Faculty & Programs

What would it take to meet the world’s energy needs, sustainably, far into the foreseeable future? Perhaps creating energy the way the sun does, through nuclear fusion.

The structure of cross-linked polymeric gels is very similar to soft tissue―which is one reason that understanding this material is so critical, according to Kelly Schultz, assistant professor of chemical and b

Dr. Israel E. Wachs, the G. Whitney Snyder Professor of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, recently surpassed a landmark in citations.

As an embryo develops, tissues bend into complex three-dimensional shapes that lead to organs. Epithelial cells are the building blocks of this process, forming, for example, the outer layer of skin. They also line the blood vessels and organs of all animals.

These cells pack together tightly. To accommodate the curving that occurs during embryonic development, it has been assumed that epithelial cells adopt either columnar or bottle-like shapes.

However, a group of scientists dug deeper into this phenomenon and discovered a new geometric shape in the process.

Traditional, centralized power grids—where power is generated, transmitted and then distributed to users—is fast becoming a thing of the past. Such systems are inefficient and vulnerable to attack. In addition, renewable energy sources, such as wind and solar, have led to more compact generators. For all these reasons, the future of power is power electronics-based microgrids.

A microgrid is exactly what it sounds like: a small grid. It consists of multiple distributed generators and loads and can work in both grid-connected- or autonomous- modes.

Engineering faculty at Lehigh’s P.C. Rossin College of Engineering and Applied Science are included in a consortium that was recently awarded $2.5 million by the U.S. Department of Transportation (US DOT) in its first round of funding for Regional University Transportation Centers. The multi-year grant is authorized under the Fixing America’s Surface Transportation Act or the FAST Act, the first federal law in more than a decade to provide long-term funding certainty for surface transportation infrastructure planning and investment.

Nearly 50 students will have the opportunity to attend an international microarchitecture conference, thanks to an NSF travel grant awarded to Xiaochen Guo, Rossin assistant professor in electrical and computer engineering at Lehigh University.

If immunotherapy—the harnessing of the body’s immune system—can destroy cancer cells, as has been demonstrated, why not try to trigger the body’s immune system to battle deadly bacteria?

That question drives Marcos Pires’ pursuit of what he calls bacterial immunotherapy or immunobiotics—using the human immune system’s powerful mechanisms of preventing entry and colonization of pathogens to defeat the deadliest, antibiotic-resistant bacteria.

Steven McIntosh wants to transform the way ammonia is produced. He hopes to create a viable alternative to the conventional method, which uses massive amounts of energy and emits harmful carbon dioxide. He’s exploring a sustainable electrochemical method to efficiently drive the chemical reaction that produces ammonia.