
Undergraduate’s summer research is a glass act
Chemical engineering major Tianhao Yu ’19 has a unique job this summer: testing organic light-emitting diodes that may help improve the screen displays of devices such as cell phones and televisions.

Student work opens the brain to help surgeons remove tumors
Brain research does not take a summer vacation, and neither does Magdalena Granados ’19. The McNair Scholar is working on “awake language mapping” research designed to help neurosurgeons operate with greater precision.

Summer research that’s totally (nano)tubular
Chemistry major Austin Bailey ’18 (T5) has spent his summer developing a special polymer to attach other molecules to nanotubes, and his work could have significant applications for creating renewable energy sources.

Shape-memory polymers expand with student research
A mechanical engineering student visiting from the University of Maryland, Ricardo Cardoza stretched himself—and the shape-memory polymers he worked with—in Mitchell Anthamatten’s chemical engineering lab this summer.

Freeform optical device packs more punch in a smaller package
Spectrometers are used in a variety of applications, from environmental monitoring to astronomy to healthcare diagnostics. A new design using freeform optics upends more than a century of optical design.

What we learn when a machine ‘listens’ to Miles Davis
Two undergraduates are spending their summer analyzing a recording that was first released nearly four decades before they were born.

One question sparks student’s research around race in America
Why does racism play a part in motivating some students to go on to college, while it seems to deter others? Winston Scott ’19 is spending his summer preparing a study into how children react when they begin to perceive racism.

With automatic transcription, musicians can save themselves the treble
Two undergraduates have joined a summer research project focused on building a machine-learning interface that generates musical scores from audio files.

Student follows liquid metal flow to build a better battery
Meghan Patrick ’18 has spent her summer studying the use of liquid metal batteries on a scale large enough to power entire cities in conjunction with solar and wind power. Patrick is helping the lab figure out where to place ultrasound probes that can capture detailed measurements of how fluids flow in those batteries and how that affects their performance.

Summer in Malawi brings student researchers closer to community
For the past 15 years, the University’s Malawi Immersion Seminar has offered students a research experience in the remote village of Gowa, carrying out individual projects, and living and working among the community members.