2024 was a year of impact for the UChicago Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering both in and out of the lab.
From shape-shifting plastics and light-operated pacemakers to insights on the origin of life itself, faculty, students and postdoctoral researchers told their stories in some of the world’s largest publications, sharing their solutions to global problems with a global audience.
Here are just a few of the ways UChicago Engineering got the whole world talking in 2024.
Quantumania
Quantum engineering is one of the most earth-changing—and difficult to explain—revolutions to come along since the computer itself.
In November, UChicago PME Dean Nadya Mason and Prof. David Awschalom took their expertise to PBS’ legendary science program Nova as part of the documentary Decoding the Universe: Quantum.
Awschalom, who heads the Chicago Quantum Exchange, had appeared on PBS’ equally impactful NewsHour earlier in the year and also told quantum’s story on BBC News and the Wall Street Journal.
Prof. Supratik Guha also shared how quantum tech can reduce the energy costs of artificial intelligence through India’s massive Economic Times readership.
Engineering climate solutions
As humanity struggles with climate change, the humble battery is key, storing energy from wind turbines and solar panels and saving them for use when the air is still and the sky dark.
It’s a message UChicago PME Prof. Shirley Meng took to a global audience in 2024 through TEDx, Physics Magazine the Chicago Tribune and beyond.
People heard about Meng’s groundbreaking new anode-free sodium solid-state battery—replacing scarce, environmentally damaging lithium with inexpensive, plentiful sodium—nationally through NPR’s Science Friday and globally through Cosmos Magazine.
UChicago’s October launch of the Insitute for Climate and Sustainable Growth, where Meng heads the new Energy Technologies Initiative, brought attention from Axios to the Times of India.
The human cost, however, remains high as the planet weans itself off fossil fuels. That’s why researchers like UChicago PME Asst. Prof. Po-Chun Hsu work on ways to cool homes and bodies as global heat events worsen. His lab in June unveiled a new heat-reflective fabric designed for “urban heat islands” where the waves off heat emanating from pavement and buildings can be as harmful as the sun above.
The fabric, which in tests kept 8.9 degrees Celsius (16 degrees Fahrenheit) cooler than the commercialized silk commonly in summer clothing, received massive global coverage, including in New Scientist, Grist and CNN.
Ooze and ahhs
When astronauts head to Mars, packing light will be key. That’s why Prof. Stuart Rowan, Assoc. Prof. Shrayesh Patel and PhD candidate Nicholas Boynton developed a new “pluripotent plastic” capable of changing shape, form and properties. It can be a wrench, an adhesive, a scoop, a cup and more, replacing several tools with one.
This innovation, profiled in the New York Times in February, has the potential to change not just space travel, but how humanity thinks of recycling on earth.
Other materials innovations of the year include Asst. Prof. Sihong Wang’s new hydrogel semiconductor—a material capable of revolutionizing how bodies can interact with electronics. It was profiled in Chemical & Engineering News’ Chemistry in Pictures series.
In another example of UChicago PME’s interdisciplinary approach to materials and human health, PhD candidate Pengju Li this year shared his ultra-thin, light-powered pacemaker with WGN News and to the global audience of The Conversation.
Research recognition
Whether it was Meng discussing material design and brush calligraphy with Chemistry World or Mason talking about problem-solving and impact with Physics World, sometimes the story was best told by the scientists themselves.
In 2024:
- The MIT Technology Review named Asst. Prof. Chibueze Amanchukwu an “Innovator Under 35” while Chemical & Engineering News named him to their “Talented Twelve” for his innovative battery research.
- Science News named Asst. Prof. Chong Liu one of their “10 Early-Career Scientists to Watch” for her work finding less environmentally harmful ways to mine lithium for batteries.
- Cell Press named Meng one of the “50 Scientists That Inspire.”
- Rowan was named a Fellow of the Royal Society.
And the origin of life
To make all life, some rain must fall. That was what UChicago PME postdoctoral researcher Aman Agrawal discovered when realizing his research into coacervate droplets could explain one of the greatest mysteries about how life on Earth began.
The innovation, an example of how UChicago PME’s interdisciplinary approach to engineering has impact across fields, was profiled in the New York Times, The Conversation, Newsweek, Popular Mechanics and more.
UChicago PME was built to solve problems, from four-billion-year-old riddles to tomorrow’s climate transition. Global impact requires global collaboration, which is why UChicago PME continues to bring its research, innovation and stories to a global audience.