Freestanding Membranes of Smart Materials Thu, January 26, 2023 Bharat Jalan (USFOE 2022) at the University of Minnesota has engineered a new method for making smart materials that can change in response to stimuli like light, magnetic fields, or electric fields for better devices such as sensors, smart textiles, and flexible electronics. Read More
And Now, Artificial...Smelling? Mon, January 23, 2023 Google's Alex Wiltschko (USFOE 2020) has engineered a type of AI known as a graph neural network to predict what a compound will smell like to a person—rose, medicinal, earthy, and so on—based on the chemical features of odor molecules. Read More
Cloaking Objects That Trick Light and Sound Thu, January 19, 2023 FOE alum Andrea Alù at City University of New York has engineered a cloak that reduces radio waves, making them hard to detect by radar. Metamaterial cloaks for small objects and longer wavelengths, such as those of sound, could change radar, wireless communications, and sensor technologies. Read More
Printing Degradable Polymers Using Salt Mon, January 09, 2023 Emily Pentzer (USFOE 2020) at Texas A&M University is engineering a 3D-printed polymer process which she hopes will lead to creating packaging materials like boxes and tape that can degrade quickly rather than sitting in a landfill for years to come. Read More
Discovery of Obscure Heat Transfer Behaviors Thu, January 05, 2023 UCLA's Yongjie Hu (USFOE 2019) has discovered a new physics principle that may lead to novel materials for smart energy systems with built-in "pressure windows" with systems that only switch on within a certain pressure range before shutting off automatically after reaching a maximum pressure point. Read More
Bias and Vulnerability in Remote Proctoring Software Thu, December 15, 2022 NAE member Edward Felten (USFOE 2007) at Princeton University conducted a study on remote proctoring software used by educators and licensing boards and found bias towards minorities as well as issues surrounding cybersecurity, data privacy, and artificial intelligence. Read More
Upcoming Mar 22 2023 - Mar 25 2023 2023 German-American Frontiers of Engineering Symposium The 2023 German-America Frontiers of Engineering symposium will be held March 22-25 in Jülich, Germany. Sixty highly accomplished early-career engineers from Germany and the United States will meet for an intensive 2-1/2 day symposium on developments at the cutting edge of ... Jülich, Germany
Upcoming Jul 17 2023 - Jul 20 2023 2023 Japan-America Frontiers of Engineering Symposium The 2023 Japan-America Frontiers of Engineering symposium will be held July 17-20 in Tokyo, Japan. Sixty of the most promising early career engineers from Japan and the United States will meet for an intensive 2-1/2 day symposium on developments at the cutting edge of ... Tokyo, Japan
Upcoming Sep 10 2023 - Sep 13 2023 2023 US Frontiers of Engineering Symposium The Grainger Foundation Frontiers of Engineering 2023 Symposium will be hosted by the University of Colorado, Boulder, September 10-13. About 100 outstanding early career engineers will meet for an intensive 2-1/2 day symposium to discuss cutting-edge developments in four areas: ...
Register for Feb. 16 Webinar: Unlocking New Possibilities for Commercial Fusion This GUIRR webinar will discuss the Department of Energy’s strategic initiatives to accelerate the technical and commercial viability of fusion energy, in partnership with the private sector in support of the Biden-Harris Administration’s bold decadal vision for commercial fusion energy. Read More
The Crucial Race to Build a Better Battery In a podcast episode, FOE alum Shirley Meng at Argonne National Laboratory and the University of Chicago discusses the need to engineer different metals and elements that could last longer and charge faster than our current lithium-ion batteries. Read More
Research Initiative to Stem Gun Violence NAE member Darryll Pines at the University of Maryland Global Campus and Gregory Washington (USFOE 2004) at George Mason University are assembling nonpartisan, data-driven, research-based faculty experts from engineering and other disciplines to educate our communities about gun violence. Read More
Electronic Tattoos to Monitor Blood Pressure Roozbeh Jafari (JAFOE 2016) at Texas A&M University is engineering an electronic tattoo that can be worn comfortably on the wrist for hours and deliver continuous blood pressure measurements at an accuracy level exceeding nearly all available options on the market today. Read More
Tough and Stretchable Ionogels FOE alum Michael Dickey at NC State University reports ionogels with best in class mechanical properties in a paper in Nature Materials titled "Tough and stretchable ionogels via in situ phase separation." Read More
How Realistic Are Those Robots in Movies? FOE alum and dean of engineering at Ohio State University Ayanna Howard discusses 11 robots from Iron Man, Spider-Man 2, Big Hero 6, Terminator, and other movies and television. Read More
2021 Winter Issue of the Bridge on Frontiers of Engineering The NAE typically dedicates the winter issue of The Bridge to papers from The Grainger Foundation Frontiers of Engineering US symposium, held in September each year. Because of the covid-19 pandemic, the 2020 US FOE was rescheduled to February 25–26, 2021. This issue presents a selection of papers from the 2020 and 2021 US FOE meetings. Read More
Frontiers of Engineering: Reports on Leading-Edge Engineering from the 2019 Symposium This volume includes 12 papers from the National Academy of Engineering's 2019 US Frontiers of Engineering (US FOE) Symposium held in September 2019. US FOE meetings bring together 100 outstanding early career engineers to exchange information about leading-edge technologies in a range of engineering fields. The 2019 symposium covered four topic areas: Advanced Manufacturing in the Age of Digital Transformation; Engineering the Genome; Self-Driving Cars: Technology and Ethics; and Blockchain Technology. The papers describe leading-edge research on these topics, among others: next-generation robotic locomotion, using CRISPR to combat human disease vectors, the ethics of autonomous vehicles, and blockchain technology. Appendixes include information about contributors, the symposium program, and participants. This is the 25th volume in the US Frontiers of Engineering series. Read More
Frontiers of Engineering: Reports on Leading-Edge Engineering from the 2018 Symposium This volume includes 12 papers from the National Academy of Engineering's 2018 US Frontiers of Engineering (US FOE) Symposium held in September 2018. US FOE meetings bring together 100 outstanding engineers (ages 30 to 45) to exchange information about leading-edge technologies in a range of engineering fields. The 2018 symposium covered four topic areas: Quantum Computers: Are We There Yet?, the Role of Engineering in the Face of Conflict and Disaster, Resilient and Reliable Infrastructure, and Theranostics. The papers describe leading-edge research on these topics, among others: quantum computing, combining formal and informal structures in crisis response, infrastructure resilience, and immune theranostics. Appendixes include information about contributors, the symposium program, and participants. This is the 24th volume in the US Frontiers of Engineering series. Read More
Frontiers of Engineering: Reports on Leading-Edge Engineering from the 2017 Symposium This volume includes 12 papers from the National Academy of Engineering's 2017 US Frontiers of Engineering (US FOE) Symposium held in September 2017. US FOE meetings bring together 100 outstanding engineers (ages 30 to 45) to exchange information about leading-edge technologies in a range of engineering fields. The 2017 symposium covered four topic areas: Machines That Teach Themselves, Energy Strategies to Power Our Future, Unraveling the Complexity of the Brain, and Megatall Buildings and Other Future Places of Work. The papers describe leading-edge research on such topics as whether machines can spot diseases faster than humans, wireless charging of electric vehicles, brain-machine interfaces, and functional natural materials for high-rise structures, among other topics. Appendixes include information about contributors, the symposium program, and a list of meeting participants. This is the twenty-second volume in the US FOE series. Read More
Frontiers of Engineering: Reports on Leading-Edge Engineering from the 2016 Symposium This volume includes 13 papers from the National Academy of Engineering's 2016 US Frontiers of Engineering (US FOE) Symposium held in September 2016. US FOE meetings bring together 100 outstanding engineers (ages 30 to 45) to exchange information about leading-edge technologies in a range of engineering fields. The 2016 symposium covered four topic areas: Pixels at Scale, Extreme Engineering, Water Desalination and Purification, and Technologies for Understanding and Treating Cancer. The papers describe leading-edge research on such topics as frontiers in virtual reality headsets, autonomous precision landing of space rockets, new materials for emerging desalination technologies, and engineering immunity against cancer, among other topics. Appendixes include information about contributors, the symposium program, and a list of meeting participants. This is the twenty-third volume in the US FOE series. Read More
Frontiers of Engineering: Reports on Leading-Edge Engineering from the 2015 Symposium This volume includes 14 papers from the National Academy of Engineering's 2015 US Frontiers of Engineering (USFOE) Symposium held in September 2015. USFOE meetings bring together 100 outstanding engineers (ages 30 to 45) to exchange information about leading-edge technologies in a range of engineering fields. The 2015 symposium covered four topic areas: Cybersecurity and Privacy, Engineering the Search for Earth-like Exoplanets, Optical and Mechanical Metamaterials, and Forecasting Natural Disasters. The papers describe leading-edge research on such topics as designing materials with unprecedented capabilities, building image-relaying mechanisms to better explore exoplanets, and improving medical device cybersecurity, among other topics. Appendixes include information about contributors, the symposium program, and a list of meeting participants. This is the twenty-first volume in the USFOE series. Read More