DSWeb logo contest results

It is with great pleasure that we announce the winner of the contest for the new DSWeb logo. Our selection committee chose the following co-winners: Lois Sellers of SIAM, who designed our previous logo; and Flavio Fenton of Georgia Tech. The selection committee asked the two to merge their contributions to form the new logo, which will debut with the new platform, which is expected for the July DS Magazine issue with a transitional period over the next several months.

The new logo will be accompanied by a new color scheme that will pick up on the blue and green colors. These new colors will replace the current red in text and graphical elements.

We thank all who submitted ideas, and we hope this new logo will serve DSWeb well for many years!

The Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) Scientific Collaboration, which includes Georgia Tech researchers, and the Virgo collaboration have observed a second gravitational wave event.

The observation was made in the early morning hours (UTC) of December 26, 2015. It is smaller than the initial, historic detection made in September 2015, but was also produced by a pair of colliding black holes.

Gravitational waves, or ripples in the fabric of spacetime, carry information about their origins and the nature of gravity that cannot otherwise be obtained. Physicists say the December waves were produced during the final moments of the merger of two black holes—14 and eight times the mass of the sun—to produce a single, more massive spinning black hole that is 21 times the mass of the sun. LIGO estimated the September black holes were 29 and 36 times the mass of the sun.

“It is very significant that these black holes were much less massive than those observed in the first detection,” said Gabriela Gonzalez, LIGO Scientific Collaboration spokesperson. “Because of their lighter masses compared to the first detection, they spent more time—about one second—in the sensitive band of the detectors. It is a promising start to mapping the populations of black holes in our universe.”

The signal was detected by both of the twin LIGO detectors located in Louisiana and the state of Washington.

During the merger, which occurred approximately 1.4 billion years ago, a quantity of energy roughly equivalent to the mass of the sun was converted into gravitational waves. The detected signal comes from the last 27 orbits of the black holes before their merger.

“Once again, the collaborative work of hundreds of scientists and engineers has allowed us to pull the curtains and peek into the new window of the universe that was opened last September,” said Laura Cadonati, Georgia Tech professor and chair of LIGO’s data analysis council. “We now have two strong signals from merging black holes and we are now excitingly awaiting for more discoveries to come in the next months as the detectors improve and our analysis is robust.”

Cadonati is one of 12 Georgia Tech faculty members, postdoctoral researchers and students in the LIGO Scientific Collaboration. The team continues to develop tools and techniques to detect, analyze and characterize sources from the first science run of Advanced LIGO, including this second event.

“With this second discovery of a binary black hole merger, we begin to unveil a population of black holes in the universe,” said Professor Deirdre Shoemaker, director of Georgia Tech’s Center for Relativistic Astrophysics and a member of LIGO. “This hints at the excitement to come as we probe deeper into the sky, listening to the story gravity is telling us about the universe.”

The first detection of gravitational waves, announced on February 11, 2016, was a milestone in physics and astronomy. It confirmed a major prediction of Albert Einstein’s 1915 general theory of relativity and marked the beginning of the new field of gravitational-wave astronomy.

LIGO research is carried out by the LIGO Scientific Collaboration, a group of more than 1,000 scientists from universities around the United States and in 14 other countries. More than 90 universities and research institutes in the LSC, including Georgia Tech, develop detector technology and analyze data. Approximately 250 students are strong contributing members of the collaboration.

The LIGO Observatories are funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF), and were conceived, built and are operated by Caltech and MIT. The new discovery, accepted for publication in the journal Physical Review Letters, was made by the LIGO Scientific Collaboration (which includes the GEO Collaboration and the Australian Consortium for Interferometric Gravitational Astronomy) and the Virgo Collaboration using data from the two LIGO detectors.

The genetic material could scrunch its way into a virus.

DNA may scrunch like a worm to get inside viral shells, a team including Georgia Tech researchers reports in the Journal of Physical Chemistry B. This deeper understanding could  lead to new ways to fight pathogens and design powerful DNA transporters.

A critical step in viral replication is the packaging of genetic material. To successfully invade host cells, viral particles must hijack the host’s machinery to make copies of viral genetic material and build protein shells called capsids to house viral DNA or RNA. Scientists have been studying how the genetic material is driven into capsids so they might one day block this step.

Viral capsids are assembled from a number of identical protein subunits, like a soccer ball sewn together from panels. At the lone opening sits a protein complex, called the protein tunnel, through which DNA enters and exits the capsid, analogous to the air valve that allows a soccer ball to be inflated.

The proteins driving this process are among the strongest biological motors known. Most scientists have assumed that these proteins act like levers, grabbing the DNA and applying force along the axis of the DNA to push it into the capsid. In this simple mechanical picture, DNA plays a passive role.

However, all molecules are dynamic, says Harold D. Kim, an associate professor at Georgia Tech’s School of Physics and a coauthor of the study. “They do not stay in one shape, but constantly change their conformation because of thermal fluctuations,” he explains. DNA is not an exception. It is therefore plausible that DNA itself contributes to genome packaging.

A couple of years ago, Stephen C. Harvey, then a professor in the School of Biology at Georgia Tech and now at the University of Pennsylvania, proposed a role for DNA. The role is based on DNA’s ability to interconvert between two alternative structures – called A and B forms – depending on the number of surrounding water molecules. Called the “scrunchworm” hypothesis, it proposes that DNA changes its form when the protein tunnel changes its shape. 

According to Kim, proteins composing the tunnel are enzymes that burn ATP to do mechanical work, which alternately widens and shrinks the tunnel itself. The hypothesis suggests that DNA assumes the short A form when the tunnel is narrow and converts to the B form when the tunnel is wide, rather than being pushed directly by the protein tunnel. Thus, the DNA itself produces the actual movement along the tunnel, while proteins only grab and release the DNA at two locations in a coordinated manner to guide it in the right direction.   

To test this hypothesis, Harvey, Kim, and James C. Gumbart, an assistant professor in Georgia Tech’s School of Physics embarked on a collaboration. The Kim group had been studying the bending dynamics of DNA that influence genome packaging, and the Gumbart group had expertise in molecular dynamics simulations. James T. Waters, a Ph.D. student in Kim’s group, carried out the molecular dynamics simulations. He and Columbia University research scientist Xiang-Jun Lu performed data analysis. In a previous work, the researchers reported a simple way to visualize the A-B transitions of DNA. The same method was used to characterize the DNA structures inside the protein tunnel.

The researchers simulated interactions between a protein and DNA sequences from a virus. The computer models suggest that the DNA scrunches spontaneously without any lever-like protein motions. If further testing bears out this proposed mechanism, it would demonstrate for the first time that changes in DNA’s shape can produce strong forces.

“These studies also reinforce our rapidly expanding view that DNA is more than just genetic information: It is an active participant in genome packaging and maintenance,” Kim notes.

Although these studies were carried out on a non-pathogenic virus, the resulting insights are most likely broadly applicable, because the same packaging mechanism is used by herpes viruses that cause diseases such as chickenpox, shingles, infectious mononucleosis, and oral and genital lesions.

The authors acknowledge funding from the National Institute of Health and the National Science Foundation.   

For more information, contact:

Harold D. Kim

School of Physics

Georgia Institute of Technology

Atlanta, GA 30332

Phone: 404-894-0080

Physicist will use award in part to pay for students’ trips to ORNL

The Oak Ridge Associated Universities (ORAU) have selected School of Physics Assistant Professor Martin Mourigal as one of 35 recipients of the 2016 Ralph E. Powe Junior Faculty Enhancement Awards. The award represents public recognition by academic peers of the quality and promise of Mourigal’s research.

Mourigal says he will use the award partly to pay for student trips to Oak Ridge National Laboratory to conduct experiments using the Spallation Neutron Source there.

Mourigal’s research aims to connect atomic structure and dynamics to emergent collective phenomena, which occurs when the behavior of a collection is different from that of its parts. Examples of such phenomena are superconductivity, which allows electron to flow without resistance, and quantum-spin liquids, which are exotic magnets arising from the entanglement of electrons’ magnetic moments, or spins.  Both phenomena emerge from complex interactions among large numbers of electrons and are “incredibly difficult to predict theoretically,” says Mourigal.   

Neutron scattering is a major tool Mourigal uses to study how electron spins organize. ORNL’s SNS, which generates an unprecedentedly high flow of neutrons and has exquisite detection efficiency, “allows radically new experiments to be performed,” he says.

In particular, Mourigal aims to study three magnetic materials for which exotic behavior has been proposed or observed. He hopes to identify model behavior in these materials by comparing experimental results to the most advanced predictions from theory.

Faculty Upbeat After Road Trip to Oak Ridge National Lab

Early-career Georgia Tech faculty members who visited Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) last month returned energized. They found opportunities to partner with scientists who complement their research interest and skills. And they saw first-hand the impressive facilities they could use to advance their own research programs at Georgia Tech.

The visit is part of the initiative of Julia Kubanek to accelerate the growth of GT-ORNL research collaborations. Kubanek is Georgia Tech’s representative to the ORNL liaison committee that oversees the national lab’s partnerships with a core group of universities, which includes Georgia Tech. Kubanek is also the associate dean for research in the College of Sciences and a professor in the School of Biology and the School of Chemistry and Biochemistry.

Kubanek also hopes to draw attention to energy-related research opportunities for Georgia Tech graduate students. “Energy is a major focus of 21st-century science, and our reliance on antiquated modes of generating energy is harming the planet,” she says. “ORNL is committed to energy-related research in many domains of science, including biology, materials, and physics.”

David Hu, an associate professor in the School of Biology and the School of Mechanical Engineering, was on the Georgia Tech road trip to ORNL on May 17-18, 2016. Previously unfamiliar with ORNL, Hu says, “I was happy to see the formidable resources they have toward collaboration. They even have a student dorm.”

Hu’s goal was to find collaborators, and yes, he found two. One studies plant roots, and the other runs a state-of-the-art fabrication facility.

“The plant root is a model system for network formation,” Hu explains.  Hu and Chloé Arson, an assistant professor in the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, have a joint grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF)-funded Center for Bio-mediated and Bio-inspired Geotechnics to study how natural networks form.

In addition, Hu says he has an NSF-funded project to study the sensory abilities of moth antennae. ORNL’s state-of-the-art fabrication capabilities will help in building an at-scale model of a moth antenna.

On the other hand, Martin Mourigal, an assistant professor in the School of Physics, is no stranger to ORNL, having done research with the national lab’s neutron sources.  He uses neutron scattering to study dynamic and static properties of matter in the nanoscale. He joined the trip to learn more about ORNL’s diverse research portfolio beyond neutron scattering.

“My interest was to learn about their materials preparation and characterization facilities and get a better feeling on how supercomputing can be used to address fundamental physics questions,” Mourigal says. “I had a fun time learning about nanoscale materials, supercomputing, and advanced manufacturing.”

Hu, Mourigal, and 14 other early-career Georgia Tech Faculty members on the road trip in May toured ORNL’s major facilities: the Spallation Neutron Source, the Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences, the Titan  supercomputer, and the Manufacturing Demonstration Facility. This last one, Mourigal says, “was pretty cool. ORNL is trying to push the boundaries of additive manufacturing, and that may have a transformative impact for various industries.” Additive manufacturing is also known as 3D printing.

Georgia Tech is one of ORNL’s eight core university partners. The others are Duke University, Florida State University, North Carolina State University, Vanderbilt University, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, University of Tennessee, and University of Virginia.

“We look to our core universities to work with us on major research projects,” says Ian S. Anderson, ORNL’s director of graduate education and university partnerships. These collaborations are evident in ORNL publications, he adds, 70% of which have university coauthors.

Some Georgia Tech research programs align well with those of ORNL, Anderson notes. Partnering enables ORNL to work with excellent faculty and students to achieve its research goals, he adds. “We would like to see more Georgia Tech graduate students carry out research at ORNL.”  

“It is clear to me now that many opportunities for partnership exist for Georgia Tech and ORNL,” Mourigal says, “particularly to access scientific equipment or technical expertise that is not present, or is complementary to what exists, in Georgia Tech.”

Hu says he will follow up with his newfound ORNL partners throughout the summer.

Mourigal, meanwhile, is co-organizer of the ORNL Challenge, a summer program for undergraduate students. He will spend two weeks of the 2016 summer semester in ORNL, he says, “supervising students, engaging with ORNL scientists, and looking forward to developing more collaborations.”

It isn’t every day that a briefing on Capitol Hill would have been appropriately accompanied by popcorn. May 25, 2016, was one of those rare days, with the screening of “Solar Superstorms,” a documentary commissioned by the National Science Foundation (NSF). Narrated by popular British actor Benedict Cumberbatch, the documentary served as the entrée to space weather, why it should be monitored, and what is needed to study it.

Helping explain the matter to a standing-room-only crowd of about 100 Congressional staffers and interns was an NSF-convened panel of the science advisers of the documentary. Among them was John H. Wise, an associate professor in the School of Physics.

Wise is a computational astrophysicist, using supercomputers to simulate the birth of stars and galaxies and to visualize those simulations. A segment of “Solar Superstorms” is based on the simulations of his research at Georgia Tech College of Sciences. The same tools are needed to study, track, and forecast space weather, especially that occurring on the sun.

Solar outbursts are common; the high-energy particles they send to Earth cause the bright dancing lights we know as auroras. At times, these outbursts can be so powerful that they can disrupt the electricity grid or damage satellites. “The largest solar superstorm that affected Earth after the advent of electricity occurred in the 1850s, when we had only telegraphs,” Wise notes. “Imagine what can happen now with the modern communications we have.”

The potential cost of solar superstorms can run to trillions of dollars in lost productivity, according to Senator Gary C. Peters (D-Michigan). Last month, he introduced a bill – S.2817, Space Weather and Forecasting Act – to ensure that the U.S. has the tools and resources to predict space weather and avoid economic catastrophe in case of severe events.

A major tool in this endeavor is computational power, Wise says. Using the example of his research at Georgia Tech, he posits that in these days of big data, computation has become the third leg of science, after theory and experiment.  “Computation is central to science now,” Wise says. “The US has been a leader globally in providing supercomputers for scientists to use and to train computational scientists.” Continued support for the funding of supercomputers for basic research is essential, he adds.

In his research Wise uses supercomputers to run simulations of galaxy formation, beginning from the first generation of stars forming when the universe was only 100 million years old. Running these simulations requires tremendous computational power. At Georgia Tech, Wise has access to a supercomputer with a computing power equivalent to 30,000 home computers running at the same time. A computation that would take 100 days on a single computer would take less than 5 minutes using the entire Georgia Tech facility. But even that is good only for software development, Wise says.

To do simulations and visualizations, Wise goes to Blue Waters, NSF’s premiere supercomputer, which is housed in the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Blue Waters is equivalent to 400,000 home computers. Wise has NSF grants that enable him to access this facility. “We are doing computations at scale,” Wise says, adding that his research can produce up to 1,000 terabytes of data in a single simulation.

Yummymath.com estimates that the Complete Works of Shakespeare, consisting of 1,300 pages of print, would require 10 megabytes of storage. Wise’s output from one simulation would be equivalent to 100 million volumes of the Shakespeare tome.

Because no direct observation of the first galaxies being born exists, “we are in a theorists’ playground,” Wise says. “Our work is planning for the future,” he explains, when the James Webb Space Telescope is launched in October 2018. This successor to the Hubble Space Telescope ought to be able to look deeper into space and see galaxies even farther away and younger than have been observed so far. “We’re trying to make predictions for the new space telescope,” says Wise. When that telescope is working, Wise will be able to compare his team’s simulations to observation.

For now, the number crunching continues at a grand scale, both to observe space weather events that could affect Earth now and to predict events that occurred long ago and far away. Scientists’ continued access to computational power, Wise says, is crucial.

School of Physics’ John Wise Roots for More Supercomputing

It isn’t every day that a briefing on Capitol Hill would have been appropriately accompanied by popcorn. May 25, 2016, was one of those rare days, with the screening of “Solar Superstorms,” a documentary commissioned by the National Science Foundation (NSF). Narrated by popular British actor Benedict Cumberbatch, the documentary served as the entrée to space weather, why it should be monitored, and what is needed to study it.

Helping explain the matter to a standing-room-only crowd of about 100 Congressional staffers and interns was an NSF-convened panel of the science advisers of the documentary. Among them was John H. Wise, an associate professor in the School of Physics.

Wise is a computational astrophysicist, using supercomputers to simulate the birth of stars and galaxies and to visualize those simulations. A segment of “Solar Superstorms” is based on the simulations of his research at Georgia Tech College of Sciences. The same tools are needed to study, track, and forecast space weather, especially that occurring on the sun.

Solar outbursts are common; the high-energy particles they send to Earth cause the bright dancing lights we know as auroras. At times, these outbursts can be so powerful that they can disrupt the electricity grid or damage satellites. “The largest solar superstorm that affected Earth after the advent of electricity occurred in the 1850s, when we had only telegraphs,” Wise notes. “Imagine what can happen now with the modern communications we have.”

The potential cost of solar superstorms can run to trillions of dollars in lost productivity, according to Senator Gary C. Peters (D-Michigan). Last month, he introduced a bill – S.2817, Space Weather and Forecasting Act – to ensure that the U.S. has the tools and resources to predict space weather and avoid economic catastrophe in case of severe events.

A major tool in this endeavor is computational power, Wise says. Using the example of his research at Georgia Tech, he posits that in these days of big data, computation has become the third leg of science, alongside theory and experiment.  “Computation is central to science now,” Wise says. “The US has been a leader globally in providing supercomputers for scientists to use and to train computational scientists.” Continued support for the funding of supercomputers for basic research is essential, he adds.

In his research Wise uses supercomputers to run simulations of galaxy formation, beginning from the first generation of stars forming when the universe was only 100 million years old. Running these simulations requires tremendous computational power. At Georgia Tech, Wise has access to a supercomputer with a computing power equivalent to 30,000 home computers running at the same time. A computation that would take 100 days on a single computer would take less than 5 minutes using the entire Georgia Tech facility. But even that is good only for software development, Wise says.

To do simulations and visualizations, Wise goes to Blue Waters, NSF’s premiere supercomputer, which is housed in the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Blue Waters is equivalent to 400,000 home computers. Wise has NSF grants that enable him to access this facility. “We are doing computations at scale,” Wise says, adding that his research can produce up to 1,000 terabytes of data in a single simulation.

Yummymath.com estimates that the Complete Works of Shakespeare, consisting of 1,300 pages of print, would require 10 megabytes of storage. Wise’s output from one simulation would be equivalent to 100 million volumes of the Shakespeare tome.

Because no direct observation of the first galaxies being born exists, “we are in a theorists’ playground,” Wise says. “Our work is planning for the future,” he explains, when the James Webb Space Telescope is launched in October 2018. This successor to the Hubble Space Telescope ought to be able to look deeper into space and see galaxies even farther away and younger than have been observed so far. “We’re trying to make predictions for the new space telescope,” says Wise. When that telescope is working, Wise will be able to compare his team’s simulations to observation.

For now, the number crunching continues at a grand scale, both to observe space weather events that could affect Earth now and to predict events that occurred long ago and far away. Scientists’ continued access to computational power, Wise says, is crucial.

The Georgia Tech campus proves it stays busy as Advanced Manufacturing & Prototyping Integrated to Unlock Potential (AMP-IT-UP) program participants visited campus as finals week approached.

AMP-IT-UP works close with Carver Middle School in Griffin, Georgia among others to provide an opportunity to engage in design and implementation steps within product development. On April 25, close to 40 8^th grade students toured the Complex Rheology And Biomechanics (CRAB) Lab in the School of Physics.

The work of interdisciplinary collaboration, the CRAB Lab builds robotic simulations that mimic organism movement in various systems. Studying the mechanics of snakes, turtle, and even cockroaches can be difficult, so the use of robot replicas are just one way to overcome obstacles.

Students also visited the Invention Studio in the Department of Mechanical Engineering. The Studio is a workshop comprised of specialized machinery for students to create their own prototypes. Modelling projects can be flexible and are open ended, giving students a unique designing experience.

Carver Middle School teacher and tour organizer Antoinette Richter selected the labs to visit after considering aligning student interest with the AMP-IT-UP mission. “I choose to take students to the CRAB Lab and Invention Studio so that they could make the connection and experience the design process in the real world.” The tours supplemented classwork, helping draw connections between concepts and applications.

The tours wrapped up with a visit to what is considered the hub of campus, the Georgia Tech Student Center. Amid undergraduates studying or stopping by for a bite to eat, AMP-IT-UP middle schoolers caught a glimpse of campus life. “I really enjoyed the diversity on the GT campus,” Richter adds. “My students were able to see students of their same ethnicity and culture having a successful educational experience.”

More information:

The CRAB Lab is headed by Dr. Daniel Goldman, Associate Professor in the School of Physics and Adjunct Professor in the 3. For more information, visit crablab.gatech.edu.

The Invention Studio is a student-run venture aimed to allow Georgia Tech affiliates access to designing and modeling their own three-dimensional prototypes. For more information, visit inventionstudio.gatech.edu.

AMP-IT-UP is an NSF funded program to provide middle schools courses exploring robotics. From the ground up approach, students can learn planning, building, and implementation along with conceptual understanding for specific utility. For more information, visit ampitup.gatech.edu. 

At the College’s Advisory Board meeting on April 22, 2016, Associate Dean for Academic Affairs David M. Collard announced the recipients of six undergraduate awards:

Jeffre H. Allen, a biochemistry major, received the Cynthia L. Bossart and James Efron Scholarship, for the top out-of-state junior in the College of Sciences. Allen hails from Tennessee, has been a GT1000 team leader, and volunteers with Outdoor Recreation Georgia Tech.

Alexander M. Covington, a graduating physics major, received the Roger M. Wartell and Stephen E. Brossette Award for Multidisciplinary Studies in Biology, Physics, and Mathematics. Covington’s research with School of Physics’ James C. Gumbart involves using molecular dynamics simulations to understand the structure and function of small proteins. Covington was an editor and writer for Georgia Tech’s student newspaper, Technique.

Alex B. George, a biochemistry major, received the Robert A. Pierotti Memorial Scholarship, for a graduating senior excelling in both academics and research. In addition to a 4.0 GPA, George has conducted undergraduate research with the School of Chemistry’s Adegboyega K. (Yomi) Oyelere and with Michael E. Davis of the Walter E. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering (BME). George is a coauthor in a paper published in 2015 in the journal Bioorganic Medicinal Chemistry and in a paper to be published in Stem Cells Translational Medicine. George is headed to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Clinical Center, in Bethesda, Md., where he will conduct full-time research as part of NIH’s Post-Baccalaureate Intramural Research Training Program.

Zixin (Wendy) Jiang, a graduating physics and applied mathematics double major, received the A. Joyce Nickelson and John C. Sutherland Undergraduate Research Award, for an undergraduate student who has jointly studied mathematics and physics and has engaged in research. Jiang has conducted research with the School of Physics’ Tamara Bogdanovic and Michael S. Chapman, as well as with the School of Mathematics’ Igor Belegradek.  In her spare time, Jiang was a violinist for the Georgia Tech Symphony Orchestra.

June Y. (Austin) Moon, a biology major, received the Virginia C. and Herschel V. Clanton Jr. Scholarship, for a top pre-medical student in the College of Sciences. Moon participates in undergraduate research with the School of Biology’s Yuhong Fan, in whose lab he studies differentiation of mouse embryonic stem cells.  He served as treasurer of the American Red Cross Club at Georgia Tech and is now the advocacy coordinator of the American Medical Student Association at Georgia Tech.

Krishma Singal, a physics major, received the Mehta Phingbodhipakkiya Undergraduate Memorial Scholarship. Singal has been an undergraduate research assistant working in the CHAOS (Complex Hearth Arrhythmias and Oscillating Systems) lab of the School of Physics’ Flavio H. Fenton. She served in the organizing committee of the highly successful Conference for Undergraduate Women in Physics held at Georgia Tech in January.  

The six award recipients were honored in the campus-wide Student Honors Celebration on April 20, 2016. “That event is an important opportunity in the academic calendar year to recognize the outstanding accomplishments of our students,” says Associate Dean Collard.

Almost all awardees joined the College of Sciences Advisory Board Members, Dean Paul M. Goldbart, and guests at the College’s awards presentation and lunch on April 22.

“Introducing our award winners to members of our Advisory Board is a particular honor,” says Associate Dean Collard. “It is something I look forward to each year.”  

Associate Dean Collard also announced the establishment and first beneficiaries of the Leddy Family Scholarship Fund. Six juniors and seniors will be receiving the scholarship for the 2016-17 academic year:

• Rabeea Ahmad, a biochemistry major, worked as an undergraduate research assistant in the clinical biomechanics lab of Geza F. Kogler in the School of Applied Physiology, conducts research at the Grady Trauma Project at Emory University under the supervision of Tanja Jovanovic, holds leadership positions in the Campus Kitchen project and the American Medical Students Association at Georgia Tech.  

• Mary Elizabeth V. Lee, a physics major, conducts research in the CHAOS lab of the School of Physics’ Flavio H. Fenton, holds leadership positions in the Georgia Tech Society of Physics Students and Georgia Tech’s Society of Women in Physics.

• Yash S. Mehta, a biochemistry major; conducts research with Amit R. Reddi of the School of Chemistry and Biochemistry on the role of heme in neurodegenerative diseases, as well as with Michael E. Davis of BME on the biochemistry of myocardial infarction; sings with Taal Tadka a capella group.

• Sarah M. Nay, a psychology major, an undergraduate research assistant in the Child Study Lab at Georgia Tech, working on software applications to flag communication behaviors that might be early markers for developmental disorders.

• Andrew D. Royappa, a chemistry major, conducts research with the School of Chemistry and Biochemistry’s Joseph P. Sadighi on silver-containing catalysts, participates in the College of Sciences’ Science and Math Research Training (SMART) Living Learning Community.

• Elizabeth A. (Lizzie) Stubbs, a psychology major with a minor in biology, an undergraduate research assistant in the Child Study Lab at Georgia Tech, investigating social communication behaviors among typical toddlers and those at risk for autism.

Lee, Mehta, Royappa, and Stubbs joined Pam and Jeff Leddy, Dean Goldbart, and school representatives on April 27, 2016, at a lunch celebration of the inaugural Leddy Family scholars in the College of Sciences.

“We take great pleasure in recognizing and nurturing the outstanding, well-rounded students in our care,” says Dean Goldbart. “They are the reason we are constantly striving to strengthen and diversify the educational experiences and research opportunities that we offer.”

“I cannot say a more heartfelt thank you to the benefactors of these awards and scholarships,” Dean Goldbart continues.  “Their generosity marvelously expands our ability to support deserving students and retain them in the College.”