textbook annotations by course staff, common questions and answers, a learning state of the student, and student feedback in a structured database system. However, machine learning plays a key role in the answer generation as well as adapting the system to the student, course staff guidance, and user feedback.

"What excites me most is demonstrating how data-driven ML and principled database systems design can reinforce each other — one providing adaptability and flexibility, the other providing structure and traceability — in a way that benefits students," Mussmann said.

Keeping the model local has been an important focus of the project. The team wanted to create an AI tutor that helps students learn from their class resources rather than just giving answers. With each response, TokenSmith cites the origin of the answer in the provided documents.  

“One problem with LLMs is that they can hallucinate and provide wrong answers, but in this controlled environment, we can add these guardrails to make sure it’s actually helpful in an educational setting,” Rong said.  

Rong said she feels that students often undervalue textbooks, and she hopes TokenSmith can motivate students to make better use of them.  

“Textbooks can sometimes be daunting, but maybe if we combine them with the model, students might be more willing to read a paragraph or page in the textbook, and that could help clarify something for them,” she said.  

Running the model locally is more cost-effective and helps preserve the user’s privacy. But running the new tool locally comes with technical challenges.  

One challenge with creating the model is speed. Since it is a locally based model, TokenSmith depends solely on the user’s computer memory.  Tests have also shown that the tutor currently struggles to answer more complex questions. 

“We are interested in pushing the boundaries of these local models so that they give students good answers and also run fast enough to keep students engaged,” Arulraj said.  

A team of researchers led by Ankur Singh, the Carl Ring Family Professor in the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering and professor in the Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering at Georgia Tech and Emory University, has been awarded up to $6 million from the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) of the U.S. Department of Defense to accelerate the development of medical countermeasures (MCMs) against deadly biological threats that endanger public health, national security, and warfighters.

DTRA’s mission is to provide solutions that enable the Department of Defense, the U.S. government, and international partners to deter strategic threats. A key priority is advancing new or improved MCMs that can be deployed before or after exposure to biological or chemical agents.

Singh’s multi-year project, Systematic Human Immune Engineering for Lethal Disease (SHIELD) Countermeasures, aims to create a threat-agnostic platform that transforms how respiratory pathogens and toxins are studied. The platform is designed to speed up the discovery, development, and production of immune-based countermeasures.

Singh leads a collaborative team that includes Cornell University’s Matthew DeLisa and Stanford University’s Michael Jewett. Together, they will integrate immune-engineering technologies with advanced cell-free protein synthesis platforms to discover and manufacture protein-based MCMs. Cell-free protein synthesis is a laboratory technique that efficiently produces proteins without relying on living cells, which can be unpredictable and technically demanding when it comes to expressing complex or toxic proteins and scaling production quickly. The team expects the SHIELD Countermeasures platform to reduce the time and cost of MCM development by more than tenfold.

“The foundational science and cutting-edge tools we develop will ignite future discoveries, ensuring a robust pipeline of advanced protein-based MCMs for chemical and biological defense,” said Singh, who also directs the Center for Immunoengineering at Georgia Tech. “This will significantly enhance national security and equip our warfighters with next-generation biodefense capabilities."

Traditional animal models often fail to accurately replicate human immune responses, and standard tissue cultures lack the complexity required to study how immune cells interact with pathogens. In contrast, human immune organoids and immune-competent devices — built from human cells — are emerging as groundbreaking research tools. These systems recreate key immune features, such as lymph nodes and mucosal environments, within three-dimensional or microengineered platforms.

“Many organoid and engineering devices, often called organ-on-chip platforms, lack immune integration,” Singh said. “Because immunity sits at the center of human health, these limitations have broad consequences. Immune-competent organ-on-chip platforms extend this concept by combining human cells with microfluidic engineering that simulates blood flow, tissue barriers, and chemical gradients.”

Singh has previously published studies on a synthetic human immune chip and an immunocompetent lung on a chip, and has also teamed up with DeLisa previously to use synthetic immune organoids for immuno-profiling antibacterial MCMs.

“It’s about being able to test far larger numbers of candidate protein-based MCMs in a single experiment—and to do it much faster,” DeLisa said. “Cell-free systems allow us to produce MCMs at unprecedented speed and scale, but traditional evaluation methods can’t keep up with those numbers. By combining cell-free MCM production with immune organoid technology, we can assess the potency of dozens or even hundreds of candidates at a time and characterize the resulting immune responses within just a few days.”

By integrating immune cells with tissues such as lung, gut, skin, or vascular systems, these devices allow scientists to observe immune responses in real time, including cell migration, inflammation, and interactions with pathogens or therapeutics. As biological threats evolve, the development and deployment of immune-competent platforms will be critical for rapid, effective countermeasures.

DTRA’s investment in Singh’s work highlights the urgent national priority of strengthening U.S. biodefense capabilities. The SHIELD Countermeasures platform and its cutting-edge technologies promise to transform the nation’s response to biological threats and help safeguard communities from biological and chemical attacks.

A philanthropic gift from the family of J.P. Singh is helping researchers at Georgia Tech push the boundaries of biomedical innovation.  

The new study is the first to visualize mosquito flight patterns and provides hard data for improving capture and control strategies. In addition to being a nuisance, mosquitoes transmit diseases such as malaria, yellow fever, and Zika, which cause more than 700,000 deaths every year.

“It’s like a crowded bar,” said David Hu, a professor in Georgia Tech’s George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering and the School of Biological Sciences, with an adjunct appointment in the School of Physics. “Customers aren’t there because they followed each other into the bar. They’re attracted by the same cues: drinks, music, and the atmosphere. The same is true of mosquitoes. Rather than following the leader, the insect follows the signals and happens to arrive at the same spot as the others. They’re good copies of each other.”

Read more and watch: 
Georgia Tech College of Engineering newsroom and The Conversation

ISyE researchers are applying AI to complex manufacturing environments, including multistage production systems, asset management, quality improvement, and human‑centered manufacturing. Faculty leaders emphasize the importance of contextualizing large volumes of manufacturing data so AI can support reliable decision‑making, efficient operations, and sustainable outcomes. At the same time, the initiative acknowledges challenges such as data integration, system complexity, and the need to balance automation with human involvement. Together, these efforts position ISyE at the forefront of shaping AI‑powered manufacturing systems that are innovative, resilient, and socially responsible.

Read the full article in ISyE Magazine 

The paper examines various strategies for enhancing the flexibility of data center energy use. One approach is to use backup power systems, such as uninterruptible power supplies, to support the grid during emergencies. Another method involves rerouting computing jobs to different data centers in other locations to balance energy demand. The authors also discuss implementing smart scheduling techniques that shift workloads to off-peak hours, reducing strain on the grid. Additionally, they highlight adjusting processor speeds by lowering CPU (central processing unit) and GPU (graphics processing unit) clock rates to limit power consumption when needed. Finally, the paper suggests pre-cooling data center equipment to limit the energy required for cooling during peak demand periods. Notably, experimental evidence shows that underclocking GPUs can cut power consumption by 40% with only a 22% performance loss, suggesting technical feasibility for demand-response interventions.

Despite these technical options, the authors find that real-world cost considerations and reliability concerns limit widespread adoption. Data center operators generally do not change their behavior in response to electricity prices, as job revenue far outweighs energy costs under normal conditions. For example, a GPU rented at $2 per hour consumes only $0.04 worth of electricity at average prices, making curtailment unattractive except during extreme price spikes. Surveys indicate that operators are reluctant to compromise reliability or deploy backup systems for ancillary services. Consequently, price-based incentives alone are unlikely to drive meaningful flexibility.

Read more on the EPIcenter Webpage
Listen to a podcast on the research here

That’s one of the main findings from a study by AI Caring on what older adults expect from explainable AI (XAI).

AI Caring is one of three AI Institutions led by Georgia Tech and funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF). The institution supports AI research that benefits older adults and their caregivers.

Niharika Mathur, a Ph.D. candidate in the School of Interactive Computing, was the lead author of a paper based on the study. The paper will be presented in April at the 2026 ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI) in Barcelona.

Mathur worked with the Cognitive Empowerment Program at Emory University to interview 23 older adults who live alone and use voice-activated AI assistants like Amazon’s Alexa and Google Home.

Many of them told her they feel excluded from the design of these products.

“The assumption is that all people want interactions the same way and across all kinds of situations, but that isn’t true,” Mathur said. “How older people use AI and what they want from it are different from what younger people prefer.”

One example she gave is that young people tend to be informal when talking with AI. Older people, on the other hand, talk to the agent like they would a person.

“If Older adults are talking to their family members about Alexa, they usually refer to Alexa as ‘she’ instead of ‘it,’” Mathur said. “They tend to humanize these systems a lot more than young people.”

Good Explanations

The study evaluated AI explanations that drew information from four sources of data:

• User history (past conversations with the agent)
• Environmental data (indoor temperature or the weather forecast)
• Activity data (how much time a user spends in different areas of the home)
• Internal reasoning (mathematical probabilities and likely outcomes)

Mathur said older users trust the agent more when it bases its explanations on data from the first three sources. However, internal reasoning creates skepticism.

Internal reasoning means the AI doesn’t have enough data from the other sources to give an explanation. It provides a percentage to reflect its confidence based on what it knows.

“The overwhelming response was negative toward confidence scores,” Mathur said. “If the AI says it’s 92% confident, older adults want to know what that’s based on.”

This is another example that Mathur said points to generational preferences.

“There’s a lot of explainable AI research that shows younger people like to see numbers in explanations, and they also tend to rely too much on explanations that contain numerical confidence. Older adults are the opposite. It makes them trust it less.”

Knowing the Context

Mathur said that AI agents interacting with older adults should serve a dual purpose. They should provide users with companionship and support independence while reducing the caretaking burden often placed on family members. 

Some studies have shown that engineers have tended to favor caretakers in the design of these tools. They prioritize daily tasks and routines, leaving some older adults to feel like they are merely a box to be checked.

She discovered that in urgent situations, older users prefer the AI to be straightforward, while in casual settings, they desire more conversation.

“How people interact with technological systems is grounded in what the stakes of the situation are,” she said. “If it had anything to do with their immediate sense of safety, they did not want conversational elaboration. They want the AI to be very direct and factual.”

Not Just Checking Boxes

Mathur said AI agents that interact with older adults are ideally constructed with a dual purpose. They should provide companionship and autonomy for the users while alleviating the burden of caretaking that is often placed on their family members. 

Some studies have shown that engineers have strayed toward favoring caretakers in the design of these tools. They prioritize daily tasks and routines, leaving some older adults to feel like they are a box to be checked.

“They’re not being thought of as consumers,” Mathur said. “A lot of products are being made for them but not with them.”

She also said psychological well-being is one of the most important outcomes these tools should produce. 

Showing older adults that they are listened to can significantly help in gaining their trust. Some interviewees told Mathur they want agents who are deliberate about understanding their preferences and don’t dismiss their questions.

Meeting these needs reduces the likelihood of protesting and creating conflict with family members.

“It highlights just how important well-designed explanations are,” she said. “We must go beyond a transparency checklist.”

As new data centers continue to be built and proposed in Georgia, counties and municipalities across the state are considering how to guide this growth. EPIcenter’s data center dashboard provides policymakers, planners, researchers, and community stakeholders with a centralized resource to better understand how data center regulations are being developed and applied across Georgia and the U.S.

“Our Data Center Hub provides Georgia communities with a one-stop shop to understand how their neighbors are managing land-use regulations for data centers,” said Laura Taylor, director of EPIcenter. “It brings together clear, accessible information to help jurisdictions plan when data center growth occurs in their area.”

The dashboard is organized around five thematic areas commonly addressed in data center land-use regulations: Site Planning and Building Design, Infrastructure and Utilities, Environmental and Community Protections, Public Safety and Security, and Lifecycle Governance. Within each theme, users can explore specific regulatory topics and access the relevant ordinances enacted by Georgia communities.

To build the dashboard, EPIcenter researchers conducted a comprehensive review of municipal codes across the state.

“We reviewed municipal codes for about 180 cities and counties across Georgia and identified ordinances that specifically address data center development,” said Yang You, EPIcenter’s research associate who developed the project. “In total, we found 19 data center-specific topics that ordinances tend to cover. We analyzed ordinances across jurisdictions and organized their ordinance provisions into topics such as building placement, setbacks, infrastructure, and environmental considerations to make it easier to compare how different jurisdictions regulate data centers.”

You added that the dashboard also incorporates examples from outside of Georgia. By gathering ordinances from other states and pairing them with Georgia-specific examples, EPIcenter aims to provide a clear framework to help communities efficiently address data center land-use regulation.

The Georgia Data Center Ordinance Hub is available through the Energy Policy and Innovation Center website.

That support, however, begins to disappear in these restrictive cultures once women reach menopause, according to new research from Georgia Tech

Naveena Karusala, an assistant professor in Georgia Tech’s School of Interactive Computing, and master’s student Umme Ammara are working toward improving existing technologies and designing new ones for a demographic they believe has been neglected.

Karusala and Ammara co-authored a paper based on a study they conducted with women in urban Pakistan experiencing menopause.

“Women’s health is understudied in general, but menopause is more neglected than other women’s health issues,” Karusala said. “Our choice to focus on menopause is motivated by expanding how we holistically think about women’s well-being across their lifespan.”

Karusala and Ammara will present their paper in April at the 2026 ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI) in Barcelona.

Masking Symptoms

Menopause is diagnosed after 12 consecutive months without a period, vaginal bleeding, or spotting. The transition to menopause, called perimenopause, usually happens over two to eight years.

Hormone changes may cause symptoms such as irregular periods, vaginal dryness, hot flashes, night sweats, trouble sleeping, mood swings, and brain fog.

These symptoms can be debilitating in some cases and affect daily life. However, Ammara said women are pressured to remain silent, maintain appearances, and regulate their emotions to meet social expectations.

“Understanding menopause is important because a woman would be experiencing all these symptoms, and people will not understand those as actual symptoms,” Ammara said. “There’s been resistance to the idea of the medicalization of menopause. People don’t view it as an illness, but as a life transition and something that happens naturally.”

Feeling Isolated

The women interviewed by Karusala and Ammara either stayed at home full-time or were part of the workforce.

The researchers discovered that trusted family members might be the only sources women who stay at home and do not work turn to for disclosure. 

“Women at home have the flexibility to take breaks or work at their own pace, so a lot of their experience is shaped by the emotional barriers they face,” Ammara said. 

“That could come from their husbands and family members. Some are supportive and some are not. They might weaponize it and use that term against them, or they might dismiss what they’re going through.”

Ammara said it might be easier for women in the workforce to confide in their coworkers, but explaining to an employer that they need sick leave for menopause symptoms can be intimidating.

Even in online communities that have enabled women to anonymously share their health experiences, menopause is seldom discussed.

Raising Awareness

Karusala and Ammara argue in their paper that a public health approach could be the most effective way to spark conversation about menopause in a patriarchal culture in which technology use varies.

They said the challenge in implementing technologies geared toward menopause support is that the condition isn’t well understood in public. Improving maternal health, for example, is easier to promote within these societies because of the general understanding that motherhood is important.

“There must be an existing infrastructure to build on,” Karusala said. “For example, menstrual and maternal health are taught in schools and regularly discussed in primary care. Cultural and social meaning and importance are placed on motherhood.

“A lot of that doesn’t exist for menopause. Primary care doctors are unprepared to talk about menopause compared to other health issues.”

Design Solutions

Ammara said that the most effective way for technologies to make an impact on women going through menopause is to directly address systemic power structures around women’s health within Pakistani culture.

It can start with the husbands. 

“Framing the issue for husbands to understand menopause should be at the forefront of designing technology solutions,” she said. 

“In Islamic contexts, we suggest using faith-based framings. This has been proposed for maternal health in prior works that draw on Islamic principles to engage expectant fathers in providing care and support. Framing it around religious responsibility to involve men in the journey can also be done for menopause.”

Published today in the journal Nature Communications, the paper “Trivalent Titanium in High-Titanium Lunar Ilmenite” confirms titanium in a reduced, trivalent state in a black, metal-rich lunar mineral called ilmenite. It’s a state only possible in low-oxygen environments, conditions researchers refer to as “reducing.”

“Models have suggested that these reducing conditions may have varied at different locations and times across the surface of the Moon,” says lead author Advik Vira, a graduate student in the School of Physics who recently earned his doctoral degree. “We hope our microscopy technique can be a valuable step in mapping and understanding the Moon’s 4.5-billion-year history.”

The team anticipates that their technique could be used on many of the lunar samples collected more than 50 years ago by the Apollo missions in addition to the Apollo Next Generation Samples — a group of lunar samples that have been stored under pristine conditions — and new samples from the planned Artemis missions, with Artemis II slated for launch this spring. The technique might also be applicable to samples collected from the far side of the Moon and returned in 2024 by the Chang’e-6 mission.

“The Moon holds clues not only to its own past, but also to the earliest eras of Earth’s evolution — history that has long since been erased from our planet,” Vira says. “This study is a step toward understanding the history of both and a reminder that there is still so much left to learn from the lunar rocks we’ve brought back to Earth.”

The School of Physics research team included corresponding authors Vira and Professor Phillip First; in addition to graduate student Roshan Trivedi; undergraduate students Gabriella Dotson, Keyes Eames, Dean Kim, and Emma Livernois; and Professor Zhigang Jiang, along with Institute for Matter and Systems Materials Characterization Facility Senior Research Scientist Mengkun Tian; School of Chemistry and Biochemistry Senior Research Scientist Brant Jones and Thom Orlando, Regents' Professor in the School of Chemistry and Biochemistry with a joint appointment in the School of Physics. 

The Georgia Tech team was joined by Addis Energy Senior Geochemist Katherine Burgess; Macalester College Assistant Professor of Geology Emily First; along with Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory Research Scientist Harrison Lisabeth, Senior Scientist Nobumichi Tamura, and Postdoctoral Fellow Tyler Farr, who recently earned a Ph.D. from Georgia Tech’s George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering.

CLEVER research

The investigation began with a dark gray rock called a lunar basalt. Formed when ancient magma erupted on the Moon’s surface, minerals crystallized as it cooled — preserving key information in their structures. Billions of years later, the rock was brought to Earth by the 1972 Apollo 17 mission, where a small piece is now stored at Georgia Tech’s Center for Lunar Environment and Volatile Exploration Research (CLEVER), a NASA Solar System Exploration Research Virtual Institute (SSERVI) center led by Orlando.

As a NASA virtual institute, CLEVER supports researchers exploring lunar conditions and developing tools for the upcoming crewed Artemis missions, and provided the lunar samples for this research. The SSERVI also plays a critical role in training the next generation of planetary researchers: both Vira and Farr earned their Ph.D.s while on the CLEVER team.

“At CLEVER, we are very interested in understanding the impacts of space weathering,” Vira says. “We implemented modern sample preparation and advanced microscopy techniques to image samples at the atomic level, and were curious to apply it more broadly to the collection of Apollo rocks in the Orlando Lab. This sample caught our attention.”

“When we imaged an ilmenite crystal from the lunar basalt, what struck us first was how uniform and perfect the crystal structure was,” he recalls. “We found no defects from space weathering and instead saw an undamaged, pristine crystal — undisturbed for 3.8 billion years.”

To investigate further, the team analyzed small chips of the rock with Burgess, a member of the RISE2 SSERVI team and then a geologist at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory. Using state-of-the-art electron microscopy and spectroscopy techniques, Vira determined the oxidation state of the elements in the ilmenite present. 

In spectroscopy measurements, each element leaves a distinct ‘signature,’ Vira explains. “When we brought our results back to Georgia Tech’s Materials Characterization Facility, Mengkun (Tian) noticed something unusual: the signature showed titanium might be present in the trivalent state.”

The presence of trivalent titanium had long been suspected in this lunar mineral. The team was intrigued. 

A new window into old rocks

With funding from Georgia Tech’s Center for Space Technology and Research (CSTAR), Vira returned to the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory to analyze additional samples. The results confirmed that more titanium was present than the mineral’s formula (FeTiO₃) predicts — indicating a portion of the titanium present was trivalent.

“That led me to place our measurements in terms of the broader geological context,” Vira shares. Working with First, Vira explored how ilmenite with trivalent titanium could help reconstruct the nature of ancient magmas from the Moon, especially the chemical availability of oxygen.

“Because its location on the Moon was noted during the Apollo mission, we know exactly where this rock is from, and we can determine how old the rock is,” he explains. “When coupled with our trivalent titanium measurements, we can use that information to estimate the reducing conditions for this specific region at the specific time our rock formed.”

If the upcoming Artemis missions return samples suitable for the team’s technique, these rocks could provide a new window into ancient lunar geology. The research also highlights that many lunar samples already on Earth could be reexamined to look for trivalent titanium.

“There is still so much to learn from the lunar samples we have already brought to Earth,” Vira says. “It’s a testament to the long-term value of each sample return mission. As technology continues to advance, this type of work will continue to give us critical insights into our planet and our place in the universe for years to come.”

DOI: 10.1038/s41467-026-69770-w

Funding: This work was directly supported by the NASA SSERVI under CLEVER. Researchers were also supported by the NASA RISE2 SSERVI and the Heising-Simons Foundation. Funding for collaborations between the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory and Georgia Tech for the investigation of lunar minerals was provided by the Georgia Tech Center for Space Technology and Research. Sample preparation was performed at the Georgia Tech Institute for Matter and Systems, which is supported by the National Science Foundation. This work utilized the resources of the Advanced Light Source, a user facility supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of Basic Energy Sciences, and was supported in part by previous breakthroughs obtained through the Laboratory Direct.

The Georgia Scientific Computing Symposium (GSCS) held its annual meeting on February 21 in Athens. Since 2009, the event has hosted researchers from across the Peach State to showcase homegrown advances in scientific computing.

The symposium highlighted Georgia’s reputation as a computing innovation hub. People from around the world come to Georgia universities to lead computing research. By advancing science, engineering, medicine, and technology, their work improves communities at home and abroad.

Faculty and students from Georgia Tech, UGA, Georgia State University, and Emory University presented at the symposium. Georgia Tech participants came from the colleges of Computing, Engineering, and Sciences.

This year’s organizers agreed to meet in Atlanta for the 2027 symposium. Georgia Tech’s School of Computational Science and Engineering (CSE) will host the 19th GSCS.

“From healthcare to computer chip design, scientific computing underpins many of the technological advances we see in our lives,” said Professor Edmond Chow, associate chair of the School of CSE.

“Scientific computing provides the mathematical models, simulations, and data‑driven tools that make modern innovation possible. It allows people to analyze complex systems, test ideas virtually before building them, and make faster, more accurate decisions across nearly every sector of society.”

Professor Haomin Zhou and Assistant Professor Helen Xu delivered two of the symposium’s five plenary talks. 

Zhou presented a new method for solving the Schrödinger equation, a landmark equation in quantum mechanics. Drawing inspiration from the mathematics used in generative artificial intelligence models, his approach develops an algorithm that more effectively simulates waves, particle motion, and other physical systems.

Xu focused on improving how computers move and organize data during complex calculations. Her work uses “cache-friendly” layouts that help computers access data more efficiently, boosting performance for scientific and engineering applications.

“Speaking at GSCS was a great opportunity,” Xu said. “The symposium fostered connections within the scientific computing community and gave us a chance to share exciting research.”

The symposium showcased student work through a poster blitz and a poster session. During the blitz, 36 students each had one minute to introduce their research to the full audience. They then shared more details about their research during the poster session.

The student projects showed the range of fields supported by scientific computing. The session also provided attendees with an opportunity to connect and expand their professional networks, helping grow the field’s future impact.

“As an aerospace engineer by training and aspiring computational scientist, GSCS gave me the platform to network with other researchers in the field while showcasing my own research,” said M.S. student Kashvi Mundra. 

“I was able to connect with scientists across different disciplines whose work intersects with my own in unexpected ways. Those conversations pushed my thinking beyond my own lab's perspective, helping me see my work on physics-informed machine learning for inverse problems in a broader scientific computing context.”

Georgia Tech students who presented posters included:

Abir Haque (CSE), Massively Parallel Random Phase Approximation Correlation Energy via Lanczos Quadrature

Antonio Varagnolo (CSE), Physics-Enhanced Deep Surrogates for the Phonon Boltzmann Transport Equation

Ben Burns (CSE), Infinite-Dimensional Stein Variational Inference with Derivative-Informed Neural Operators

Ben Wilfong (CSE), Shocks without Shock Capturing; Compressible Flow at 1 quadrillion Degrees of Freedom without Loss of Accuracy

Daniel Vickers (CSE), Highly-Parallel Fluid-Solid Interactions for Compressible Flows

Eric Fowler (CSE), High-Performance Tensor Contractions in Computational Chemistry

Haoran Yan (Math), Understanding Denoising Autoencoders through the Manifold Hypothesis: A Geometric Perspective

Kashvi Mundra (CSE), Autoregressive Multifidelity Neural Surrogate Modeling under Scarce Data Regimes

Sebastián Gutiérrez Hernández (Math/CSE), PDPO: Parametric Density Path Optimization

Vivian Zhang (AE), Multifidelity Operator Inference: Non-Intrusive Reduced Order Modeling from Scarce Data

Xian Mae Hadia (CSE), Data Efficiency of Surrogate Models: Learning Physics Data from Full Field Data vs. Inductive Bias from Approximate PDE Solvers

Xiangming Huang (CSE), Neural Operator Accelerated Evolutionary Strategies for PDE-Constraint Optimization

Zhaiming Shen (Math), Understanding In-Context Learning on Structured Manifolds: Bridging Attention to Kernel Methods

Zhongjie Shi (Math), Towards Understanding Generalization in DP-GD: A Case Study in Training Two-Layer CNNs

New cybersecurity research from the Georgia Institute of Technology, however, revealed that crews aboard commercial vessels were often not adequately prepared to manage cyberattacks effectively due to systemic training gaps.

The findings are based on interviews conducted by researchers with more than 20 officer-level mariners to assess the maritime industry’s readiness to handle cybersecurity attacks at sea.

"Historically, cybersecurity research has focused heavily on cyber-physical systems like cars, factories, and industrial plants, but ships have largely been overlooked,” said Anna Raymaker, Ph.D. student and lead researcher.

“That gap is concerning when more than 90% of the world’s goods travel by sea. Recent incidents, from GPS spoofing to ships linked to subsea cable disruptions, show that maritime systems are increasingly part of the global cyber threat landscape.”

The researchers proposed four practical strategies to strengthen maritime cyber defenses and close the training gaps. Their findings were presented recently at the ACM SIGSAC Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS).

1. Make Cybersecurity Training Actually Maritime

Many of those interviewed for the study described current cybersecurity training as “boilerplate” — generic modules that don’t reflect real shipboard risks. 

Researchers recommend:

• Role-specific instruction: Navigation officers should learn to detect and identify GPS spoofing. Engineers should focus on vulnerabilities in remotely monitored systems.
• Bridging IT and Operational Technology: Crews need to understand how attacks on IT systems can trigger physical consequences in operational technology — including collisions, groundings, or explosions.
• Hands-on delivery: Replace passive PowerPoints with drills and in-person exercises that build muscle memory.
• Accessible standards: Training must account for the wide range of educational backgrounds across crews and be standardized across ranks.

2. Move Beyond “Call IT”

At sea, crews can’t simply escalate a cyber incident to a shore-based IT department and wait. Operational resilience requires onboard readiness.

Researchers recommend:

• Vessel-specific response plans: Ships need clear, actionable protocols for threats such as AIS jamming or radar manipulation.
• Military-style drills: Adopting MCON (Emission Control) exercises — used by the U.S. Military Sealift Command — can train crews to operate safely without electronic systems.
• Stronger connectivity controls: High-bandwidth satellite systems like Starlink introduce new risks. Clear policies and network segregation are essential to prevent new entry points for attackers.

Related Article: When GPS lies at sea: How electronic warfare is threatening ships and their crews by Anna Raymaker

3. Create Unified, Ship-Specific Regulations

Maritime cybersecurity regulations are often reactive and fragmented. Researchers argue the industry needs a cohesive, domain-specific framework.

Key recommendations include:

• A unified global model: Like the energy sector’s NERC CIP standards, a maritime framework could mandate baseline controls such as encryption, network segmentation, and anonymous incident reporting.
• Rules built for real crews: Regulations designed for large naval operations don’t translate well to smaller merchant or research vessels. Standards must reflect actual shipboard conditions.
• Future-proofing requirements: Autonomous ships and remotely operated vessels expand the cyber-physical attack surface. Regulations must proactively address these emerging technologies.

4. Invest in Maritime-Specific Cyber Research

Finally, the researchers stress that long-term resilience requires deeper technical research focused on maritime systems.

Priority areas include:

• Real-time intrusion detection systems tailored to shipboard protocols.
• Proactive security risk assessments of interconnected onboard systems.
• Cyber-physical modeling to better understand cascading failures in complex maritime environments.

The Bottom Line

Cyber threats at sea are no longer hypothetical. Mariners report real-world incidents ranging from GPS spoofing to ransomware that disrupts global trade.

“Through our interviews with mariners, I saw firsthand how much dedication and pride they take in their work,” said Raymaker. “Our goal is for this research to serve as a call to action for researchers, policymakers, and industry to invest more attention in maritime cybersecurity and support the people who risk their lives every day to keep global trade, food, and energy moving."

A Sea of Cyber Threats: Maritime Cybersecurity from the Perspective of Mariners was presented at CCS 2025. It was written by Raymaker and her colleagues, Ph.D. students Akshaya Kumar, Miuyin Yong Wong, and Ryan Pickren; Research Scientist Animesh Chhotaray, Associate Professor Frank Li, Associate Professor Saman Zonouz, and Georgia Tech Provost and Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs Raheem Beyah.

Li, an accomplished computer security and privacy researcher, joined Georgia Tech in 2020 as the Institute was launching the School of Cybersecurity and Privacy (SCP). He holds a joint appointment with the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE). 

“While tenure may be an individual's milestone, in reality, it reflects the help, support, and hard work of countless others,” Li said.

He credits his accomplishments to the ongoing mentorship and support he has received from faculty and staff at SCP, ECE, and Georgia Tech.

“I'm also extremely thankful to work with such amazing students at Georgia Tech, especially the Ph.D. students in my research lab, and the BS and MS students in my classes, who help our research efforts. Georgia Tech has been an amazing place to start my faculty career,” said Li.

Li advises five Ph.D. students at his Better Empirically Established Security (BEES) lab in SCP. They take a data-driven approach to understanding how security and privacy concerns manifest in practice, and use the insights gained to drive improvements in real-world security.

Their research examines how users, security operators, and attackers behave in various security and privacy-sensitive situations, often using internet-wide measurements, network traffic analysis, user studies and experiments, and large-scale data mining.

“The tenure and promotion to associate professor rank is in recognition of the outstanding research program Frank has developed at SCP,” said Mustaque Ahamad, interim chair and Regents’ Entrepreneur.

“He is an award-winning educator. We look forward to his continued leadership in the important areas of usable security and network security in the future.”

Li was among nine College of Computing faculty members who received promotion and tenure this year.

John P. Imlay Jr. Dean of Computing Vivek Sarkar emailed the College community with the good news.

“We are truly thrilled to celebrate this moment with you, as we recognize your contributions to our students and to the advancement of our College and Institute in so many ways,” he said.

In 2025, Li received the prestigious CAREER Award from the National Science Foundation (NSF). His CAREER project will investigate real-world uses of FIDO2/passkeys and address security and usability issues that can arise. A goal of his research is to identify and resolve problems before they become widespread and more difficult to solve.

Amino acids also play a critical role commercially where they are manufactured and added to pharmaceuticals, dietary supplements, cosmetics, animal feeds, and industrial chemicals — an energy-intensive process leading to greenhouse gas emissions, resource consumption, and pollution.

A landmark new system developed at Georgia Tech could lead to an alternative: a commercially scalable, environmentally sustainable method for amino acid production that is carbon negative, using more carbon than it emits.

The breakthrough builds on a method that the team pioneered in 2024 and solves a key issue – increasing efficiency to an unprecedented 97% and reducing the bioprocess cost by over 40%. It’s the highest reported conversion of CO2 equivalents into amino acids using any synthetic biology system to date.

Published in the journal ACS Synthetic Biology, the study, “Cell-Free-Based Thermophilic Biocatalyst for the Synthesis of Amino Acids From One-Carbon Feedstocks,” was led by Bioengineering Ph.D. student Ray Westenberg and Professor Pamela Peralta-Yahya, who holds joint appointments in the School of Chemistry and Biochemistry and School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering. The team also included Shaafique Chowdhury (Ph.D. ChBE 25) and Kimberly Wennerholm (ChBE 23); alongside University of Washington collaborators Ryan Cardiff, then a Ph.D. student and now a Chain Reaction Innovations Fellow at Argonne National Laboratory, and Charles W. H. Matthaei Endowed Professor in Chemical Engineering James M. Carothers; in addition to Pacific Northwest National Laboratory Synthetic Biology Team Leader Alexander S. Beliaev.

"This work shifts the narrative from simply reducing carbon emissions to actually consuming them to create value,” says Peralta-Yahya. “We are taking low-cost carbon sources and building essential ingredients in a truly carbon-negative process that is efficient, effective, and scalable.”

Heat-Loving Organisms

The work builds on the cell-free technology the team used in their earlier study. “Previously, we discovered that a system that uses the machinery of cells, without using actual living cells, could be used to create amino acids from carbon dioxide,” Peralta-Yahya explains. “But to create a commercially viable system, we needed to increase the system’s efficiency and reduce the cost.”

The team discovered that bits of leftover cells were consuming starting materials, and — like a machine with unnecessary gears or parts — this limited the system’s efficiency. To optimize their “machine,” the team would need to remove the extra background machinery.

"Leftover cell parts were using key resources without helping produce the amino acids we were looking for,” says Peralta-Yahya. “We knew that heating the system could be one way to purify it because heat can denature these components.”

The challenge was in how to protect the essential system components from the high temperatures, she adds. “We wondered if introducing enzymes produced by a heat-loving bacterium, Moorella thermoacetica, might protect our system, while still allowing us to denature and remove that inefficient background machinery.”

The results were astounding: after introducing the enzymes, heating and “cleaning” the system, and letting it cool to room temperature, synthesis of the amino acids serine and glycine leaped to 97% yield — nearly three times that of the team’s previous system.

Scaling for Sustainability

To make the system viable for large-scale use, the team also needed to reduce costs. “One of the most costly components in this system is the cofactor tetrahydrofolate (THF),” Peralta-Yahya shares. “Reducing the amount of THF needed to start the process was one way to make the system more inexpensive and ultimately more commercially viable.”

By linking reaction steps so waste from one step fueled the next, the team devised a method to recycle THF within the system that reduces the amount of THF needed by five-fold — lowering bioprocessing costs by 42%.

“This decrease in cost and increase in yield is a critical step forward in creating a method with real potential for use in industry and manufacturing,” Peralta-Yahya says. “This system could pave the way for moving this carbon-negative technology out of the lab and onto the continuous, industrial scale."

Funding: The Advanced Research Project Agency-Energy (ARPA-E); U.S. Department of Energy; and the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Biological and Environmental Research Program.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1021/acssynbio.5c00352

Applying the Scheimpflug technique, the researchers are developing inexpensive rangefinder camera technology, advanced sensors and computational techniques to both complement and provide an alternative to established light detection and ranging (LiDAR) technology in certain applications. The technique works best in short- and medium-distance metrology, and can be used passively or in collaboration with laser-based techniques.
 

“The Scheimpflug technique is a complete alternative to time-of-flight (ToF) LiDAR, and we’re looking for everything we can do with it,” said Nathan Meraz, a GTRI senior research scientist who has been refining the new applications for several years. “It measures things differently, and since it’s a camera sensor, there’s a lot more information to process compared to a LiDAR signal. And there are also data fusion aspects.”
 

A paper on the technique and its potential remote sensing applications was presented during 2025 at the SPIE Defense + Commercial Systems (DCS) Conference. The research was supported by GTRI’s Independent Research and Development (IRAD) program and also has been advanced by teams of student researchers from the GTRI Research Internship Program (GRIP).

See the complete article on the GTRI news site
 

The Advanced Technology Development Center (ATDC) in Georgia Tech’s Office of Commercialization announced two of its health technology (HealthTech) portfolio companies, Nephrodite and OrthoPreserve, earned the designation. 

Achieving this rare milestone underscores the caliber of founders, science, and support in ATDC’s 30-company HealthTech portfolio, the incubator’s largest focus area. It’s also a win for Georgia because it reflects the strength of the state’s health innovation ecosystem. 

“This designation is one of the strongest signals the FDA gives that a technology could change the standard of care,” said Greg Jungles, HealthTech catalyst at ATDC. “For ATDC to have two in the same year is remarkable.” 

The Breakthrough Device Program doesn’t waive evidence requirements, but it accelerates learning with the FDA, ATDC’s Jungles said. “That means shorter response times, more frequent meetings, and prioritized review. Teams avoid dead ends and align earlier on study designs and endpoints.” 

For the founders of both startups, their technologies come one step closer to moving their innovations to market. Nephrodite’s technology improves the lives of dialysis patients. OrthoPreserve’s device addresses challenges faced by those who suffer from chronic knee pain. 

Nephrodite: Advancing Continuous Artificial Kidney Technology 

Dr. Nikhil Shah and Dr. Hiep Nguyen, cofounders of Nephrodite, aim to improve care for dialysis patients with end-stage kidney disease who need transplants. These patients often spend three to four hours in a dialysis clinic up to three times a week. Being tethered to stationary machines with needles drawing blood via arm grafts complicates everyday activities — from work tasks to the ability to travel. 

Dialysis addresses chronic kidney disease, which means kidneys no longer work properly. The treatments filter out toxins, waste, and other fluids in the blood. Kidney disease costs Medicare $124.5 billion every year, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. And those costs are expected to rise because of increasing rates of kidney failure and chronic kidney disease. 

“Dialysis, while lifesaving when it was pioneered in 1952, is incredibly burdensome,” Shah said. Besides being a long process that keeps the patient in a fixed location, it’s physically tiring. “Taking out your blood continually many, many times over, and over the course of four hours is the equivalent of running the Boston Marathon, hitting the finish line, and then someone saying, ‘You're not done; go do it again,’ ” he said. 

A surgeon by training, with expertise in transplantation and oncology, Shah is also an adjunct associate professor in Tech’s School of Interactive Computing. He worked with Nguyen to develop a continuously functioning mechanical artificial kidney, leading to Nephrodite’s formation. 

The FDA’s breakthrough designation on its artificial kidney allows the company to pursue approvals to begin tests in human trials. 

The company traces its beginnings to a German aerospace facility outside Munich, where Nguyen and Shah watched engineers demonstrate a pediatric artificial heart — the Berlin Heart. 

“That’s how we got started,” Shah said. “Seeing an artificial heart that led us to think about doing this for kidneys — because the kidney space has been largely ignored for 70 years.” 

Backed by a German federal grant, Nephrodite grew, moving from Germany to Boston, Massachusetts, then to Austin, Texas, before calling Atlanta home. The company joined ATDC and tapped into other Georgia Tech programs. This included the Center for MedTech Excellence and the Georgia Manufacturing Extension Partnership. Nephrodite also drew on student talent as the researchers quietly worked on their continuous mechanical artificial kidney. 

Nephrodite began interviewing patients to find out what they wanted the artificial kidney needed to solve. 

They learned patients want the ability to be mobile. Patients also desire an alternative therapy to large needles being inserted into arm grafts because the injection sites are prone to infection and the grafts can fail. In addition, the process can be painful and disfiguring. Finally, patients want a quality of life independent of machines. 

“Those quality-of-life needs, especially being free and mobile, were absolutely universal,” Shah said.  

Nephrodite began developing the technology to build its device — a filter surgically implanted in the pelvis area. 

“We developed an implant designed to run constantly, connected to larger blood vessels in the pelvis to avoid arm graft failures, and paired with an external interface that lets patients sleep at night while the system removes toxins and excess fluid,” Shah explained. 

The device also has built-in sensors, with data uploaded to the cloud, enabling medical care teams to remotely monitor their patients while freeing patients from frequent in-clinic visits. 

Shah said Nephrodite’s device could restore everyday independence, while potentially lowering infection risk. 

“It's like having an actual kidney, but without all the issues of an unhealthy one,” Shah said.  

OrthoPreserve: Innovating a Minimally Invasive Meniscus Implant 
 
OrthoPreserve’s technology aims to address issues from people have with their meniscus, the C‑shaped piece of cartilage in a knee joint that acts as a shock absorber between the thigh bone and shin bone. 

Though patients undergo a now-routine surgery to address it, incomplete recoveries are also common. An estimated quarter of patients later experience recurring knee pain. No FDA-approved implant currently exists for this population. Now, OrthoPreserveis developing a minimally invasive, artificial meniscus implant to restore cushioning, relieve pain, and delay — or even prevent — knee replacement for some patients. 

“There are a million meniscus surgeries every year, and 25% of those patients still live with recurring pain,” said Jonathan Schwartz, OrthoPreserve’s founder and CEO. 

Patients can face daily pain from ordinary activities, such as prolonged standing or walking a dog. Other activities like jogging and recreational sports can trigger flares that can lead to swelling and prolonged discomfort, Schwartz said. “Those patients have no reliable options today,” he said. “We’re building a minimally invasive implant to restore cushioning and help people get back to the activities they love.” 

OrhoPreserve’s durable implant restores cushioning, and it could help people return to normal activities and delay invasive knee replacement. Along with this comes potential cost and recovery benefits for the healthcare system.   

Schwartz created the implant as his Georgia Tech master’s thesis in the lab of David Ku in the Lawrence P. Huang Endowed Chair for Engineering Entrepreneurship and Regents' Professor in the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering. After industry experience, Schwartz returned to further develop the technology, building on Georgia Tech’s translational expertise 

OrthoPreserve has completed mechanical testing and a successful study. The company is raising a $2 million seed to complete validations and begin human trials, which Schwartz expects to start in 18 months. 

“The FDA breakthrough designation validates that nothing like this technology exists, and that it has the potential to disrupt the standard of care,” Schwartz said, adding the U.S.’ market opportunity is roughly $1.5 billion. “We finally have a minimally invasive option to bridge the gap between meniscus surgery and knee replacement.” 

What FDA Breakthrough Designation Means for ATDC’s HealthTech Startups 

Having a faster and clearer path is a derisking milestone for investors who are evaluating capital intensive medical device technologies, Jungles said. 

“This breakthrough device designation is a really big deal for medical device companies,” Jungles said, adding that startups often fear navigating the FDA approval process. “But this designation adds to the legitimacy of their technologies and the problemsthey are solving. The designation will help them get to market faster, assuming their data continues to meet expectations.” 

ATDC launched its HealthTech vertical in 2018, which is now sponsored by Catalyst by Wellstar ATDC’s HealthTech portfoilo companies include medical devices, biotech, and digital health, among other segments. 

ATDC’s Role in Accelerating HealthTech Innovation 

Nephrodite and OrthoPreserve’s founders noted ATDC’s coaching and programming as critical in navigating fundraising and regulatory milestones. Another factor, they said, was ATDC’s connection to Georgia Tech’s labs and facilities and prototyping support and clinical advisors from across metro Atlanta.  

“We meet with ATDC coaches every two to four weeks to troubleshoot and plan,” Schwartz said. “Having that level of seasoned guidance, all without consultant-level costs, has been huge.” 

Jungles added that two Breakthrough device designations in the same year reflects ATDC’s selection rigor, noting he’s evaluated hundreds of technologies since the HealthTech vertical launched. 

“It reflects the caliber of the companies in ATDC, specifically in the medical device space,” Jungles said. “It’s the strength of their teams, the persistence of the founders, and the collaboration of the ecosystem in Georgia and Atlanta.” 

Reliable energy is required to keep safe in cold winters and hot summers, making it a matter of national security. There are also vying economic policies to consider, political and financial incentives to navigate, and questions of social and economic inequality.

Experts in Georgia Tech’s Ivan Allen College of Liberal Arts examine the challenges we face with the U.S. energy transition, and work to help make it safe, fair, and effective for all.

• Challenge No. 1: Managing National Security — with Adam N. Stulberg, professor and chair of the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs.
• Challenge No. 2: Confronting Inequality — with Bijesh Mishra, a postdoctoral scholar in the Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter School of Public Policy.
• Challenge No. 3: Choosing the Right Economic Policies — with Bobby Harris, an assistant professor in the School of Economics.
• Challenge No. 4: Navigating Financial and Political Incentives — with Kate Pride Brown, a sociologist in the School of History and Sociology.

Read the article on the Ivan Allen College website.

A new mobile app will soon put the ability to monitor a baby’s prenatal heartbeat in the hands of pregnant women who may worry about their baby’s health in between doctor’s visits. 

Set in the heart of Tech Square on the Georgia Tech campus, this year’s event explores how energy systems, materials, technologies, supply chains, and policy must evolve in response to AI’s accelerating impact. As digital infrastructure expands and computation intensifies, the need for reliable, resilient, and sustainable power has never been more urgent. 

“Energy Day reflects Georgia Tech’s strength in connecting world-class research in materials and components with the infrastructure and partnerships needed to translate discovery into scalable energy technologies that serve industry, society, and the future economy,” said Eric Vogel, executive director of the IMS and the Hightower Professor in Materials Science and Engineering. 

Energy Day 2026 also marks an important milestone with the introduction of its first group of corporate sponsors: GE Vernova, Southern Company, Georgia Power, ExxonMobil, Southwire Spark, Gems Setra, and Tektronix. Their support reflects a shared commitment to advancing energy solutions. 

“Tektronix is excited to be part of Energy Day because advancing the future of energy starts with precise measurement and trusted insights,” said Christopher Bohn, president of Tektronix. “From power electronics and high voltage systems to grid scale renewables and AI driven control technologies, the breakthroughs discussed here directly align with the innovations we support through our products and solutions. Collaborating with Georgia Tech allows us to engage early with emerging research and the next generation of engineers—critical collaborators in building a cleaner, smarter, and more resilient energy ecosystem.”

The keynote address will be delivered by Vanessa Z. Chan, a nationally recognized leader at the intersection of innovation, commercialization, and emerging technologies. Chan will provide insights on accelerating technological discovery, emphasizing how AI is transforming energy and materials design. She will discuss how commercialization strategies must rapidly evolve across multidisciplinary energy domains from grid modernization to advanced batteries and clean manufacturing.

Building on the themes introduced in the keynote, the program transitions into a fireside chat with Georgia Tech EVPR Tim Lieuwen featuring Amit Kulkarni and Jim Walsh. Kulkarni is vice president of Product Management and Strategy for the Gas Power business within GE Vernova, where he oversees the world’s largest portfolio of power generation equipment. Walsh, vice president of GE Vernova’s Consulting Services, leads teams providing innovative solutions across the full spectrum of power generation, delivery, and utilization.

Next comes a policy-focused panel that will explore the surge in power demand driven by AI, how the United States is addressing today’s most urgent energy challenges, and the long-term implications of today’s decisions for a sustainable energy future. Bringing together leading voices in U.S. environmental and energy policy, the panel features Joe Aldy of Harvard University and former special assistant to the president for Energy and Environment; Al McGartland of New York University’s Institute for Policy Integrity and former Environmental Protection Agency lead economist and director of the National Center for Environmental Economics; and Kevin Rennert, fellow and director of the Comprehensive Climate Strategies Program at Resources for the Future and former staff member on the U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources.

The second panel focuses on critical materials — the foundation of advanced energy systems and digital technologies. As AI, data centers, and advanced energy technologies drive demand for critical materials, securing them now requires integration and coordination across the entire value chain. Panelists include Rachel Galloway, British consul general in Atlanta; Vijay Murugesan, head of Materials Intelligence and Digital Innovation at Amazon; Colin Spellmeyer, executive strategic sourcing leader at GE Vernova;  Charles Sims, Tennessee Valley Authority Distinguished Professor of Energy and Environmental Policy at the University of Tennessee; and Nortey Yeboah, principal engineer at Southern Company. Together, they will offer perspectives on the policy and economic frameworks shaping the energy supply chain, from developing raw resources to manufacturing the technologies essential to future energy systems.

In the afternoon, participants can dive deeper into specialized topics through three focused technical tracks. 

• “Meeting the Demand for Power” will examine how emerging technologies, advanced nuclear systems, and renewable integration can work together to deliver reliable, resilient electricity.
• “Data Center Infrastructure and Resources” will explore innovations in thermal management technologies, energy-efficient computing, and the broader resource impacts of expanding digital infrastructure.
• “Grid Technologies and Markets” will highlight strategies for strengthening grid capacity, incorporating demand-side management, and optimizing carbon performance as energy systems evolve.

“Meeting the rapidly rising electricity demand driven by AI requires bold ideas, coordinated action, and research that moves at the speed of innovation,” said Yuanzhi Tang, executive director of the SEI. “Energy Day 2026 brings together the people and expertise needed to shape resilient, sustainable energy systems for the future. At Georgia Tech, we see this event as a catalyst for new partnerships, new solutions, and a shared commitment to strengthening the nation’s energy foundation.”

Energy Day 2026 is designed for researchers advancing emerging energy technologies, policymakers navigating shifting regulatory and geopolitical landscapes, industry professionals seeking insight into emerging tools and supply chains, and students preparing to enter one of the most consequential sectors of the decade. It also welcomes anyone interested in AI, sustainability, electrification, and critical materials. 

Join us to explore the future of energy. To learn more and register, visit: Energy Day 2026.

“This first set of CreationsVC Fellows offers an exciting cross-section of innovative hardware and software technologies built on Georgia Tech’s legacy of space exploration, hardware development, and product commercialization,” said Jud Ready, SRI executive director. 

In the first year of the three-year program, CreationsVC provides $125,000 to promote and accelerate innovations that have both space and terrestrial applications. The series offers participants training focused on customer discovery, engaging and compelling storytelling, value proposition design and quantification, and lean/agile project/product management.

“CreationsVC is centered on a deep appreciation for innovation and big thinking,” said Steve Braverman, co-founder and managing partner of CreationsVC. “We felt this was the right time to align our efforts in sourcing and supporting dual-value technologies that will have an impact on both Earth and space.” 

The six startups tackle real-world space research problems like supply chain management, how artificial intelligence works in space, and navigation.

“We are excited CreationsVC is providing us with an opportunity to try new approaches to accelerate deep tech development,” said Jonathan Goldman, Quadrant-i’s director. “These are the toughest kinds of startups to build, and we look forward to the learning we will gain from forcing our innovators out of their comfort zones to embrace some new and valuable skills.”

Meet the cohort:
 

Company: CIMTech.ai
 

Founders: Shimeng Yu, James Read

School: School of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE)

Objective: To develop energy-efficient, radiation-tolerant artificial intelligence processors using a persistent type of ferroelectric memory. The startup aims to improve applications requiring high power efficiency, such as battery-powered devices and space-based systems.

Why Q-i: “The advantage of Q-i is in helping technical founders turn their research into products that solve customers’ problems,” noted James Read. “For us, that means talking with potential customers and hearing their pain points directly from the source. Now we’re use that information to build a convincing narrative around our startup’s value for stakeholders and investors.” 

Company: SkyCT
 

Founders: Morris Cohen, Matthew Strong

School: ECE

Objective: To provide up-to-date mapping of the electrical properties of the upper atmosphere, with applications to GPS-free navigation, long-range communication, and satellite and launch vehicle viability. The startup uses the radio energy released by lightning strikes to create this map. 

Why Q-i: “This weird region about 50 miles up from Earth’s surface is both really hard to track and measure, and also impacts a surprising array of applications,” said Cohen. “It’s sometimes called the `ignorosphere’ because of how difficult it is to measure, and it’s time we change that.” 

Company: Penumbra Autonomy
 

Founders: Panagiotis Tsiotras, Juan Diego Florez-Castillo, Iason Velentzas 

School: Daniel Guggenheim School of Aerospace Engineering (AE)

Objective: To commercialize algorithms that help spacecraft maneuver when they have limited information on their environment. The algorithms use state-of-the-art computer vision and localization techniques. This could benefit manufacturing, assembly, and refueling in orbit, as well as enable monitoring, situational awareness, and debris removal. 

Why Q-i: “The program offers a conduit to entrepreneurship opportunities and spinoff companies in the space domain by providing guidance and commercialization ‘know-how,’” said Panagiotis Tsiotras. 

Company: TerraMorph

 
Founders: Yashwanth Kumar Nakka, Sadhana Kumar, Vincent Griffo, Sachin Kelkar

School: AE

Objective: To create an autonomous rover platform with adaptive, reconfigurable mobility. The rover will implement software and sensing algorithms to automatically detect terrain type and improve traction and energy usage. This could be used on the moon or Mars, or even terrestrial search and rescue. 

Why Q-i: “TerraMorph was developed to address fundamental challenges in mobility and autonomy across uncertain terrain,  but successfully translating that work into impact requires creative guidance, critical feedback, and experienced perspectives beyond the lab,” said Yashwanth Kumar Nakka. “Q-i’s culture of leading by example and fostering strong, ethical teams aligns closely with how we want to build TerraMorph: iteratively, thoughtfully, and with a focus on real-world deployment.” 

Company: OpenWerks
 

Founders:  Shreyes Melkote, Mike Yan

School: George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering

Objective: To deliver real-time manufacturing supply chain visibility for the space and national security industries. OpenWerks technology aims to dramatically reduce current sourcing cycles from eight months down to weeks by connecting corporate buyers directly with verified supplier manufacturing capability and capacity data. 

Why Q-i: “From the very beginning, principals at VentureLab and  Q-i offered a clear pathway to translate academic research into a viable business,” said Mike Yan. “Their reputation for guiding Georgia Tech startups through both business and technology derisking, combined with their comprehensive ecosystem of programs and coaches, made them the natural partner for our entrepreneurial journey.”

Company: 8Seven8
 

Founders: Chandra Raman

School: School of Physics

Objective: To manufacture quantum hardware in Georgia. 8Seven8 aims to put high-precision atomic clocks and gyroscopes on a chip for applications ranging from aircraft navigation to industrial automation.  

Why Q-i: “They have mentored me and my students through the commercialization process, providing opportunities such as the Space Fellows Cohort,” Chandra Raman said. “One of my former students, Alexandra Crawford, gained valuable business experience through a Q-i entrepreneur’s assistantship, and is now working at 8Seven8 full-time. They have also guided me through the process of obtaining funding through the Georgia Research Alliance for our commercialization effort.”

Indoor farms, also known as vertical farms, are popular among agricultural researchers and are expanding across the agricultural industry. Some benefits they have over outdoor farms include:

• Year-round production of food crops
• Less water and land requirements
• Not needing pesticides
• Reducing carbon emissions from shipping
• Reducing food waste

Additionally, some studies indicate that indoor farms produce more nutritious food for urban communities. 

However, these farms are often inaccessible to birds, bees, and other natural pollinators, leaving the pollination process to humans. The tedious process must be completed by hand for each flower to ensure the indoor crop flourishes.

Ai-Ping Hu, a principal research engineer at the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI), has spent years exploring methods to efficiently pollinate flowering plants and food crops in indoor farms to find a way to efficiently pollinate flower plants and food crops in indoor farms.

Hu, Assistant Professor Shreyas Kousik of the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering, and a rotating group of student interns have developed a robot prototype that may be up to the task.

The robot can efficiently pollinate plants that have both male and female reproductive parts. These plants only require pollen to be transferred from one part to the other rather than externally from another flower.

Natural pollinators perform this task outdoors, but Hu said indoor farmers often use a paintbrush or electric tootbrush to ensure these flowers are pollinated. 

Knowing the Pose

An early challenge the research team addressed was teaching the robot to identify the “pose” of each flower. Pose refers to a flower’s orientation, shape, and symmetry. Knowing these details ensures precise delivery of the pollen to maximize reproductive success. 

“It’s crucial to know exactly which way the flowers are facing,” Hu said.

“You want to approach the flower from the front because that’s where all the biological structures are. Knowing the pose tells you where the stem is. Our device grasps the stem and shakes it to dislodge the pollen.

“Every flower is going to have its own pose, and you need to know what that is within at least 10 degrees.”

Computer Vision Breakthrough

Harsh Muriki is a robotics master’s student at Georgia Tech’s School of Interactive Computing, who used computer vision to solve the pose problem while interning for Hu and GTRI.

Muriki attached a camera to a FarmBot to capture images of strawberry plants from dozens of angles in a small garden in front of Georgia Tech’s Food Processing Technology Building. The FarmBot is an XYZ-axis robot that waters and sprays pesticides on outdoor gardens, though it is not capable of pollination.

“We reconstruct the images of the flower into a 3D model and use a technique that converts the 3D model into multiple 2D images with depth information,” Muriki said. “This enables us to send them to object detectors.”

Muriki said he used a real-time object detection system called YOLO (You Only Look Once) to classify objects. YOLO is known for identifying and classifying objects in a single pass.

Ved Sengupta, a computer engineering major who interned with Muriki, fine-tuned the algorithms that converted 3D images into 2D.

“This was a crucial part of making robot pollination possible,” Sengupta said. “There is a big gap between 3D and 2D image processing.

“There’s not a lot of data on the internet for 3D object detection, but there’s a ton for 2D. We were able to get great results from the converted images, and I think any sector of technology can take advantage of that.”

Sengupta, Muriki, and Hu co-authored a paper about their work that was accepted to the 2025 International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) in Atlanta.

Measuring Success

The pollination robot, built in Kousik’s Safe Robotics Lab, is now in the prototype phase. 

Hu said the robot can do more than pollinate. It can also analyze each flower to determine how well it was pollinated and whether the chances for reproduction are high.

“It has an additional capability of microscopic inspection,” Hu said. “It’s the first device we know of that provides visual feedback on how well a flower was pollinated.”

For more information about the robot, visit the Safe Robotics Lab project page.

Georgia Stoica is one of 38 Ph.D. students worldwide researching machine learning who were named a 2025 Google Ph.D. Fellow.

Stoica is designing AI training methods that bypass fine-tuning, which is the process of adapting a large pre-trained model to perform new tasks. Fine-tuning is one of the most common ways engineers update large-language models like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude to add new capabilities. 

If an AI company wants to give a model a new capability, it could create a new model from scratch for that specific purpose. However, if the model already has relevant training and knowledge of the new task, fine-tuning is cheaper.

Stoica argues that fine-tuning still uses large amounts of data, and that other methods can help models learn more effectively and efficiently.

“Full fine-tuning yields strong performance, but it can be costly, and it risks catastrophic forgetting,” Stoica said. “My research asks if we can extend a model’s capabilities by imbuing it with the expertise of others, without fine-tuning?

“Reducing cost and improving efficiency is more important than ever. We have so many publicly available models that have been trained to solve a variety of tasks. It’s redundant to train a new model from scratch. It’s much more efficient to leverage the information that already exists to get a model up to speed.”

Stoica said the solution is a cost-effective method called model merging. This method combines two or more AI models into a single model, improving performance without fine-tuning.

On a basic level, Stoica said an example would be combining a model that is efficient at classifying cats with one that works well at dogs.

“Merging is cheap because you just take the parameters, the weights of your existing models, and combine them,” he said. “You could take the average of the weights to create a new model, but that sometimes doesn’t work. My work has aimed to rearrange the weights so they can communicate easily with each other.”

Through his Google fellowship, Stoica seeks to apply model merging to create a cutting-edge vision encoder. A vision encoder converts image or video data into numerical representations that computers can understand. This enables tasks such as image or facial recognition and generative image captioning.

“I want to be at the frontier of the field, and Google is clearly part of that,” Stoica said. “The vision encoder is very large-scale, and Google has the infrastructure to accommodate it.”

Georgia Tech’s Qi Tang is building machine learning (ML) models to accelerate nuclear fusion research, making it more affordable and more accurate. Backed by a grant from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), Tang’s work brings clean, sustainable energy closer to reality.

Tang has received an Early Career Research Program (ECRP) award from the DOE Office of Science. The grant supports Tang with $875,000 disbursed over five years to craft ML and data processing tools that help scientists analyze massive datasets from nuclear experiments and simulations.

Tang is the first faculty member from Georgia Tech’s College of Computing and School of Computational Science and Engineering (CSE) to receive the ECRP. He is the seventh Georgia Tech researcher to earn the award and the only GT awardee among this year’s 99 recipients.

More than a milestone, the award reflects a shift in how nuclear research is done. Today, progress depends on computing and data science as much as on physics and engineering.

“I am honored and excited to receive the ECRP award through DOE’s Advanced Scientific Computing Research program, an organization I care about deeply,” said Tang, an assistant professor in the School of CSE. 

“I am grateful to my former colleagues at Los Alamos National Laboratory and collaborators at other national laboratories, including Lawrence Livermore, Sandia, and Argonne. I am also thankful for my Ph.D. students at Georgia Tech, whose dedication and creativity make this award possible.”

[Related: New Faculty Applies High-Performance Computing, Scientific Machine Learning Interests to Studies in Plasma Physics]

A problem in nuclear research is that fusion simulations are challenging to understand and use. These simulations generate enormous datasets that are too large to store, move, and analyze efficiently.

In his ECRP proposal to DOE, Tang introduced new ML methods to improve the analysis and storage of particle data.

Tang’s approach balances shrinking data so it is easier to store and transfer while preserving the most important scientific features. His multiscale ML models are informed by physics, so the reduced data still reflects how fusion systems really behave.

With Tang’s research, scientists can run larger, more realistic fusion models and analyze results more quickly. This accelerates progress toward practical fusion energy.

“In contrast to generic black-box-type compression tools, we aim at preserving the intrinsic structures of the particle dataset during the data reduction processes,” Tang said. 

“Taking this approach, we can meet our goal of achieving high-fidelity preservation of critical physics with minimum loss of information.”

Computing is essential in modern research because of the amount of data produced and captured from experiments and simulations. In the era of exascale supercomputers, data movement is a greater bottleneck than actual computation.

DOE operates three of the world’s four exascale supercomputers. These machines can calculate one quintillion (a billion billion) operations per second.

The exascale era began in 2022 with the launch of Frontier at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Aurora followed in 2023 at Argonne National Laboratory. El Capitan arrived in 2024 at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.

With Tang’s data reduction approaches, all of DOE’s supercomputers spend more time on science and less time waiting for data transfers.

“Qi’s work in computational plasma physics and nuclear fusion modeling has been groundbreaking,” said Haesun Park, Regents’ Professor and Chair of the School of CSE. 

“We are proud of Qi and what this award means for him, Georgia Tech, and the Department of Energy toward leveraging computation to solve challenges in science and engineering, such as sustainable energy."

Previous Georgia Tech recipients of DOE Early Career Research Program awards include:

Itamar Kimchi, assistant professor, School of Physics

Sourabh Saha, assistant professor, George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering

Wenjing Lao, associate professor, School of Mathematics

Ryan Lively, Thomas C. DeLoach Professor, School of Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering

Josh Kacher, associate professor, School of Materials Science and Engineering

Devesh Ranjan, Eugene C. Gwaltney Jr. School Chair and professor, Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering

Associate Professor Jessica Roberts and Ph.D. student Emily Amspoker of Georgia Tech’s School of Interactive Computing are working with the University of Georgia’s Marine Extension and Georgia Sea Grant in Savannah. Together, they’ve developed a prototype display that uses sonification and texture to convey sea floor habitat information from Gray’s Reef National Marine Sanctuary off the coast of Georgia.

Sonification is the process of translating data points into sound.

The display functions as a map that BLV users can follow to learn about each habitat. It is made from a wooden board with laser-cut patterns engraved into the surface. Each pattern represents information about the four types of habitats found in Gray’s Reef. Each pattern has a distinct sound that corresponds to a legend on the board, which provides an audio description of each habitat.

The four habitats are:

• Flat sand — smooth sandy seafloor with little topographic variation that provides habitat for burrowing organisms such as worms, clams, and sand dollars.
• Rippled sand — sandy bottom shaped into small wave-like ridges by currents and wave action; supports microhabitats of small invertebrates and attracts fish feeding on buried prey.
• Sparse live bottom — areas of exposed hard surfaces with scattered attached organisms like sponges, corals, and algae, offering structure and shelter for reef-associated fish and invertebrates.
• Dense live bottom — hard-bottom reef areas with abundant attached marine life, providing high biodiversity and offering food, and breeding sites for numerous species.

By allowing learners to explore these habitats, the team hopes to emphasize the importance of protecting diverse ocean habitats. 

“Our job was to figure out how we can use sounds and touch to represent each of the four habitat types so our visitors can explore the ocean without being able to see it,” she said.

Roberts said the project is critical to advance understanding of how science and informal learning can be more inclusive to those who have difficulty processing visual data displays.

Ryan Punamiya (CS 2025) and Summer Abramson, a third-year computational media student, have been honored by the Computing Research Association (CRA) through its 2025–2026 Outstanding Undergraduate Researcher Award (URA) program. 

Punamiya was named a runner-up for the prestigious award, while Abramson received an honorable mention among hundreds of applicants from universities across North America. 

The CRA Outstanding Undergraduate Researcher Award program recognized eight awardees in 2026, along with eight runners-up, nine finalists, and over 200 honorable mentions from thousands of applications.  

Advancing Robotics Research 

Punamiya knew early on that he didn’t want to wait until starting his Ph.D. to do meaningful and impactful robotics research.  

Punamiya joined the Robot Learning and Reasoning Lab (RL2) directed by Assistant Professor Danfei Xu. While there, he contributed to the lab’s Meta-sponsored EgoMimic project, which trains robots to perform human tasks using recordings captured by Meta’s Project Aria research glasses. 

Punamiya is also the first author of a paper accepted to the 2025 Conference on Neural Information Processing Systems (NeurIPS), one of the world’s most prestigious artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning conferences. 

“Ryan is the strongest undergraduate I've worked with,” Xu said, “including students who went on to Stanford, Berkeley, and leadership roles in major tech companies. He’s already operating at the level of a strong third-year Ph.D. student.” 

Punamiya said it was a challenge to balance his undergraduate coursework with his research in Xu’s lab. 

“You get out how much you put in,” he said. “I built my class schedule to give myself as much time to do research as possible. It also boils down to having the right research mentors. 

“(Xu) never saw me as an undergrad who’s just there to do grunt work. I was fortunate he saw my curiosity and cultivated me as a researcher. That’s really how you get more undergrads motivated to research — giving them the chance to be independent and explore ideas of their own.” 

Punamiya said his work in Xu’s lab has already helped him identify the research areas he wants to focus on as he considers his next steps. He will continue developing generalized training models for robots using human data so they can perform tasks instantly upon deployment. 

"The amount of data needed to train a robot is difficult to obtain even for top industry companies," he said. "We have embodied robot data available in billions of humans. With the advent of extended reality devices, we can get a scalable source of diverse interactions within environments."

Punamiya graduated in December and recently started an internship at Nvidia. He mentioned he has been accepted into several Ph.D. programs, including Georgia Tech, and he is choosing where to continue his research. 

“It’s the first time my research has been acknowledged externally by the robotics community,” he said. “It’s good to know the problem I’m working on is important, and that motivates me. Robotics is an exciting field. We are doing things now that two years ago were difficult to do.” 

Researching Inclusion in Computing Education 

Abramson conducts research in the People-Agents Research for Computing Education (PARCE) Laboratory under the mentorship of Pedro Guillermo Feijóo-García, a faculty member in the School of Computing Instruction. He and the Associate Dean for Undergraduate Education, Olufisayo Omojokun, nominated her for the award. 

Her work focuses on the intersection of computing education and human-AI interaction, where she’s been exploring ways to create more equitable technology. 

“This is such a huge milestone, and I couldn't be prouder of Summer,” Feijóo-García said. “Mentoring her for almost two years has been an amazing experience.” 

Abramson has received the Georgia Tech President’s Undergraduate Research Award (PURA) twice, which supports her research exploring how user-centered design curricula can help address attrition among women in computing.

“I’ve had the amazing opportunity to pursue research at the intersection of student identity, community belonging, and how we can build tools that support our diverse student population,” Abramson said. 

“Dr. Pedro and I have a goal to build community through a human-first approach, and I could not be more grateful for his support and guidance in my own journey. The CRA highlights the best of what the computing discipline has to offer, and I am incredibly honored for our work to be recognized.”

Abramson will spend the summer researching how user-centered design curricula can help promote confidence, belonging, and retention for women in computing.

Nominees for the PURA program were recognized for contributing to multiple research projects, authoring or coauthoring papers, presenting at conferences, developing widely used software artifacts, and supporting their communities as teaching assistants, tutors, and mentors. 

School of Computing Instruction Communications Officer Emily Smith contributed to this story.

Main Photo: Ryan Punamiya works with a robot during the 2025 International Conference on Robotics and Automation in Atlanta. Photo by Terence Rushin/College of Computing.

Applying what she’d learned along the way, Sizer started Growth Impact to support startups and stakeholders in the innovation ecosystem. As a part of her business, she created partnerships and networks between the U.S. and South Africa, bridging the gap between startups and corporations to encourage co-creation and pilot projects. During this time, she saw how much early‑stage founders needed clear frameworks, honest guidance, and hands‑on support. 

“I started Growth Impact to support startups and stakeholders such as venture studios, investors, and accelerators. I support early-stage startups in finding product-market fit, customer understanding, go-to-market strategy, and business model development,” she said. “I also help startups with fundraising readiness and enterprise readiness. I support stakeholders by helping to assess viability, and de-risk new ventures, as well as connecting startups to enterprises.” 

Eventually, her work brought her in contact with Georgia Tech. She was working with a South African innovation lab to enable pilot projects between startups and enterprises with the goal of facilitating the co-creation of digital solutions, which led her to Rahul Saxena, director of CREATE-X. 

Sizer said she reached out to see if any potential CREATE-X startups or enterprises would want to connect to the companies she was working with in South Africa.

“Over the last few years, there's been quite a lot of interest in Georgia Tech and Atlanta in terms of a tech and innovation hub in the U.S., and there's a lot of investment happening too, in both the city of Atlanta and in Georgia Tech, in entrepreneurship and innovation and technology,” she said. “I think it's an interesting market.”

Once connected, she kept meeting Georgia Tech founders, many from CREATE‑X.

Quietly, she began helping where she could, making introductions for CREATE-X founders outside of Atlanta. For Augment Health, she made investor and potential partner introductions. For the founder of Strapt, she made introductions to investors, shared market insight, and highlighted the company in her own newsletter, which has an audience of innovation ecosystem stakeholders, including more investors. And for ZenVR, she made a connection to WeFunder for funding, which resulted in $250,000 raised.  

Collaborating with CREATE-X on a webinar, Sizer also taught Startup Launch alumni about customer understanding and segmentation, value proposition, and other topics for health and wellness founders. Beyond connecting, Sizer shaped mindsets. 

In her business, one founder she worked with was building non‑toxic performance apparel for women — a product selling through Amazon, REI, and even the U.S. military. The founder had ambition but struggled to balance DTC (direct to consumer) sales, retail, and B2B opportunities. Sizer helped her analyze her data, identify her real early adopters, and rebuild her value proposition and messaging. With a clearer customer understanding and stronger brand direction, the founder revamped her website and refined her pitch.

“I love that thrill of them being excited about implementing some of the ideas and things we talk about, seeing the growth in their business, and the positive change in their business. That really excites me,” she said.

Atlanta is an enterprise-heavy city with Fortune 500 companies, SaaS (Software as a Service) companies, and a growing biotech sector. The startup ecosystem is growing in Atlanta, and with that comes advantages. 

“I have noticed that there's a lot of strong support for Atlanta and Georgia entrepreneurs from other Atlanta and Georgia entrepreneurs,” she said. “They all support each other.”

Over the years, Sizer has advised or mentored over 100 startups and built investor connections.  

“My business is Growth Impact, because growth and impact are part of my core values. I'm glad to give back and support early entrepreneurs, sharing knowledge, tools, and resources,” she said.

As a founder, Sizer went through her own learning curve. When she first launched her company, she assumed her target customers would be venture capital firms and spent months talking to pre‑seed and seed investors, only to discover that VCs either didn’t fund the kind of operational support she offered or they expected founders to pay for it themselves. Meanwhile, the founders she spoke with said they needed her help but didn’t have the budget. She said it was a classic chicken‑and‑egg problem.

“I said, OK, this is not my target customer. The target customer is the startup,” she said. “That's where the pivot point was for me.”
That shift reshaped her entire business and reinforced the same advice she now gives students: Talk to customers, listen deeply, and don’t be afraid to adjust when the data points you in a new direction.

She officially joined the CREATE‑X mentor community last year to help more founders, guiding them in finding product-market fit, and understanding who needs this solution and why.

One thing Sizer emphasized, however, is the need for founders to continue to take initiative and be resilient in the face of challenges.
“A mentor can guide you or ask the right questions, but the founder has to find the path,” she said.

Ready to build something real?

Meet mentors like Alison Sizer in Startup Launch, where you can develop a startup to solve real-world problems and build entrepreneurial skills. Apply to Startup Launch today; applications close Tuesday, March 17.
Interested in mentoring?

Want to mentor and support the next generation of Georgia Tech founders?

Fill out our engagement form to join CREATE‑X’s mentor network. 

For many of these patients, care has long meant pain and disfigurement alongside other severe side effects, rather than receiving treatment that addresses the disease itself. This new ARPA-H award marks a potential turning point.

Lead researcher Susan Napier Thomas, Woodruff Professor in the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering and the Parker H. Petit Institute of Bioengineering and Bioscience (IBB), has collaborated with her colleague J. Brandon Dixon, Woodruff Professor in the Woodruff School and IBB, for more than a decade on this project. The research partners are driven by the lack of meaningful treatment options available to patients.

“Funding support at this level is unprecedented,” Thomas said. “It finally gives us a chance to move beyond symptom management and toward real treatment. We’re addressing an underserved population with a huge unmet need.” 

A Gap in Care

The lymphatic system helps keep fluid moving through the body and plays a key role in immune health. When it does not function properly, fluid can build up in tissues, causing chronic pain and other long-term complications. Thomas noted that despite its toll on patients, lymphatic disease has lagged decades behind cardiovascular care in both treatment and research investment. 

“We are excited about this groundbreaking project in lymphatic engineering,” said Andrés García, IBB executive director. “By uniting interdisciplinary expertise, this work addresses long-standing challenges in lymphatic disease and moves meaningful solutions closer to the patients who need them most.”

What Comes Next

In the coming years, Thomas, Dixon, and their research partners will work toward an initial human trial, with an early focus on rare lymphatic conditions in children, as well as chronic disease in adults.

“This award reflects Georgia Tech’s growing leadership in using engineering to solve some of healthcare’s biggest challenges,” said Carolyn Seepersad, Eugene C. Gwaltney Jr. School Chair and professor in the Woodruff School. “It reinforces the Institute’s role in advancing innovations that improve patient care and strengthen Georgia’s position as a hub for health technology and biomedical innovation.”

The award was made through ARPA-H’s Groundbreaking Lymphatic Interventions and Drug Exploration (GLIDE) program led by Dr. Kimberley Steele.

This research was funded, in part, by the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H) under Agreement No. 1AY2AX000137-01. The views and conclusions contained in this document are those of the authors and should not be interpreted as representing the official policies, either expressed or implied, of the U.S. government.

In these contests, a handler directs a trained dog with whistle signals to guide a small group of sheep across a field and sometimes split the flock cleanly into two groups. But sheep do not always cooperate.

Researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology studied how handler–dog teams manage these unpredictable flocks in sheepdog trials and found principles that extend beyond livestock herding.

In a study published in Science Advances as the cover feature, the researchers applied those insights to computer simulations showing how similar strategies could improve the control of robot swarms, autonomous vehicles, AI agents, and other networked systems where many machines must coordinate their actions despite uncertain conditions.

Group Movement Dynamics

“Birds, bugs, fish, sheep, and many other organisms move in groups because it benefits individuals, including protection from predators,” said Saad Bhamla, an associate professor in Georgia Tech’s School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering. “The puzzle is that the ‘group’ is not a single organism. It is built from many individuals, each making local, imperfect decisions.”

When a predator threatens a herd of sheep, individuals near the edge often move toward the center to reduce their own risk, Bhamla explained. “This is ‘selfish herd’ behavior,” he said. “Shepherds exploit that instinct using trained dogs.”

From examining hours of contest footage, the researchers found that controlling small groups of sheep can be harder than managing large ones. A larger group, with more sheep protected in the center, may behave more coherently than a small group as the animals constantly shift between two instincts: “follow the group” and “flee the dog.”

“That switching behavior makes the group unpredictable,” said Tuhin Chakrabortty, a former postdoctoral researcher in the Bhamla Lab who co-led the study.

Looking closely at how dogs and their handlers guide small groups, the researchers found that unpredictability in the flock’s behavior does not always make control harder. “Under the right conditions, that ‘noisy’ behavior might actually be a benefit,” Bhamla said.

Successful Sheep Herding

Sheepdog handlers categorize sheep by how strongly they respond to a dog’s threatening pressure. Some very responsive sheep might panic under too much pressure, while others might ignore mild pressure and require stronger positioning by the dog.

The researchers observed that successful control often followed a two-step pattern. First, the dog subtly influenced the sheep’s orientation while the animals were mostly standing still. Once the flock was aligned in the desired direction, the dog increased pressure to trigger movement. The timing of those actions was critical, because alignment within a small group could disappear quickly as individuals switched between instincts.

“In our simulations, increasing pressure makes the flock reach the desired orientation faster, but how long the flock stays aligned is set mainly by noise,” Chakrabortty said. “In essence, dogs can steer the direction, but they can’t hold that decision indefinitely, so timing matters.”

Atlanta is consistently ranked among the top cities for congestion, but new projects and a commitment to improving transportation on campus and in the city have earned Georgia Tech several honors and a reputation as a transportation infrastructure leader.  

Gerald Keys, chief of production for Chris "Ludacris" Bridges’ media company, Karma's World LLC, will be on campus April 14 as part of Georgia Tech’s CTRL+CM Speaker Series.

The event is one of three in the series scheduled this spring. The series will bring together students, faculty, alumni, and industry professionals from Georgia Tech and the Atlanta region to explore the evolving creative technology landscape. Events are scheduled for March 11, March 31, and April 14.

The CTRL + CM Speaker Series, developed by Georgia Tech’s Collective Impact of Creative Technology (CICT), is open to all. The events are free, but registration is required. Registration links for each event are included below.

“The series was created with students in computational media, digital media, and human-computer interaction programs in mind,” said Aneesah Allen, an education outreach manager with the College of Computing.

“However, due to its popularity and success, we have expanded the audience for the speaker series to include the broader Georgia Tech community, students from other Atlanta-area colleges, and anyone interested in creative technology.”

Designed to help students take greater control of their academic and professional paths, the CTRL+CM Speaker Series exposes attendees to career fields on the creative side of technology. Each event will feature a moderated panel discussion with industry leaders, alumni, and faculty, followed by networking opportunities.

Topics will span emerging tools and workflows, creative practice, professional development, and ethical considerations surrounding AI, generative media, and other emerging technologies.

The spring CTRL + CM Speaker Series lineup includes:

• Code That Creates: AI, Generative Media, and the Future of Creative Practice will take place on March 11, from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. at Coda at Tech Square, 9th Floor Atrium. The discussion will explore how creative coding and generative systems are reshaping artistic practice and the ethical responsibilities of AI-driven creative work.
  • Featured panelists include Mark Riedl, Elizabeth Strickler, Jelani Liddell, and Judith Uchidiuno. Moderated by Bryan Cox.
  • RSVP link: https://forms.office.com/r/zGMYdqUemZ
• Worlds in Motion: Exploring Interactive Media and Emerging Technologies is scheduled for March 31, from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m., in the Price Gilbert Library’s Scholars Event Theater. Panelists will examine developments in augmented, virtual, and extended reality technologies, immersive storytelling, and interactive systems, and how these developments are impacting design and research.
  • Featured panelists: Alison Valk, Kelly Williams, and Meryem Yilmaz Soylu
  • RSVP link: https://forms.office.com/r/Cdp0vxG22u
• Composing with Technology: Digital Tools, Interactive Sound, and Creative Expression will be held on April 14, from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m., also at the Price Gilbert Library. The session will focus on digital audio tools, interactive sound, and innovative approaches to composition and storytelling across games, film, and immersive media.
  • Featured panelist: Gerald Keys, chief of production for Chris "Ludacris" Bridges media company, Karma's World LLC
  • RSVP link: https://forms.office.com/r/exLGwYMTgF

CICT draws on expertise from the College of Computing, the College of Design, and the Ivan Allen College of Liberal Arts. The collective is housed in the Constellations Center for Education in Computing, which has worked since 2017 to expand access to computing education through research, advocacy, and community building.

“I’m thrilled to see Professor Sherrill tackle this role for the coming 5 years. He understands the rapidly evolving opportunities to apply AI and data science approaches to the diversity of research conducted by Georgia Tech faculty and students, and has a strong agenda to help our researchers make the most of this explosive change in the research landscape.” Said V.P. of Interdisciplinary Research, Julia Kubanek. “He also has deep experience with team building and management which will position IDEaS favorably.”

As executive director, Sherrill will guide IDEaS’ current initiatives, which include the Microsoft CloudHub program that supports innovative applications in Generative Artificial Intelligence, and provide oversight and support for the joint College of Computing / IDEaS Center for Artificial Intelligence in Science and Engineering (ARTISAN), which provides  Georgia Tech faculty and research engineers expert support staff, needed cyberinfrastructure, software resources, and advice to assist faculty with projects using large data sets or using AI and machine learning to drive discovery.

Sherrill will also the lead the launch of a new strategic vision, emphasizing the Georgia Tech research community’s expertise in the development of AI and ML techniques and their application to problems in science and engineering, high performance computing, and academic software. Sherrill will focus on internal and external partnerships at IDEaS, creating new collaborative efforts in areas such as economics, policy, and the arts and humanities. He will also work to strengthen current connections across Georgia Tech’s Colleges, Interdisciplinary Research Institutes (IRIs), and the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI).

“It’s a great honor to be named the next executive director of IDEaS,” said Sherrill.  “Georgia Tech has world-class faculty and students, and an unparalleled spirit of collaboration.  By bringing together faculty from across campus and working together with some of the amazing student groups, we can leverage the power of AI to accelerate our research and maximize our impact.  IDEaS will continue to run upskilling workshops to help our campus keep pace with the rapid changes in AI.”

Sherrill is an active promoter of education in computational quantum chemistry, as well as a strong voice for the benefits of open-source software for research acceleration. He was named Outreach Volunteer of the Year by the Georgia Section of the American Chemical Society in 2017, and he is the lead principal investigator of the Psi open-source quantum chemistry program.

Sherrill earned a B.S. in chemistry from MIT in 1992 and a Ph.D. in chemistry from the University of Georgia in 1996. From 1996-1999 Sherril was an NSF Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of California, Berkeley.

Sherrill is Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the American Chemical Society, and the American Physical Society, and he has been Associate Editor of the Journal of Chemical Physics since 2009. Sherrill has received a Camille and Henry Dreyfus New Faculty Award, the International Journal of Quantum Chemistry Young Investigator Award, an NSF CAREER Award, and Georgia Tech's W. Howard Ector Outstanding Teacher Award. In 2023, he received the Herty Medal from the Georgia Section of the American Chemical Society, and in 2024, he was elected to the International Academy of Quantum Molecular Science.

- Christa M. Ernst

“It was a hypothesis. I was the experiment, and the hypothesis was proven true.” 

Can an inner-city student who grew up below the poverty line earn a Ph.D. and make a career in research? In theory, yes.  

The barriers are many. But literature suggests that early exposure to STEM and research opportunities can increase the odds for students in need.  

For Kendreze Holland, the idea of making it to college and earning an advanced degree was a hypothesis. Sure, theoretically it could be done — but in his own home, not everyone had even made it past high school.  

Often, the first question on the way to scientific discovery is: What if? What if a student like Holland received the right help at the right time? What if he was guided along the way by mentors who were leaders in their fields? What if he was given the opportunity to develop professional skills and make valuable connections?