Six other Engineering Faculty Earn Seed, Salomon Awards
Honoring faculty from a wide variety of fields of study, Brown University presented Research Achievement Awards to six professors at its annual Celebration of Research program on Tuesday, April 23. Engineering Associate Professor Andrew Peterson received an Early Career Research Achievement Award for his work focusing on understanding and controlling chemical reaction processes on solid surfaces, with primary applications for energy and environmental technologies such as solar fuel production and carbon dioxide capture and conversion.
Peterson has published more than 50 articles in peer-reviewed journals, and given more than 24 invited talks at universities, research institutes and conferences since 2016. In the competitive field of catalysis, he has helped Brown develop a balanced program across several disciplines and he is especially known for his computational work. He has raised nearly $10 million in total research funding, including a recent $3.5 million grant from the Department of Energy. He has received a National Science Foundation CAREER award and a Young Investigator Award from the U.S. Navy.
"Researchers at Brown are advancing knowledge and making a difference in the world through exceptional achievements and discoveries," said Jill Pipher, vice president for research at Brown. "These awards, now in their third year, elevate the University's recognition of the extraordinary research contributions of our faculty."
Pipher presented the awards along with Provost Richard M. Locke at Brown's Faculty Club. The annual awards program recognizes the research and scholarship of both longtime and early-career faculty members.
"Brown's faculty are central to the University's mission to make a difference in the world by collaborating across multiple disciplines to address society's most pressing challenges through critical research and inquiry," Locke said. "With these awards, we celebrate our faculty for their endless curiosity, drive and commitment to excellence, and for their contributions and discoveries."
Locke added that the faculty members' research accomplishments are also closely entwined with their successes in teaching and mentoring students.
Nominations for the awards were sought in six categories and then reviewed by panels of Brown faculty. Pipher said that many highly accomplished researchers were nominated this year, which presented panelists with the challenge of selecting a small number of awardees from an outstanding group of nominees. "Each of these individual award winners has shown deep scholarship and creative solutions to complex problems," Pipher said.
In addition to the awards, each winner received a $5,000 research stipend. The other five winners of the 2019 Research Achievement Awards included: Biology and Medical Science's Elizabeth Brainerd (Distinguished Research Achievement Award), History and Portuguese and Brazilian Studies' James Green (Distinguished Research Achievement Award), American Studies' Monica Munoz Martinez (Early Career Research Award), Health Services, Policy and Practice's Kali Thomas (Early Career Research Award), and Chemistry's Lai-Sheng Wang (Distinguished Research Achievement Award).
The Research Achievement Awards are one of a number of Brown programs that recognize the importance of research by Brown faculty. Also honored at the Celebration of Research program were 21 teams as recipients of annual Research Seed awards, which advance competitive research proposals by supporting the generation of preliminary data and pursuing new directions or collaborations.
Professor of Biology and Engineering Sharon Swartz, who is investigating "Structure and Mechanics of the Bat Shoulder: Testing a New Model for Human Rotator Cuff Disorders" was a seed winner in the Biological and Life Sciences category. Among the Bio-Physical Sciences, engineering winners included Kareen Coulombe, who is researching "A Novel Gene Therapy Targeting Cardiac Fibroblast Electrical Remodeling to Reduce Fatal Arrhythmias After Heart Attack", Eric Darling, Haneesh Kesari and Jeffrey Morgan, who are "Probing the Role of Mechanical Forces in Tissue Assembly Using in Situ Force Sensors" and Anita Shukla, who is researching "Enhancing Would Healing Using Hydrogels for Localized Chemokine Delivery."
A Salomon Faculty Research Award was presented to Assistant Professor Haneesh Kesari for his work "Understanding the Potential of Architecture in Enhancing Material Toughness through Mechanical Testing of Robot-Assembled, Bio-Inspired, Composite Materials." Designed to recognize excellence in scholarship, the Richard B. Salomon Faculty Research Awards fund exceptional faculty research projects. From 1995 to 1999, the program was funded by the bequest of the late Richard B. Salomon, Chancellor of Brown University. Since 1999, the University has continued to fund this program, with preference given to junior faculty.
Following are the description of the engineering-affiliated projects funded by the 2019 Research Seed and Salomon awards:
Research Seed Award for Biological and Life Sciences
Structure and mechanics of the bat shoulder: Testing a new model for human rotator cuff disorders
To date, mice have served as the primary animal model for disorders of the human shoulder. However, mice differ from humans in fundamental and critical ways that limit this approach: during locomotion, impact loads apply compression/bending to the forelimb; mice experience relatively few loading cycles over their short lives; and mouse shoulder anatomy and patterns of motion differ greatly from those of humans. In contrast, bats are long-lived (typically 15 to 35 years), and their natural flight patterns entail a very large number of locomotor cycles (over 1,200,000 over 15 years). Anatomy of the bat shoulder skeleton, muscles, and tendons resembles that of humans remarkably closely, and shoulder motions used by bats during flight appear to closely match those of humans during high stress, injury-causing activities (throwing, swimming, racquet power strokes, overhead hammering). Moreover, the structures of the human-like bat rotator cuff appear to withstand mechanical demands that are extreme, in magnitude and number of repetitions, without the wear or damage that frequently result from occupational and athletic activities in humans. To determine feasibility of use of our laboratory bat colonies as a model for ongoing study, and specifically to develop collaborative proposals to NSF and NIH (with G. Genin, Washington University and S. Thomopolous, Columbia University), we propose to carry out two foundational analyses. We aim to demonstrate achievability of 1) accurate capture of 3D shoulder kinematics during controlled flight (wind tunnel and obstacle course) and swimming with XROMM, and 2) direct measurement of shoulder muscle activity patterns.
PI: Sharon Swartz, Professor of Biology, Professor of Engineering
Funded: $48,233
Research Seed Awards for Bio-Physical Sciences
A novel gene therapy targeting cardiac fibroblast electrical remodeling to reduce fatal arrhythmias after heart attack
When an athlete suddenly drops to the ground and dies during competition, the cause is often "sudden cardiac death," a medical term that means there was a severe problem with the electrical activity of the heart that caused it to stop beating. As we age, we all have an increased likelihood of developing heart disease, like having a heart attack or developing atrial fibrillation. Many of these heart conditions have interrupted electrical activity, called arrhythmias, yet current medical care for arrhythmia is technically challenging and often carries great risks, including worsening the problem. We aim to develop new, targeted gene therapies for arrhythmia by specifically instructing the fibroblasts of the heart to help manage the electrical patterns. These cells are very active and change their behavior as we age and particularly after a heart attack, becoming more agitated and excitable. Our research aims to calm down the electrical activity of fibroblasts and reduce fatal arrhythmias. To do this, we formed a multi-disciplinary team of experts in cardiac arrhythmia mechanisms, tissue engineering, and gene therapy. This project is expected to launch a new research enterprise at Brown that will lead the field in developing an understanding of fibroblast-driven arrhythmia mechanisms and advancing novel therapeutic strategies to treat arrhythmia and lessen the risks for sudden cardiac death.
PI: Kareen Coulombe, Assistant Professor of Engineering, Assistant Professor of Molecular Pharmacology, Physiology and Biotechnology
Co-PI: Bum-Rak Choi, Associate Professor of Medicine (Research)
Collaborators: Peng Zhang, Assistant Professor of Medicine; Ulrike Mende, Professor of Medicine
Key Personnel: Collin Polucha, Research Technician, Engineering; Tae Yun Kim, Postdoctoral Fellow, Medicine; Peter Bronk, Research Scientist, Medicine; Karim Roder, Assistant Professor of Medicine (Research)
Funded: $50,000
Probing the role of mechanical forces in tissue assembly using in situ force sensors
The forces cells exert, and have exerted on them in return, play a critical role in early development, wound healing, and disease. However, these forces are not easily investigated, nor have they been quantified within 3D, cell-dense tissues. This information is critical for understanding cellular interactions necessary for tissue assembly and repair. The proposed project will investigate the role of intercellular forces in cell-dense structures. To accomplish this, we will quantify cell traction forces in 3D constructs by embedding discrete, hyper-compliant microparticles (HCMPs) alongside living cells and monitoring the resultant deformations. Existing approaches for quantifying traction forces require measuring the displacement of fiducial markers in bulk, deformable materials. That approach is not compatible for studying cell-only neotissues that serve as models of native tissue building. Instead, we will embed a small number of HCMPs of defined size (25 µm) and elastic modulus (100 Pa) alongside thousands of cells as they self-assemble into geometrically defined microtissues (spheroid and toroid shapes). Serial images of deformed HCMPs will be captured using a high-content confocal microscope and then computationally assessed to determine applied cellular forces. We will investigate differences for mesenchymal and epithelial cell types, as well as for integrin- vs. cadherin-coated HCMPs. Mechanistic understanding will be pursued using cytoskeleton-targeting drug treatments. This project will produce critical knowledge about how mechanics influences neotissue self-assembly and organization. By better understanding how cells exert forces on one another, we can begin to grasp how to direct these behaviors towards regenerative applications.
PI: Eric Darling, Associate Professor of Medical Science, Associate Professor of Engineering, Associate Professor of Orthopaedics
Co-PI: Haneesh Kesari, Assistant Professor of Engineering
Co-PI: Jeffrey Morgan, Professor of Medical Science, Professor of Engineering
Funded: $85,000
Enhancing Wound Healing Using Hydrogels for Localized Chemokine Delivery
Wound healing is an essential process in human health, and poorly healing wounds can lead to secondary infections, permanent disablement, and increased mortality. The Jamieson lab studies the role of the innate immune response in wound healing. We found that poorly healing wounds have a decrease in innate immune cells infiltrate. The immune suppression included lower levels of chemokines, which are essential to attract cells of the immune system. The wound healing rate could be restored by exogenous addition of the chemokines CXCL1 and CCL2. However, the materials used to apply chemokines had to be applied daily, which is not practical in a clinical setting. Therefore, we propose to develop chemokine delivering biomaterials that can be used to enhance wound healing. In the proposed work, we will build on expertise from PI Shukla's lab on the development of hydrogel drug delivery materials and the expertise of PI Jamieson's lab in the innate immune response and in vivo wound models, to develop and examine the efficacy of new chemokine releasing hydrogel materials. The mechanical properties of these hydrogels will be investigated along with the in vitro release and chemokine activity. Hydrogel formulations will be tested in vivo in two animal models of wound healing. Successful completion of this collaboration will pave the way for the development of a new research program using novel materials to improve wound healing. This research will be relevant to a variety of patient populations.
PI: Anita Shukla, Assistant Professor of Engineering, Assistant Professor of Molecular Pharmacology, Physiology and Biotechnology
Co-PI: Amanda Jamieson, Assistant Professor of Molecular Microbiology and Immunology
Funded: $75,000
Salomon Award for Physical Sciences
Haneesh Kesari
Assistant Professor of Engineering
$14,796
Understanding the potential of architecture in enhancing material toughness through mechanical testing of robot-assembled, bio-inspired, composite materials
Stiff structural biological materials (SSBMs), such as bone and shell, are an interesting class of materials. Despite predominantly being composed of brittle ceramic materials, they have been shown to possess extraordinary toughness. SSBMs are composites that consist of a ceramic phase and an organic phase mixed together in intricate 3D architectures. The highly organized nature of these architectures is thought to be at the root of the SSBMs' remarkable toughness. However, SSBMs' toughness has only rarely been reproduced in synthetic composites. The key hurdle behind this is the lack of the scientific knowledge that connects how small-scale architectural motifs affect overall toughness. The proposed project addresses this key hurdle. In it, we propose a new method—robot-assisted large-scale assembly—to manufacture idealized physical models of a prototypical SSBM. In this method, brittle polymers will be laser cut into millimeter-sized tablets that will then be positioned, with micrometer precision, and glued back together into centimeter-sized specimens using (4) four-axis robotic arms. We will develop the robotic-end effectors for our robotic arms so that the first arm positions and orients the tablets, the second applies glue to the tablet's edges, and the last two apply force to the tablet as the glue sets. We will guide our robotic arms using computer vision. Through systematically varying the key parameters in the architectural motifs and mechanically testing the robot-manufactured material specimens, we aim to gain key insights into how small-scale architectural motifs affect large-scale toughness.