Engineering Nanoscience Small Scale, Huge Potential
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ENGINEERING NANOSCIENCE SMALL SCALE, HUGE POTENTIAL A CAMERA THAT POWERS ITSELF INTERNET OF THINGS: NEXT STEPS KY HARLIN BS’08: DATA + GROWTH AT CONDÉ NAST SENIOR DESIGN EXPO engineering.columbia.edu/web /newsletter/expo Seniors from all nine Engineering departments showcased their innovative capstone projects at the School’s Senior Design Expo last spring. (Photo by Timothy Lee Photographers) | 1 facebook.com/CUSEAS twitter.com/CUSEAS instagram.com/CUSEAS youtube.com/ColumbiaSEAS Dean of the School Columbia Engineering is published Opposite page: Mary C. Boyce twice a year by: Dean Mary C. Boyce (Photo by Jeffrey Schifman) Executive Director of Communications Columbia University Margaret R. Kelly in the City of New York The Fu Foundation School of Editor Engineering and Applied Science Melanie A. Farmer 500 West 120th Street Room 510, MC 4714 Writers New York, NY 10027 Jesse Adams, Jennifer Ernst Beaudry, Amy Biemiller, Timothy P. Cross, Comments, suggestions, or address Jessica Driscoll, Holly Evarts, changes may be e-mailed to and Elaine Rooney [email protected] or sent to our address above. Photography Eileen Barroso, Michael Dames, For the latest news and updates Timothy Lee Photographers, about Columbia Engineering, visit and Jeffrey Schifman engineering.columbia.edu. Design & Art Direction Columbia Creative Contributors Kim Martineau, Jane Nisselson, Jack Reilly, and David Simpson Cover: Assistant Professor Nanfang Yu’s research expertise is in nanophotonics and optoelectronic devices. In a collaborative project with Professor Michael Weinstein, he is exploring a planar device for robust transport of guided optical waves. Illustrated in this research image is the intensity of light reflected from a nanostructured silicon membrane that supports two closely spaced optical resonances. (Image courtesy of Adam Overvig) 2 | he first day of the fall semester marks a new beginning for clean rooms, and creating an electron microscopy lab with a students and faculty alike, and, at Columbia Engineering, new transmission electron microscope as part of a set of shared T many exciting changes have taken place over the past year, facilities with Arts and Sciences. paving the way for great advancements in research, education, In addition to renovated spaces for research, transformations and innovation. to education and common spaces have also been a priority. Last year we initiated a series of faculty discussion forums Students were greeted by a fresh, sleek campus-level entry to focused around highly interdisciplinary research themes that cut Mudd, and a modern, inviting student space, Carleton Commons, across our School, many of which also leverage incredible collab- with areas for quiet study, tables to work or eat together, and orations with our sister schools. We have discussed research comfortable seating for relaxing between classes or activities. initiatives that address society’s grand challenges and those that Carleton Commons is open 24 hours a day and is well used, both push disciplinary frontiers. Not surprisingly, these fields intersect day and night! See details of all our new renovations on page 48. and all spur discovery of novel areas of research. Also in this issue you’ll get to know some of the many inno- Our faculty and students are concentrating on global challenges vations coming from our faculty, students, and alumni. Shree including water, energy, climate, mobility, human health, and K. Nayar, T. C. Chang Professor of Computer Science, a serial communications, and, on the frontiers of sensing and imaging, inventor, has developed a self-powered video camera (page data science, computation-based engineering science, and 24). Alums Ky Harlin of Condé Nast and Shahram Ebadollahi of advanced materials and devices. These research endeavors IBM Watson Health both use big data to achieve their different advance fundamental knowledge that will impact society at all business objectives (pages 36–38); and students like Jason levels—truly transcending disciplines and transforming lives. Kang (page 26), Ritish Patnaik, Riley Spahn, and Jessica Valarezo The research focus of this issue, starting on page 6, showcases (pages 32–35) epitomize the spirit and inventiveness of today’s our work in nanoscience and nanoengineering—a field of advanced Columbia Engineering students. materials and devices where the line between a material and a We are proud to share these stories with you so that you device is often absent. Columbia is recognized worldwide as one can see for yourself the remarkable institution that is Columbia of the leaders in the development of nanoscience. Manipulating Engineering today. materials at the atomic and molecular levels will provide new ways to fabricate macroscale products with innovative applications that will impact medicine, energy, water, computing, and much more. To support the research endeavors of our faculty, including 15 new faculty (page 40) and four more joining in January, we Mary Cunningham Boyce have committed significant resources to outfitting new laborato- Dean of Engineering ries, renovating current laboratories, expanding and renovating Morris A. and Alma Schapiro Professor | 3 CONTENTS 6 20 24 RESEARCH INNOVATION EDUCATION 6 ENGINEERING NANOSCIENCE 22 VENTURE COMPETITION 26 STUDENT RESEARCH ADVANCED NEW MATERIALS, SEAS STARTUPS FORGE AHEAD RE AL-WORLD RESEARCH NANOPHOTONICS, OPTICAL Winners of this year’s Columbia Venture EXPERIENCE A PLUS WAVES, AND MORE Competition are busy taking their startup The School’s new Summer@SEAS Find out how our faculty and their ventures to the next level. program and how students are working collaborators are continuing to push with Ugandan partners on low-cost, research boundaries in the burgeoning, 24 THE ETERNAL CAMERA biomedical devices multidisciplinary field of nanoscience. A NEW CAMERA THAT James Hone + Colin Nuckolls (p. 8); 30 INTERNET OF THINGS Keren Bergman + Michal Lipson + Alex POWERS ITSELF! Gaeta (p. 10); Michael Weinstein + Computer Science Professor Shree K. NEXT STEPS IN IoT Nanfang Yu (p. 12); Chris Marianetti Nayar and his team have invented a Prepping students for a future where (p. 14); Sanat Kumar + Christopher prototype video camera that is the first Internet connectivity for devices is a given Durning (p. 16); Aron Pinczuk + to be fully self-powered. Shalom Wind (p. 18) 32 STUDENT SPOTLIGHTS Ritish Patnaik, senior (p. 32); 20 FACULTY Q&A Riley Spahn, PhD student (p. 33); KATAYUN BARMAK Jessica Valarezo and Girls Who A pioneering materials scientist, Code (p. 34) Katayun Barmak is focused on finding new, better, more advanced materials. 4 | FALL 2015 | VOLUME 57, NO. 1 26 36 51 ALUMNI NEWS DEPARTMENTS 36 BIG DATA GROWTH 40 FACULTY NEWS 55 CEAA/CEYA KY HARLIN BS’08 WELCOME AND PROMOTIONS ALUMNI ASSOCIATION MESSAGE As vice president of growth and data science at Condé Nast, Ky Harlin is 45 SEAS IN BRAZIL 55 Class Notes putting into practice what he learned as an applied mathematics major at SEAS. NEW INNOVATION HUB IN RIO UPDATES FROM UNDERGRADUATE ALUMNI 38 REVOLUTIONIZING HEALTH 46 SUSTAINABILITY RESEARCH 61 PROGRAM Notes SHAHRAM EBADOLLAHI SEAS COLEADS NEW LIVABLE MS’99, PHD’05 CITIES RESEARCH PROJECT UPDATES FROM Shahram Ebadollahi is vice president GRADUATE ALUMNI of innovation and chief science officer 47 NAE REGIONAL SYMPOSIUM of IBM Watson Health, the tech 65 IN MEMORIAM giant’s business unit dedicated to 48 RESHAPING SEAS JOSEPH F. TRAUB computational health. Pioneering computer scientist and founder 49 of the Computer Science Department 39 REUNION 2015 COMMENCEMENT 2015 WELCOME BACK, ALUMNI! 50 68 DONOR SPOTLIGHT More than 300 alumni returned to ENTREPRENEURSHIP NIGHT New York for Columbia Engineering William and Harriet Lembeck to Reunion Weekend, held May 28 to 31. 51 SPOT NEWS ROUNDUP endow professorship | 5 RESEARCH 6 | JAMES HONE + COLIN NUCKOLLS engineering.columbia.edu/web /newsletter/honenuckolls olumbia has been at the fore- move through molecules; of what graphene, EnginEEring front of nanoscience research a material we pioneered here, is and how for more than 15 years, and, it works; and established basic knowledge with the University’s launch about carbon nanotubes. Our discoveries Faculty lEad Cof the Columbia Nano Initiative (CNI), have fostered important research around activity on this front is accelerating. As the world, and that’s really come about nanosciEncE James T. Yardley, CNI’s acting executive because of the collaborative environment director, puts it, “When I came here in we’ve created here at Columbia.” 2000 and walked up and down the hall- The complexities of nanoscience, discovEriEs ways, you’d hardly see anybody. But now manipulating individual atoms and when you walk up and down the halls, molecules, make for a perfect intersec- you see people arguing with each other, tion of disciplines. The rules change holding samples, animated in discussion.” at the nanoscale; materials, electrons, Working with colleagues Keren Bergman, chemicals—all behave differently. Shared James Hone, Colin Nuckolls, Ken Shepard, equipment, such as the state-of-the-art Latha Venkataraman, and many others, transmission electron microscope, and Yardley has been instrumental in leading expanded facilities like the Nanofabrication nanoscience at Columbia, and he sees Clean Room, which is almost doubling this burgeoning field bringing together in size, are reinforcing partnerships, as investigators in an exciting new way. is Columbia’s new $15 million, multiyear “At Columbia, we’ve really pioneered NSF