houck2040/tees huggingface dataset:
therefore grunlan and her team focused their efforts in fine-tuning the properties of poly nipaams to limit the leaking of glucose-sensing molecules while still allowing the glucose to freely diffuse through the hydrogel to decrease the size of gaps the researchers inserted dangling molecules of different charges lengths and concentrations to the poly nipaam hydrogel when incorporated into the hydrogel these molecules create comb-shaped barriers whose teeth are designed to block diffusion of small assay-sized molecules to test if this comb-like architecture can limit diffusion of glucose sensors they also put within the hydrogel fluorescently tagged molecules called dextrans which served as proxies for glucose-sensing molecules next they placed the hydrogel into water and measured the amount of fluorescence in the water due to the leaking of dextrans from the hydrogel the researchers found that when they used a negatively charged molecule called poly(2-acrylamido-2-methyl-1-propanesulfonic acid) or pamp the combs prevented the diffusion of dextrans furthermore they also observed that glucose molecules were unhindered in their flow in and out of the hydrogel grunlan noted that now that they have proof-of-concept that their hydrogels can curb leaking of small dextrans the next step in their research would be to build a biosensor with glucose-sensing molecules contained within the membrane even though our present study did not involve actual sensing molecules it very conclusively and precisely shows you what comb architectures can do for hydrogels to limit diffusion said grunlan this was a systematic study to show the effectiveness of our approach and the possibility of extending our findings to other areas of research other than glucose sensing for which hydrogels with limited diffusion need to be designed contributors to this research include ping dong and bradley schott from the biomedical engineering department and dr kristen means a former student from the department of materials science and engineering at texas a&m and current post-doctoral researcher at rice university this research is funded by the robert j kleberg jr and helen c kleberg foundation the national science foundations engineering research center for precise advanced technologies and health systems (paths-up) and the national science foundation graduate research fellowship program
to develop effective therapeutics against pathogens scientists need to uncover how they attack host cells first in that effort researchers at texas a&m university have invented a high-throughput cell separation method that can be used in conjunction with droplet microfluidics a technique whereby tiny drops of fluid containing biological or other cargo can be moved very precisely and at high speeds specifically the researchers successfully isolated pathogens attached to host cells from those that were unattached within a single fluid droplet using an electric field other than cell separation most biochemical assays have been successfully converted into droplet microfluidic systems that allow high-throughput testing said dr arum han professor in the department of electrical and computer engineering and principal investigator of the project we have addressed that gap and now cell separation can be done in a high-throughput manner within the droplet microfluidic platform this new system certainly simplifies studying host-pathogen interactions but it is also very useful for environmental microbiology or drug screening applications the researchers reported their findings in the august issue of the journal lab on a chip microfluidic devices consist of networks of micron-sized channels or tubes that allow very controlled movements of fluids recently microfluidics using water-in-oil droplets have gained popularity for a wide range of biotechnological applications these droplets which are picoliters (or a million times less than a microliter) in volume can be used as platforms for carrying out biological reactions or transporting biological materials thus millions of droplets within a single chip facilitate high-throughput experiments saving not just laboratory space but the cost of chemical reagents and manual labor however biological assays can involve different cell types within a single droplet which eventually need to be separated for subsequent analyses this task is extremely challenging in a droplet microfluidic system said han
getting cell separation within a tiny droplet is extremely difficult because if you think about it first its a tiny hundred-micron diameter droplet and second within this extremely tiny droplet multiple cell types are all mixed together he said to develop the technology needed for cell separation han and his team chose a host-pathogen model system consisting of the salmonella bacteria and the human macrophage a type of immune cell when both these cell types are introduced within a droplet some of the bacteria adhere to the macrophage cells the goal of their experiments was thus to separate the salmonella that attached to the macrophage from the ones that did not for cell separation han and his team constructed two pairs of electrodes that generated an oscillating electric field in close proximity to the droplet containing the two cell types since the bacteria and the host cells have very different shapes sizes and electrical properties they found that the electric field produced a different force on each cell type this force resulted in the movement of one cell type at a time thereby separating the cells into two different locations within the droplet to separate the mother droplet into two daughter droplets containing one type of cells the researchers also made a downstream y-shaped splitting junction liquid handling robotic hands can conduct millions of assays but are extremely costly droplet microfluidics can do the same in millions of droplets much faster and much cheaper said han we have now integrated cell separation technology into droplet microfluidic systems allowing the precise manipulation of cells in droplets in a high-throughput manner which was not possible before this work is funded by the defense advanced research projects agency
the turbomachinery laboratory conducts theoretical and applied research on the reliability and performance of turbomachinery - rotating machinery that extracts or adds energy to fluids the turbo labs acclaimed turbomachinery and pump symposia (tps) is held annually in houston texas and its sister event the asia turbomachinery and pump symposia biennially in singapore both feature a world-class exhibit hall and cutting-edge technical program
gastric bypass surgery is sometimes the last resort for those who struggle with obesity or have serious health-related issues due to their weight since this procedure involves making a small stomach pouch and rerouting the digestive tract it is very invasive and prolongs the recovery period for patients in a new study researchers at texas a&m university have described a medical device that might help with weight loss and requires a simpler operative procedure for implantation researchers said their centimeter-sized device provides the feeling of fullness by stimulating the endings of the vagus nerve with light unlike other devices that require a power cord their device is wireless and can be controlled externally from a remote radio frequency source we wanted to create a device that not only requires minimal surgery for implantation but also allows us to stimulate specific nerve endings in the stomach said dr sung ii park assistant professor in the department of electrical and computer engineering our device has the potential to do both of these things in the harsh gastric conditions which in the future can be hugely beneficial to people needing dramatic weight-loss surgeries further details about their device are published in the january issue of nature communications obesity is a global epidemic and associated health problems have a significant economic impact on the health care system in the united states costing $147 billion a year additionally obesity puts people at risk for chronic diseases such as diabetes heart disease and even some cancers for those with a body mass index greater than 35 or who have at least two obesity-related conditions surgery offers a path for patients to not only lose the excess weight but maintain their weight over the long term in recent years the vagus nerve has received much attention as a target for treating obesity since it provides sensory information about fullness from the stomach lining to the brain although there are medical devices that can stimulate the vagus nerve endings and consequently help in curbing hunger these devices are similar in design to a pacemaker that is wires connected to a current source provide electrical jolts to activate the tips of the nerve
however park said wireless technology as well as the application of advanced genetic and optical tools have the potential to make nerve stimulation devices less cumbersome and more comfortable for the patient despite the clinical benefit of having a wireless system no device as of yet has the capability to do chronic and durable cell-type specific manipulation of neuron activity inside of any other organ other than the brain he said the researchers said they were surprised to uncover that the biological machinery coordinating hunger suppression in their experiments was different from conventional wisdom in other words it is widely accepted that when the stomach is full it expands and the information about stretch is conveyed to the brain by mechanoreceptors on the vagus nerve our findings suggest that stimulating the non-stretch receptors the ones that respond to chemicals in the food could also give the feeling of satiety even when the stomach was not distended said park looking ahead he said that the current device could also be used to manipulate nerve endings throughout the gastrointestinal tract and other organs like the intestine with little or no modifications wireless optogenetics and identifying peripheral neural pathways that control appetite and other behaviors are all of great interest to researchers in both the applied and basic fields of study in electronics material science and neuroscience said park our novel tool now enables interrogation of neuronal function in the peripheral nervous systems in a way that was impossible with existing approaches this work has been supported by grants from the interdisciplinary x-grants program a narsad young investigator award from the brain and behavior research foundation the national science foundations engineering research center for precise advanced technologies and health systems (paths-up) the university of washington diabetes research center and the national institutes of health
the national cemetery administration (nca) has awarded a contract to the texas a&m engineering experiment station as part of ncas veterans legacy program (vlp) to engage texas a&m university students in the development of an immersive and interactive digitized national cemetery experience we are excited to be partnering with texas a&m university said under secretary for memorial affairs randy reeves with this contract we will make great progress towards our goal of ensuring that every veterans story continues to be told – even when it is not possible to visit a va cemetery this is an important step in ensuring ‘no veteran ever dies the $249 832 contract will provide support to faculty and graduate students from texas a&ms college of engineering department of geography and department of history researchers will develop geographic information system (gis)-based applications to allow public contributions to memorialize veterans interred in three va cemeteries: houston national cemetery and san antonio national cemetery in texas and alexandria national cemetery in virginia the one-year contract was awarded on sept16 2020 capturing us veterans legacies and enabling virtual visits to their headstones through technology requires a transdisciplinary approach said dr stacey lyle texas a&m engineering and geosciences professor of practice who leads the project by transcending disciplinary boundaries between history geoscience and engineering we will preserve and make accessible the stories of american veterans great contributions to our freedoms for all people to experience students from texas a&ms corps of cadets will contribute biographical research of veterans interred in those cemeteries and others the texas a&m project team will partner with klein independent school district in houston to create gis-based learning opportunities for students and professional development for steam (science technology engineering arts and mathematics) teachers programs like the veterans legacy program are important to our country for many reasons they allow us to preserve our nations history and legacy while using that same knowledge to shape our future said brig gen joe e ramirez jr 79 commandant of cadets at texas a&m im proud that the corps of cadets is involved with this project as guardians of tradition we take pride in honoring our past while preparing leaders for the future for over 140 years the corps has taken great care to preserve and execute the most time-honored traditions at texas a&m it will be no different with the stories of our nations veterans this work will contribute to ncas efforts to enhance the on-site national cemetery experience through technology while also extending that experience to citizens who are unable to visit a national cemetery
in a new study published in nature machine intelligence researchers at texas a&m university have unveiled a machine learning-based algorithm that can reduce graininess in low-resolution images and reveal new details that were otherwise buried within the noise images taken with low-powered beams can be noisy which can hide interesting and valuable visual details of biological specimens said dr shuiwang ji associate professor in the department of computer science and engineering to solve this problem we use a pure computational approach to create higher-resolution images and we have shown in this study that we can improve the resolution up to an extent very similar to what you might obtain using a high beam ji added that unlike other denoising algorithms that can only use information coming from a small patch of pixels within a low-resolution image their smart algorithm can identify pixel patterns that may be spread across the entire noisy image increasing its efficacy as a denoising tool instead of solely relying on microscope hardware to improve the images resolution a technique known as augmented microscopy uses a combination of software and hardware to enhance the quality of images here a regular image taken on a microscope is superimposed on a computer-generated digital image this image processing method holds promise to not just cut down costs but also automatize medical image analysis and reveal details that the eye can sometimes miss currently a type of software based on a machine-learning algorithm called deep learning has been shown to be effective at removing the blurriness or noise in images these algorithms can be visualized as consisting of many interconnected layers or processing steps that take in a low-resolution input image and generate a high-resolution output image
in conventional deep-learning-based image processing techniques the number and network between layers decide how many pixels in the input image contribute to the value of a single pixel in the output image this value is immutable after the deep-learning algorithm has been trained and is ready to denoise new images however ji said fixing the number for the input pixels technically called the receptive field limits the performance of the algorithm imagine a piece of specimen having a repeating motif like a honeycomb pattern most deep-learning algorithms only use local information to fill in the gaps in the image created by the noise said ji but this is inefficient because the algorithm is in essence blind to the repeating pattern within the image since the receptive field is fixed instead deep-learning algorithms need to have adaptive receptive fields that can capture the information in the overall image structure to overcome this hurdle ji and his students developed another deep-learning algorithm that can dynamically change the size of the receptive field in other words unlike earlier algorithms that can only aggregate information from a small number of pixels their new algorithm called global voxel transformer networks (gvtnets) can pool information from a larger area of the image if required when they analyzed their algorithms performance against other deep-learning software the researchers found that gvtnets required less training data and could denoise images better than other deep-learning algorithms furthermore the high-resolution images obtained were comparable to those obtained using a high-energy light beam the researchers noted that their new algorithm can easily be adapted to other applications in addition to denoising such as label-free fluorescence imaging and 3d to 2d conversions for computer graphics our research contributes to the emerging area of a smart microscopy where artificial intelligence is seamlessly integrated into the microscope said ji deep-learning algorithms such as ours will allow us to potentially transcend the physical limit posed by light that was not possible before this can be extremely valuable for a myriad of applications including clinical ones like estimating the stage of cancer progression and distinguishing between cell types for disease prognosis equal contributors to this research include zhengyang wang and yaochen xie from the computer science and engineering department this research is funded by the national science foundation (nsf) the national institutes of health (nih) and the defense advanced research projects agency (darpa)
the nuclear engineering and science center seeks to improve the health wellbeing and environment of mankind through the application of nuclear technology the center provides services to researchers and/or faculty from texas a&m university other colleges and universities government agencies and private industry the center is recognized primarily for providing radioisotopes and other nuclear irradiation services for research academic medical and industrial applications and as a teaching and nuclear training facility
the gram-negative bacteria helicobacter pylori (h pylori) colonize the stomachs of the majority of the worlds population although most people may never experience major complications due to the pathogen h pylori infections increase the risk of certain types of gastric cancer as well as other illnesses such as peptic ulcers and gastritis currently h pylori infections are treatable with a cocktail of antibiotics but the rapid emergence of antibiotic resistance in h pylori is a significant concern to counter these threats dr pushkar lele assistant professor in the artie mcferrin department of chemical engineering at texas a&m university investigated how h pylori locate their ideal environment within a hosts stomach motile bacteria such as h pylori swim by rotating string-like appendages called flagella they navigate by sensing chemical signals in their environment a process known as chemotaxis an intracellular signaling pathway – the chemotaxis network – aids navigation by controlling the direction of rotation of the flagella current understanding of how the chemotaxis network operates is based on studies of escherichia coli (e coli) which is a model system for bacterial chemotaxis and motility the chemotaxis network in e coli modulates the probability of clockwise rotation in otherwise counterclockwise-rotating flagella to help the cell migrate toward favorable chemical environments how the chemotaxis network modulates flagellar functions in h pylori is not known popular techniques that use probes to study chemotactic function in bacteria do not work well in h pylori this creates significant challenges in understanding flagellar functions in this species to overcome these challenges leles group pioneered a novel probe-free approach to study flagellar functions in h pylori their approach exploited the fact that cells swam around in clockwise circles near glass surfaces when their flagella rotated counterclockwise and counterclockwise circles when their flagella rotated clockwise in a paper published in elife lele and his research team used this approach to report the probability of the clockwise rotation in h pylori for the first time jyot antani a doctoral student in leles group performed the experiments that further showed that h pyloris chemotaxis network modulates flagellar functions similar to that in e coli lele said the similarity in the form of flagellar control in the two bacterial species is intriguing given that they differ in many key aspects whereas h coli prefer the stomach e coli are found in the lower gastrointestinal tract the physical characteristics of h pylori are such that they run forward and reverse unlike e coli which run forward and then tumble as a result the modulation of the probabilities of clockwise flagellar rotation which suits e coli very well is predicted to cause errors in chemotaxis in h pylori lele predicts that future work with their new approach will reveal how h pylori reach their targets despite the errors and how dietary interventions can be developed to inhibit chemotaxis this research was supported by a high impact high risk awards grant from the cancer prevention and research institute of texas
harmony aeronautics a company started by members of the texas a&m university department of aerospace engineering has recently won a small business technology transfer (sttr) contract from the air forces agility prime program to further develop and commercialize their quiet rotor technology for vertical flight capable urban air mobility aircraft the contract is worth $150 000 and enables the company to seek up to $2-3 million in total funding over the next three years harmony aeronautics was co-founded by dr moble benedict and his graduate students david coleman farid saemi atanu halder hunter denton carl runco and bochan lee at the advanced vertical flight laboratory as well as two external collaborators benedict first started this team to compete in boeings gofly prize in spring 2018 this global design challenge sought to encourage development of a personal flying device that could quietly fly a single person for at least 30 minutes the aggie teams design was one of 10 winners in the contests design stage one of five winners in the contests build stage and the sole team to demonstrate quiet flight in the contests fly-off stage the air force kicked off its agility prime campaign to fund support and test novel electric vertical flight technologies soon after the team competed in the gofly contest the team successfully submitted an sttr proposal to agility prime with help from the office of commercialization and entrepreneurship at the texas a&m engineering experiment station (tees) the contract provides $150 000 and 6 months to further research the feasibility of the proposed idea next harmony aeronautics can apply for $750 000 and 15 months to demonstrate a prototype after this the startup can work with the air force and private partners to further field-test a product and develop a formal production line "the tees commercialization & entrepreneurship team is fully committed to working with harmony aeronautics as it makes progress towards the next stages of commercialization " said dr saurabh biswas tees executive director for commercialization and entrepreneurship "harmony is a tees commercialization & entrepreneurship portfolio company and its successful outcome in phase i provides a great foundation to build the next generation of products to serve both defense and civilian markets with their quiet rotor technology platform"
the texas a&m engineering experiment station's office of commercialization and entrepreneurship aims to help inventors with planning effective patents copyright or trademark strategy invention disclosures and marketplace technology transfers the office connects industrial and private sector entities to a variety of technologies available for sponsored research licensing options and investment opportunities
the texas a&m university system board of regents on wednesday confirmed dr m katherine banks as the 26th president of texas a&m university banks who is currently vice chancellor of engineering and national laboratories and dean of the texas a&m college of engineering assumes her duties june 1 banks also will carry the title vice chancellor of national laboratories and national security strategic initiatives because of her continued involvement with los alamos national laboratory and the george hw bush combat development complex at the rellis campus banks who has led texas a&m engineering for the past decade was selected after a national search led by board of regents chairman elaine mendoza vice chairman tim leach and a 15-member search committee after a robust national search which drew top-notch competitive candidates our board today unanimously confirmed dr katherine banks as the next president of texas a&m university mendoza said with her decade of accomplishments evident right here on campus dr banks will be ready and able to move forward from day one texas a&m is a great university and under her leadership we are expecting it to be even greater; we are excited to see this next chapter unfold we have all worked with dr banks for many years and we know what she has done to transform our engineering college to be among the biggest and best in the world said texas a&m system chancellor john sharp dr banks is going to do for the university what she has already done for engineering she is going to be a great president i am truly honored that the board of regents has selected me to be the next president of this great university said banks crucial listening sessions will begin soon with key stakeholders across campus and the state to gather perspectives concerning the issues challenges and opportunities that we face today i look forward to working together as we take texas a&m university to new levels of preeminence
dr vladislav yakovlev professor in the department of biomedical engineering at texas a&m university is part of a multiuniversity team researching how electrical and optical pulses can benefit cell absorption of materials including vaccines the team investigated the optical and electrical breakdown of materials those effects which describe material modification in the presence of extreme optical or electrical fields have been studied since the 1950s however the simultaneous application of optical and electrical fields especially to biologically relevant systems hasnt been explored before yakovlev said by investigating the synergistic action of electrical and optical pulses they were able to promote highly localized breakdown while reducing the threshold for such breakdown the newly discovered synergistic effect is particularly important if there is a need to selectively disrupt cellular membrane in a highly localized manner typically electroporation a technique that applies an electrical field to cells to increase the permeability of the cell membrane is used alternatively an optoporation which uses ultrashort laser pulses to form a small hole in the cell membrane can be employed a powerful combination of electroporation and optoporation can provide the benefits of both approaches leading to new ways drugs and vaccines can be delivered to cells and tissues one of the impacts of paramount significance of this effect which can be of great interest to a general audience is improved accuracy of vaccine delivery for covid-19 the team said in an impact statement the team recently published a paper in the journal photonics research where it was selected as editors' pick the research is funded by the air force office of scientific research with dr sofi bin-salamon serving as project manager salamon facilitated the collaboration between the three different research teams involved in this project while this technology would be a new addition to a laboratory the research team noted that creating the effect doesnt require sophisticated equipment allowing it to be used in a broad range of facilities we believe that a unique combination of a new fundamental science and a broad range of high-impact applications ranging from extreme light-matter interactions to nano- and biotechnology would be of great interest for a broad audience yakovlev said
five faculty members from the texas a&m university college of engineering were selected to receive a 2021 distinguished achievement award from texas a&m and the association of former students they were among 24 outstanding members of the universitys faculty and staff to be honored the college of engineering recipients recognized for their research were dr mahmoud el-halwagi professor and bryan research and engineering chair in chemical engineering artie mcferrin department of chemical engineering and managing director of the gas and fuels research center; and dr svetlana sukhishvili professor department of materials science and engineering and director of the soft matter facility dr ibere alves professor of practice harold vance department of petroleum engineering and dr aakash tyagi professor of practice department of computer science and engineering were recognized for teaching; and dr gerard l coté texas a&m regents professor james j cain professor i in biomedical engineering and director of the center for remote health technologies and systems was recognized for graduate mentoring the university-level distinguished achievement awards were first presented in 1955 and have since been awarded to those who have exhibited the highest standards of excellence at texas a&m in recognition of their achievements each recipient receives a cash gift an engraved watch and a commemorative plaque see the complete list of honorees on texas a&m today
since the early industrial revolution in the mid-1700s fossil fuels have acquired an ever-growing footprint in energy production but the environmental concerns of fossil fuels use and their inevitable depletion have led to a global shift toward renewable energy sources these transitions however raise questions about the best choice of renewables and the impact of investing in these resources on consumer cost in a recent study published in the journal nature communications researchers at texas a&m university have devised a metric that reflects the average price of energy in the united states much like how the dow index indicates trends in stock market prices the researchers metric reflects the changes in energy prices resulting from the type of energy sources available and their supply chains energy is affected by all kinds of events including political developments technological breakthroughs and other happenings going on at a global scale said stefanos baratsas a graduate student in the artie mcferrin department of chemical engineering at texas a&m and the lead author on the study it's crucial to understand the price of energy across the energy landscape along with its supply and demand we came up with one number that reflects exactly that in other words our metric monitors the price of energy as a whole on a monthly basis today the energy industry is largely dominated by fossil fuels like coal natural gas and petroleum an increase in fossil fuel consumption particularly in the last few decades has raised increasing concerns about their environmental impact most notably the intergovernmental panel on climate change has reported an estimated increase at 02 degrees celsius per decade in global temperature which is directly linked to burning fossil fuels but only around an 11% share of the total energy landscape comes from renewable sources although many countries including the united states have committed to using more renewable energy sources there isnt a way to quantitatively and accurately measure the price of energy as a whole for example an establishment might use a combination of solar and fossil fuels for various purposes including heating power and transportation in this case it is unclear how the price would change if there is an increased tax on fossil fuels or subsidies in favor of renewables are introduced energy transition is a complex process and there is no magic button that one can press and suddenly transition from almost 80% carbon-based energy to 0% said dr stratos pistikopoulos director of the texas a&m energy institute and senior author on the study we need to navigate this energy landscape from where we are now toward the future in steps for that we need to know the consolidated price of energy of end users but we don't have an answer to this fundamental question
to address this research gap the researchers first identified different energy feedstocks such as crude oil wind solar and biomass and their energy products so for example crude oils energy products are petrol gasoline and diesel next they categorized the energy end users as either residential commercial industrial or transportation further they obtained information on which energy product and how much of it is consumed by each user from the united states energy information administration last they identified the supply chains that connected the energy products to consumers all this information was used to calculate the average price of energy called the energy price index for a given month and forecast energy prices and demands for future months as a potential real-world use of this metric the researchers explored two policy case studies in the first scenario they studied how the energy price index would change if a tax on crude oil was imposed one of their main findings upon tracking the energy price index was that around $148 billion could be generated in four years for every $5-per-barrel increase in crude oil tax also this tax would not significantly increase the monthly cost of energy for us households in the second case study that explored the effect of subsidies in the production of electricity from renewable energy sources they found that these policies can cause a dip in energy prices even with no tax credit baratsas said their approach offers a way to optimize policies at the state regional and national level for a smooth and efficient transition to clean energy further he noted that their metric could adapt or self-correct its forecasting of energy demands and prices in the event of sudden unforeseen situations like the covid-19 pandemic that may trigger a drastic decrease in the demand for energy products this metric can help guide lawmakers government or non-government organizations and policymakers on whether say a particular tax policy or the impact of a technological advance is good or bad and by how much said pistikopoulos we now have a quantitative and accurate predictive metric to navigate the evolving energy landscape and thats the real value of the index this research is funded by the texas a&m energy institute and mays business school
in 2020 the world watched as spacex launched a two-man crew in a commercially built and operated spacecraft to the international space station they then watched as they safely splashed down two months later long before the actual liftoff however researchers with nasa worked with staff from texas a&m university to ensure the crew would land safely under emergency conditions three years ago a team from nasa worked out the design of the life raft that would have protected the crew in the event of an emergency in the gulf of mexico the first water landing of nasa astronauts in 45 years at a texas a&m facility in college station cody kelly 10 an aerospace engineering graduate who currently serves as deputy for national affairs with the nasa search and rescue mission office worked closely with the offshore technology research center (otrc) staff to perform extensive and detailed testingnasa used this testing to make an initial down-selection for the life raft design that became the nasa baseline for all human-rated spacecraft across all existing human spaceflight programs kelly said the raft ops were the first look at rescue beacon integration into our spacesuits early in the design cycle located in texas a&ms research park the otrc is a graduated national science foundation (nsf) engineering research center supporting the offshore oil and gas industry that conducts basic engineering research and develops systems for the economic and reliable recovery of hydrocarbons at ocean depths of 3 000 feet or more it is jointly operated by texas a&m the texas a&m engineering experiment station and the university of texas at austins cockrell school of engineering additionally we were able to test rescue beacon designs prior to manufacturing kelly said early testing provided the opportunity for efficient data sharing between the orion program and our commercial crew counterparts dr richard mercier professor in the zachry department of civil and environmental engineering at texas a&m has been director of the otrc since 2001 and manages all wave basin projects and the research program
otrc has conducted numerous projects for nasa and associated contractors (boeing united space alliance jacobs engineering) since the facility opened in 1991 he said codys project was the fourth in a series that was executed between 2004 and 2017 having to do with testing of life preserver units life rafts and miscellaneous vehicle egress equipment the otrc wave basin is capable of large-scale simulations of the effects of wind waves and currents on fixed floating and moored floating structures the wave basin is 150 feet long and 100 feet wide with a depth of 19 feet the pit located in the center of the basin has a depth of 55 feet with 48 individually controlled paddles the wavemaker can generate various wave conditions including unidirectional and multidirectional regular and irregular (random) waves sixteen dynamically controlled fans can generate prescribed gusty wind conditions from any direction a modular current generation system consisting of banks of submerged jets can generate sheared current profiles nasa provided all equipment and test protocols for these projects but the facility offered capabilities of producing wind and waves for prescribed sea states and also safety divers to assist nasa personnel in the water our staff and student workers are always eager to support and participate in these projects mercier said nasa shared videos photos and facility test data with their partners at spacex and boeing to help engineers certify and fly the design following testing at otrc astronauts robert behnken and douglas hurley were on the spacex crew dragon spacecraft that took off into orbit from the kennedy space center in florida with their landing fully protected by the life raft design that was decided upon in 2017 at the otrc
the offshore technology research center provides technology expertise and services needed for the development of drilling production and transportation systems that enable the safe and economically viable exploitation of hydrocarbon resources in deep and ultra-deep water it has a deepwater model basin the only one of its kind in the us
the texas a&m university system national laboratories office (nlo) was formed by the chancellor to be a conduit for expanding engagement with the national laboratories for faculty staff and students of the a&m system this office engages with all department of energy and national nuclear security agency laboratories and sites the nlo has developed a multi-element program to help texas a&m system researchers develop collaborative ties with researchers at los alamos national laboratory (lanl) execute the texas a&m system and lanl collaborative research projects and formalize long-term relationships where appropriate such as through joint appointments
sickle cell disease (scd) is the most prevalent inherited blood disorder in the world that affects between 70 000 to 100 000 americans however it is considered an orphan disease meaning it impacts less than 200 000 people nationally and is therefore underrepresented in therapeutic research a team led by dr abhishek jain from the department of biomedical engineering at texas a&m university is working to address this disease im trying to create these new types of disease models that can impact health care with the long-term goal of emphasizing on applying these tools and technologies to lower health care costs said jain assistant professor we strategically wanted to pick up those disease systems which fall under the radar in orphan disease category jains research is in organ-on-a-chip where cells from humans can be grown on usb-sized devices to mimic the way the organ would work inside the body this sort of system is ideal for testing new drug treatments as drugs cannot be tested on humans and animal models have not shown to be a good representation of how a patient and disease would interact with a treatment for scd patients the organ-on-a-chip would also be beneficial because patients can present with mild to severe cases jain works with tanmay mathur a fourth-year doctoral student who trained as a chemical engineer in his undergraduate years his research focused on microfabrication techniques and simulationsskills he said merge well into the organ-on-a-chip research he now performs in jains lab the team collaborates closely with the texas medical center in houston
their work recently published in bioengineering & translational medicine builds off a 2019 publication in the journal lab on chip where the team demonstrated that endothelial cells (cells that line the blood vessels) could be used to model the disease physiology of a patient without having to stimulate the model to perform differently than a healthy vessel traditionally these cells were not used for disease modeling so in that way our approach is very novel mathur said we are one of first to harness these cells and employ them in disease modeling research mathur and jain demonstrate that these models can be used to differentiate between patients the first step: build a blood vessel that mimics a patients vessel for that the team would need two components patient blood and endothelial cells collecting the blood involved a simple blood draw they faced a challenge with the endothelial cells however they would need to take a biopsy of the cells or use stem cells to grow their own neither of which was ideal then they found the answer was in the blood what we learned is within blood samples are some endothelial cells also circulating jain said we call them blood outgrowth endothelial cells that we can harness very easily thats what is new about this work you can get those cells grow them so thats theres enough in number and then you can make blood vessels now that they could build the vessels the next step was to see if these models would show how the disease has various biological impacts in different patients again the goal was to be able to test treatments on these models so the closer they mimiced their human patient the better
were able to differentiate a very severe sickle cell patient in terms of their phenotype from very mild patients mathur said moving forward we can take a larger population of any sickle cell disease patients and assess them using our organ-chip technology and then categorize them into different groups based on symptoms their findings indicate that these organs-on-a-chip could lead to patient-centric personalized treatment improving how clinicians approach this and other cardiovascular diseases when you take it to the field now it can become a predictive device jain said now you do not have to know whether the patient is mild or severe you can test for that you can predict if patient is serious and can dictate their therapeutic needs the next step is to continue to expand the patient cohort to collect more results a long-term goal would be to use the patient information collected to develop a database to better predict disease progression you take a history of a lot of these patients and their cardiovascular health with this device and you can predict which patient might have better chance of having a stroke and you start treating them early on jain said mathur said even with future challenges he looks forward to continuing their research i think even though it may take 10 15 years we will at least push forward some of the research that were doing and get it out in the clinical field he said we are one of the only groups in the world that have started this field of personalized treatment i feel that our impact is pretty high and im sure we will be able to expand the same treatment to other cardiovascular diseases and attract more attention and deeper insights into the biology that we are looking at this work is funded by a trailblazer award jain received from the national institute of biomedical imaging and bioengineering
during the start and onrush of the covid-19 pandemic all hospitals in the state of texas restricted visitation for intensive care unit (icu) patients and their families because of the infectious nature of the virus family members were unable to visit or even communicate with their loved ones leaving many individuals with feelings of anxiety confusion and fear of the unknown a group of doctors from houston methodist and researchers from texas a&m university identified a novel approach of adapting a virtual icu or vicu to make family visitations possible the vicu involves physiological sensors that are monitored 24/7 in the operations center of the hospital the system also includes two-way audio/video communication technology in the past this technology has been reserved for virtual visits by doctors and consultants but it was instrumental in connecting icu patients with their family members especially when dealing with the highly infectious coronavirus a new process was designed and rapidly implemented to allow family members to book a visit with their loved ones virtually after speaking to a virtual registered nurse (vrn) family members receive a link in a text which would connect them to the audio/video equipment installed in the patients room this improvised solution was important since bringing in outside technology such as phones or tablets into the icu was no longer possible because it posed sanitation threats and subjected medical staff to much higher risks of infection often patients werent able to use everyday technology themselves due to sedation and intubation restrictions and would require assistance from medical staff to use the equipment
using vicu technology not only provided more accessible technology for the patient but also posed less of a risk of infection for health care workers even though some patient assistance could be needed depending on the severity of the patients condition we needed to think outside the box and use something that wasnt intended for this purpose at all said dr farzan sasangohar assistant professor of industrial and systems engineering at texas a&m this is an example of effective improvisation and adaptation which are key characteristics of resilient health systems we know from the literature that family engagement is extremely important it has positive impacts on patient outcomes to evaluate this improvised solution the research team interviewed 230 family members after using this technology to communicate with their loved ones and overall the responses were very positive albeit emotional a majority of users reported feelings of joy and relief being able to see their family members still there were reports of sadness with family members seeing their loved one in a difficult situation particularly when the patient was intubated or unable to speak there were also some responses recorded from family members who lost their loved ones while in icu and reported that they were grateful to have had this option to see them and get closure some users reported potentially making this available on-demand to enable initiating calls on their own the adoption of a vicu for family visitation shows promise during an unusual and trying time for many however several areas identified for modification and improvement need to be addressed i believe our family-centered approach provides an opportunity to take us closer to a real open-icu concept in which family members are engaged more efficiently and effectively sasangohar said this will have a significant positive impact on patient outcomes