Science Nation profiles NSF collaborative project on bat flight mechanics

Brown University engineer Kenny Breuer and biologist Sharon Swartz are profiled in this week's Science Nation, a science video series commissioned by the NSF Office of Legislative and Public Affairs.
Since 2001, Swartz and Breuer have teamed up to study the mechanics of bat flight. With support from the National Science Foundation (NSF), the two scientists from very different disciplines set up a special facility, including a wind tunnel, to study bats in flight.

Learn more about the project here:
http://www.nsf.gov/news/special_reports/science_nation/index.jsp

Gao and his research team discovers new principle in Material Science

A research team led by Brown University engineers has discovered a new mechanism that governs the peak strength of nanostructured metals. The team found that the deformation of nanotwinned metals is characterized by the motion of highly ordered, necklace-like patterns of crystal defects called dislocations. The finding, published in Nature, could lead to stronger and more ductile metals.

Full press release here:
http://news.brown.edu/pressreleases/2010/04/nanotwins

Prof. Webster and Erik Taylor's implant research highlighted

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (Ivanhoe Newswire) -- Almost 1 million people go under the knife every year for a knee, hip or shoulder replacement. Surgeons say those metal implants can become playgrounds for bacteria, leading to potentially deadly infections like MRSA. It happens to nearly 20,000 people every year. One scientist has developed a tiny solution that could kill the infection without removing the implant.

Dr. Webster is creating a nano-sized solution to fight implant infections. He manufactured iron-oxide nanoparticles -- tiny warriors that zero in on the implant, penetrate the bacterial shield, and kill the bacteria. In lab tests, an injection of the specially-designed nanoparticles eliminated 74 percent of the bacteria on an implant in 48 hours. When repeated three times over six days, the nanoparticles killed 100  percent of the bacteria.

Entire article and a TV clip airing across the country summarizing some of Professor Webster's and graduate student Erik Taylor's research (make sure to click play in the first image):

http://www.ivanhoe.com/channels/p_channelstory.cfm?storyid=23473

Professor Franck studies cellular movement

Our cells are more like us than we may think. They’re sensitive to their environment, poking and prodding deliberately at their surroundings with hand-like feelers and chemical signals as they decide whether and where to move. Such caution serves us well but has vexed engineers who seek to create synthetic tissue, heart valves, implants and other devices that the human body will accept.

To overcome that obstacle, scientists have sought to learn more about how cells explore what’s around them. While numerous studies have looked at cellular movement in two dimensions and a few recent experiments involved cellular motion in three dimensions, scientists remained unsure just how much cells interacted with their surroundings. Now, a study involving Brown University and the California Institute of Technology has recorded for the first time how cells move in three dimensions by measuring the force exerted by cells on their environs. The research gives scientists their most complete assessment to date about how cells move.

To read more of the release, click here. Also, posted here.

Deoni using MRI imaging to study neurodevelopment in children

Two Brown Faculty To Study Brain Development in Infants and Children With Bipolar Disorder

Sean Deoni, assistant professor of engineering, and Dr. Daniel Dickstein, assistant professor of psychiatry, have each received funding from the National Institute of Mental Health to study brain development in children with bipolar disorder. They will collaborate on each other’s projects.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — Two Brown University faculty members have received federal funding for innovative new neuroscience research projects focusing on brain development in infants and bipolar disorder in children.

Sean Deoni, assistant professor of engineering, plans to use his $2.5-million grant to study neurodevelopment throughout infancy and early childhood, from 2 months to age 5, using an MRI imaging technique at Brown he previously developed with colleagues.

Read more here.

Summer Insights

Brown Engineers were involved in a variety of worthwhile projects this summer:

or visit:
http://www.youtube.com/user/brownengin