Lucas Johnson

Ethan Lippmann, associate professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering and biomedical engineering, has won a Collaborative Pairs Pilot Project Award from the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (CZI) to create a more effective way for the immune system to fight against neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s. The pilot project seeks to generate an immune response – or defense […] Read More

Vanderbilt researchers have developed a new nanoparticle that can more effectively get drugs inside of cells to boost the immune system and fight diseases like cancer. The research is led by John Wilson, associate professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering and biomedical engineering, as well as a corresponding author on the paper about the research […] Read More

James Weimer, assistant professor of computer science and noted medical-device entrepreneur, has received a National Science Foundation CAREER Award to improve the safety and efficacy of systems that use advanced machine learning and artificial intelligence techniques. Learning-enabled medical cyber-physical systems (LE-MCPS) are smart medical systems that provide actionable feedback to caregivers. They use machine learning... Read More

The U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) has designated Vanderbilt University as a Center of Academic Excellence in Cyber Research, positioning the university as a premier institution for cyber-related education and innovation. Each year, cybercrime grows as a threat to national security and vital U.S. interests around the world. In addition to the rise of increasingly... Read More

A multidisciplinary group of investigators from Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Vanderbilt University, and the University of Pennsylvania received a $3.2 million grant to develop novel brain network-based measures to guide surgical decisions and improve outcomes in the field of epilepsy surgery. Epilepsy is a debilitating neurological disorder where seizures are often resistant to medications, but... Read More

Soheil Kolouri, assistant professor of computer science at Vanderbilt University, has received a National Science Foundation CAREER Award to explore ways to make machine learning more efficient and possibly impact the next generation of such methods. Despite the success of machine learning, scientists say many foundational questions and theoretical aspects remain poorly understood, posing unwanted... Read More

Justus Ndukaife, assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering, is leading innovative research that more effectively traps nanosized extracellular vesicles and particles to analyze their roles in cancer, and neurodegenerative diseases. The research by Ndukaife and his collaborators was recently published in Nano Letters Scientific journal. The research was done in collaboration with the lab... Read More

Damage or removal of calcium-regulating parathyroid glands during endocrine surgery can put children at risk for poor growth and slow mental development. Preserving the often rice-sized organ in children is vital, but not always easy. Anita Mahadevan-Jansen, Ph.D., professor of Biomedical Engineering and the Orrin H. Ingram Chair in Biomedical Engineering, is the lead investigator... Read More

Damage or removal of calcium-regulating parathyroid glands during endocrine surgery can put children at risk for poor growth and slow mental development. Preserving the often rice-sized organ in children is vital, but not always easy. Anita Mahadevan-Jansen, Ph.D., professor of Biomedical Engineering and the Orrin H. Ingram Chair in Biomedical Engineering, is the lead investigator... Read More

Vanderbilt researchers are hosting a free workshop on July 13 to shed more light on the Medical Open Network for Artificial Intelligence (MONAI). The daylong workshop is being held following the 2023 MIDL/NVIDIA Conference in Nashville and participation is in person or via Zoom. Registration for the daylong workshop opened on June 26, 2023. Project... Read More

Karl Zelik, associate professor of mechanical and biomedical engineering and physical medicine and rehabilitation, is being recognized for his contributions to the field of biomechanics with a prestigious Goel Award from the American Society of Biomechanics. The award recognizes outstanding accomplishments in translational biomechanics research, entrepreneurship, and societal benefit. Zelik co-directs the Center for Rehabilitation... Read More

History was made in December when scientists at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory’s National Ignition Facility successfully produced a nuclear fusion reaction resulting in a net energy gain. And a Washington-based start-up backed by hundreds of millions of dollars of venture capital announced a few months later that it expects to have a fusion power plant built... Read More

Vanderbilt researchers are bolstering the fight against cancer with technology that enhances the effectiveness of T cells that attack tumors. The cutting-edge research was recently published in the high-impact journal Science Immunology. Cancers co-opt both the immune and cardiovascular systems to fuel their own growth, researchers say. They do this in part by forming new... Read More

By Lucas Johnson When Robert J. Webster III was working on an engineering project for his Ph.D. at Johns Hopkins University, he was struck with an unnerving thought: The technology he was helping create seemed interesting, but it wouldn’t reach patients for at least 20 years. “And that’s only if everything went well,” he recalls.... Read More

By Lena Anthony First-year nursing students, U.S. Army soldiers and a middle school science class might seem very different at first glance. But when you consider the recent work of Cornelius Vanderbilt Professor of Engineering Gautam Biswas, the similarities become clear. Each group has been a test case for Biswas’ research, which collects multimodal data... Read More

Mikail Rubinov, assistant professor of biomedical engineering, has been awarded $600,000 from the National Science Foundation to develop new computational methods for analysis of large-scale brain activity data. The three-year project is funded by the NSF Collaborative Research in Computational Neuroscience (CRCNS). It was awarded alongside a companion project from the U.S.-Israel Binational Science Foundation... Read More

A company co-founded by Robert J. Webster III, Richard A. Schroeder Professor of Mechanical Engineering and associate professor of medicine and urology at Vanderbilt University, has received a breakthrough device designation from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration that could open the door for new diagnostic and therapeutic applications of flexible endoscopy. The designation given... Read More

A company co-founded by Robert J. Webster III, Richard A. Schroeder Professor of Mechanical Engineering and associate professor of medicine and urology at Vanderbilt University, has received a breakthrough device designation from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration that could open the door for new diagnostic and therapeutic applications of flexible endoscopy. The designation given... Read More

Maizie (Xin) Zhou, assistant professor of biomedical engineering and computer science, is the recipient of a $1.9 million award from the National Institutes of Health. She has also received $120,000 from Complete Genomics, a leader in human genome sequencing. The Maximizing Investigators’ Research Award (MIRA)(R35) from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIH) will... Read More

Vanderbilt researchers have uncovered conditions needed to produce cellulose at the single molecule level that could one day aid in the dismantling of bacterial defenses as well as potentially lead to the engineering of more efficient and cost-effective biofuel feedstock sources. The findings were published in the scientific journal PNAS. The researchers used optical tweezers... Read More