Title
Topic
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Visible light system could revolutionize underwater-to-air communication
“Electrical and computer engineering William Lincoln Smith Professor Tommaso Melodia and research assistant professor Emrecan Demirors were awarded a patent for ‘Visible-Light Software-Defined Modem.'”
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‘Why Belonging Matters More Than Just Diversity’
“Creative workforces, accelerated business growth, and leaders who have learned how to harness their team’s diversity are all expected outcomes of well-executed diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives. Hiring to develop a more diverse workforce, however, doesn’t mean that these synergies will automatically accrue. Inclusive leaders need to understand that implementing DEI practices is a great starting point but an insufficient place to finish.”
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‘Time-Warping Analysis for Biological Signals: Methodology and Application’
“Any set of biological signals has variability, both in the temporal and spatial domains. To extract characteristic features of the ensemble, these spatiotemporal profiles are typically summarized by their mean and variance, often requiring prior padding or resampling of the data to equalize signal length. Such compression can conceal essential information in the signal. This work presents the method of time-warping, reformulated as elastic functional data analysis (EFDA), in an accessible way.” Find the paper and full list of authors in Scientific Reports.
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‘Higher-Order Connectomics of Human Brain Function Reveals Local Topological Signatures’
“Traditional models of human brain activity often represent it as a network of pairwise interactions between brain regions. Going beyond this limitation, recent approaches have been proposed to infer higher-order interactions from temporal brain signals involving three or more regions. However, to this day it remains unclear whether methods based on inferred higher-order interactions outperform traditional pairwise ones for the analysis of fMRI data. To address this question, we conducted a comprehensive analysis using fMRI time series of 100 unrelated subjects from the Human Connectome Project.” Find the paper and full list of authors in Nature Communications.
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‘Human Mobility Is Well Described by Closed-Form Gravity-Like Models Learned Automatically from Data’
“Modeling human mobility is critical to address questions in urban planning, sustainability, public health, and economic development. However, our understanding and ability to model flows between urban areas are still incomplete. … Here, we show that simple machine-learned, closed-form models of mobility can predict mobility flows as accurately as complex machine learning models, and extrapolate better.” Find the paper and full list of authors in Nature Communications.
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‘Data-Driven Techniques in Rheology: Developments, Challenges and Perspective’
“With the rapid development and adoption of different data-driven techniques in rheology, this review aims to reflect on the advent and growth of these frameworks, survey the state-of-the-art methods relevant to rheological applications, and explore potential future directions. We classify different machine learning (ML) methodologies into data-centric and physics-informed frameworks.” Find the paper and full list of authors in Current Opinion in Colloid & Interface Science.
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Durable enzyme biosensors
“Civil and environmental engineering distinguished professor Ming Wang was awarded a patent for ‘Durable enzyme-based biosensor and process for drop deposition immobilization.'”
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‘Epitaxial Strain Tuning of Er3+ in Ferroelectric Thin Films’
“ER3+ color centers are promising candidates for quantum science and technology due to their long electron and nuclear spin coherence times, as well as their desirable emission wavelength. By selecting host materials with suitable, controllable properties, we introduce new parameters that can be used to tailor the ER3+ emission spectrum.” Find the paper and full list of authors in the Journal of Applied Physics.
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‘Topological Data Analysis Based Characteristics of Electroencephalogram Signals in Children With Sleep Apnea’
“This study aims to identify differences in the functional neural connectivity of the brain of paediatric patients with obstructive sleep apnea. Using EEG signals from 3673 paediatric patients, we grouped subjects into OSA or control groups based on sleep oxygen desaturation levels and apnea-hypopnea index (AHI), and applied topological data analysis (TDA) techniques. We evaluated our approach through statistical testing of TDA-based EEG features, which indicate fundamental differences in the functional neural connectivity of subjects with sleep apnea as compared to controls.” Find the paper and full list of authors in the Journal of Sleep Research.
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‘3D spatial distribution of Sost mRNA and sclerostin protein expression in response to in vivo tibia loading in female mice’
“Bones adapt to external mechanical loads through a process known as mechanoadaptation. Osteocytes are the bone cells that sense the mechanical environment and initiate a biological response. Investigating the changes in osteocyte molecular expression following mechanical loading has been instrumental in characterizing the regulatory pathways involved in bone adaptation. … We used WISH-BONE (Whole-mount In Situ Histology of Bone) to investigate the spatial distribution of Sost-mRNA transcripts and its encoded protein, sclerostin, in 3D mouse tibia midshaft following in vivo tibia loading. Our findings showed a decrease in the percentage of Sost-positive osteocytes.” Find the paper and authors list in…
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‘Testing of Reverse Causality Using Semi-Supervised Machine Learning’
“Two potential obstacles stand between the observation of a statistical correlation and the design (and deployment) of an effective intervention, omitted variable bias and reverse causality. Whereas the former has received ample attention, comparably scant focus has been devoted to the latter in the methodological literature. … In this article, we draw upon advances in machine learning, specifically the recently established link between causal direction and the effectiveness of semi-supervised learning algorithms, to develop a novel method for reverse causality testing that circumvents many of the assumptions required by traditional methods.” Find the paper and full list of authors in…
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‘Experience as a Service for the AI-Driven World’
“As more professionals and startups adopt generative AI tools, the baseline of output is improving, but also converging. If everyone uses similar tools trained on similar data, outputs risk becoming indistinguishable. That’s why I believe experience is the new edge. It’s not just about using AI—it’s about how you direct, refine and build on what it gives you. Think of AI as a smart intern: impressive with guidance, but perhaps average without it.”
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Patent for ‘lightweight pose estimation network’ goes to Fu
“Electrical and computer engineering distinguished/Khoury professor Yun Raymond Fu was awarded a patent for ‘Light-Weight Pose Estimation Network With Multi-Scale Heatmap Fusion.'”
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‘Need Greater Adaptability in the Workforce? Foster Contextual Agility Competencies’
“In today’s dynamic global marketplace, organizations face relentless change and uncertainty. Navigating market disruptions, technological advancements, and cultural diversity demands a workforce equipped with the right competencies to thrive in dynamic environments. Building an agile talent pipeline requires organizations to develop six key competencies in their employees: tolerance of ambiguity, curiosity, resilience, humility, relationship-building, and perspective-taking. This article explores how these competencies shape decision-making, innovation, collaboration, and leadership in complex and uncertain contexts.”
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‘A Novel Regulation on the Developmental Checkpoint Protein Sda’
“Biofilm formation by Bacillus subtilis is triggered by an unusually simple environmental sensing mechanism. … In this study, we designed an algorithm to score all protein-coding genes in B. subtilis. … We generated a short list of 50 genes that could be subject to regulation by this novel mechanism. We further investigated one such gene from the list, sda, which encodes a developmental checkpoint protein regulating both sporulation and biofilm formation. We showed that synonymously switching the TCN serine codons to AGC in sda led to delayed biofilm formation and sporulation.” Find the paper and authors list in the Journal of…
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‘Collective Mechanics of Small Migrating Cell Groups’
“Migration of adhesive cell groups is a fundamental part of wound healing, development and carcinogenesis. Intense research has been conducted on mechanisms of collective migration of adhesive groups of cells. Here we focus on mechanical and mechanistic lessons from small migrating cell groups. We review forces and locomotory dynamics of two- and three-cell clusters, rotation of cell doublets, self-organization of one-dimensional cell trains, nascent efforts to understand three-dimensional collective migration and border cell clusters in Drosophila embryo.” Find the paper and full list of authors in Seminars in Cell & Developmental Biology.
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‘Low dimensionality of Phenotypic Space as an Emergent Property of Coordinated Teams in Biological Regulatory Networks’
“Cell-fate decisions involve coordinated genome-wide expression changes, typically leading to a limited number of phenotypes. Although often modeled as simple toggle switches, these rather simplistic representations often disregard the complexity of regulatory networks governing these changes. Here, we unravel design principles underlying complex cell decision-making networks in multiple contexts.” Find the paper and full list of authors in Cell Press.
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‘Prediction of Effects of Missense Mutation on Biochemical Function’
“The machine learning method partial order optimum likelihood (POOL) is used to obtain predictions of the effects of missense mutations on biochemical function, based on the effects of the mutation on computed electrostatic and chemical properties of the catalytic residues. Two human enzymes, DNA polymerase kappa (PolK) and ornithine transcarbamoylase (OTC) are presented as test cases. Seventeen cancer-associated variants of PolK were studied. … The ability to predict the effects of missense mutation on catalytic function has important implications for protein engineering and for a variety of biomedical questions.” Find the paper and full list of authors in Biophysical Journal.
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‘Interlayer Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya Interactions Induced via Nonlinear Phononics in Bilayer van der Waals Materials’
“We theoretically study the impact of light-driven structural changes via nonlinear phononics on the magnetic order of untwisted bilayer van der Waals materials. We consider an illustrative example of the AA-stacked bilayer honeycomb lattice and show that high-intensity light in resonance with selected phonons induces large-amplitude phonon displacements that modify the magnetic Hamiltonian of the system. … We find that the structural changes in the strongly driven regime lower the symmetry relative to the equilibrium lattice and produce changes in the magnetic interactions between the local moments.” Find the paper and full list of authors in Physical Review B.
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‘Bundling Effect of Semiconductor-Enriched Single-Walled Carbon Nanotube Networks’
“Despite continual progress in creating semiconductor-enriched single-walled carbon nanotube (SWCNT) networks, significant challenges still remain in achieving electronically homogeneous channels for field-effect transistors (FETs) due to persisting metallic percolation and uncontrollable nanotube bundling. To address this critical issue, we systematically explored the bundling effect of the SWCNTs on the electrical characteristics of SWCNT network-based FETs.” Find the paper and full list of authors in Materials Science in Semiconductor Processing.
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‘Biochemical Characterization of Disease-Associated Variants of Human Ornithine Transcarbamylase’
“Human ornithine transcarbamylase deficiency (OTCD) is the most common ureagenesis disorder in the world. OTCD is an X-linked genetic deficiency in which patients experience hyperammonemia to varying degrees depending on the severity of the genetic mutation. More than two-thirds of the known mutations are caused by single nucleotide substitutions. In this paper, partial order optimum likelihood (POOL), a machine learning method, is used to analyze single nucleotide substitutions in OTC with varying disease phenotypes and predicted catalytic efficiencies.” Find the paper and full list of authors in ACS Chemical Biology.
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‘The Microbiome’s Influence on the Neurobiology of Opioid Addiction and Brain Connectivity’
“Opioids are the most effective and potent analgesics available for acute pain management. With no viable alternative for treating chronic or post operative pain, it is not surprising that over 10 million people misuse opioids. This study explores the developmental influence of the microbiome on resistance to opioid addictive behavior and functional connectivity.” Find the paper and full list of authors in Brain Research Bulletin.
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‘Site-Specific Growth and Printing of Nanowires for Resource Efficient Fabrication of Flexible Electronics’
“Semiconducting nanowires (NWs) hold great potential for high-performance flexible electronics. However, using them, to fabricate electronic devices, is a complex process requiring multiple lithography steps to address the issues such as the one arising from mismatches between the temperatures needed for NW growth and the temperatures the polymeric substrates can withstand. Herein, a facile “design to fab” approach is presented, which avoids lithography-based fabrication by implementing the device layout at the NW synthesis level itself.” Find the paper and full list of authors in Small.
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‘Antibiotic Pretreatment Inhibits White Band Disease Infection by Suppressing the Bacterial Pathobiome’
“Diseases have caused unprecedent mortality in Caribbean coral communities. White band disease (WBD) has killed up to 95% of all endangered Caribbean Acroporids since it was first observed in 1979. … To better understand the disease etiology of WBD, we pretreated corals with antibiotics to determine how prophylactic use of antibiotics impacts the transmission of WBD in a replicated tank-based experiment. We found the prophylactic use of antibiotics led to significantly reduced infection rates in disease exposed corals with a 30-percentage point decrease in the infection rate.” Find the paper and full list of authors in Frontiers in Marine Science.