Research Quick Takes

Silicon for the Quantum Defect Era

Research associates Yihuang Xiong and Jiongzhi Zheng, PhD student Shay McBride, and Professor Geoffroy Hautier are co-authors of "Computationally Driven Discovery of T Center-like Quantum Defects in Silicon" published in Journal of the American Chemical Society. "Finding new 'quantum defects' facilitates bringing quantum technologies to real world scalable technologies." says Hautier. Adds Xiong, "Our study identifies several silicon defects that were overlooked before the quantum defect era and proposes high-yield synthesis routes."

On the Future of Flexible Electronics

Professor Will Scheideler authored "Nimble native oxides: Printing circuits from the skin of liquid metal," published in Matter, which focuses on new two-dimensional metal oxides that are thin, transparent, and flexible. "This preview highlights the opportunities for new applications of flexible and printed electronics and discusses a few of the most important challenges for this emerging research field," says Scheideler.

BMES Annual Meeting

At the 2024 Biomedical Engineering Society (BMES) Annual Meeting in Baltimore, MS student Anisia Tiplea '24 presented her senior honors thesis, and Hixon Lab gave an invited talk on their bone regeneration work supported by the Dartmouth Innovations Accelerator for Cancer.

INFORMS MIF Best Paper Award

Professor Wesley Marrero received the INFORMS MIF Best Paper Award as co-author of, "Interpretable Policies and the Price of Interpretability in Hypertension Treatment Planning" published in Manufacturing & Service Operations Management. The paper uses optimization to design clinically intuitive hypertension treatment protocols that greatly outperform clinical guidelines.

Research Webinar Award

Prabhat Hegde receiving the award in Seattle.

PhD student Prabhat Hegde received an Honorable Mention award at the inaugural INFORMS Minority Issues Forum (MIF) Summer Webinar Competition. Judges said Hegde's 5–10 minute research webinar, titled Rural school bus routing and scheduling with endogenous demand and traffic congestion, "demonstrated great skill and creativity." Hegde accepted the award at the INFORMS Annual Meeting in Seattle.

3D Metastructure for Better Energy Harvesting

PhD students Huan Zhao and Xiangbei Liu, and Professor Yan Li co-authored "Architecture Design of High-Performance Piezoelectric Energy Harvester with 3D Metastructure Substrate" featured on the cover of Advanced Theory and Simulations. "We achieved a remarkable 13.26-fold improvement in PEH performance by replacing the traditional solid substrate with a 3D auxetic unit-cell metastructure," says Li.

Oxygen Evolution Reaction

Professor Geoffroy Hautier is one of six co-authors of a perspective published in Nature Energy about the path to more efficient production of sustainable fuels. The researchers describe a way to map out the oxygen evolution reaction that's critical for sustainable, decarbonized fuels such as hydrogen.

Nanoparticle-Based Biosensors

PhD candidate Gabby Moss and Professor Sol Diamond co-authored "Effects of Salt Concentration on a Magnetic Nanoparticle-Based Aggregation Assay with a Tunable Dynamic Range," published in Sensors. The team experimentally demonstrated the effects of salt concentration on magnetic nanoparticle (MNP) biosensing efficacy and mathematically modeled MNP stability in solutions with different salt concentrations. "Our work can be leveraged to design an in vivo nanoparticle-based biosensor with enhanced efficacy in the event of varying salt concentrations," says Moss.

NIH Cancer Imaging Award

Professors Geoffrey Luke and Kim Samkoe were awarded a $2.2 million four-year grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH). "The project is focused on combining ultrasound imaging with tumor-targeted nanodroplets to detect the presence of oral cancer in lymph nodes," says Luke. The research could lead to better diagnosis and fewer surgeries.

INFORMS AAS Best Paper Award

Professor Vikrant Vaze received the INFORMS AAS Best Paper Award as co-author of, "Vertiport Planning for Urban Aerial Mobility: An Adaptive Discretization Approach" published in Manufacturing & Service Operations Management. The paper optimizes the number, locations, and capacities of vertiports for electric vertical-takeoff-and-landing (eVTOL) vehicles in urban aerial mobility (UAM) systems while capturing interdependencies between vertiport deployment, tactical operations, and passenger demand.

Metamaterial Designs for Better Energy Harvesting

PhD students Ya Tang, Huan Zhao, and Xiangbei Liu, alum Jace Henry '24, and Professor Yan Li co-authored "Design of metamaterial thermoelectric generators for efficient energy harvesting," published in Energy Conversion and Management: X. The team demonstrated that thermoelectric generators (TEGs) incorporating metamaterial designs offer significant potential to enhance energy harvesting efficiency and broaden application possibilities. "By capturing waste heat from industrial processes, vehicles, and electronic devices, these metamaterial-based TEGs can contribute to energy conservation and promote environmental sustainability," says Li.

NSF Quantum Information Science Award

Professor Mattias Fitzpatrick received a $600,000 award from the National Science Foundation (NSF) titled, "Explorations in Non-Hermitian Physics: From Fundamentals to Quantum Information Science Applications." The award is part of NSF's investment in quantum technologies with applications that include powerful computers, secure communications, and new industrial materials, sensors, and imaging tools.