School Notes: School of Engineering & Applied Science
May/June 2017

Grant will advance lupus research

Rong Fan, associate professor of biomedical engineering, was named the inaugural awardee for the Lupus Research Alliance’s new Target Identification in Lupus program. The award’s $600,000 grant will help Fan advance his research on the interaction of B cells and T cells, also known as T lymphocytes, which is critical to the development of lupus. Doing so would be a crucial step toward improving treatment of lupus. Fan will use a microchip platform that he developed to trap the cells and “listen” to how they interact with each other. 

Better lacrosse through engineering

A student team in the course Engineering Innovation & Design (ENAS 118) designed and built a new practice tool for Yale’s lacrosse team. The students developed a frame with six movable panels arranged in an “L” shape that can be placed in any of the goal’s four corners. The device, designed to minimize injuries during practice, stands in the place of the goalie. With a remote control, coaches can specify which panels players should set their sights on. When targets are hit, panels emit a positive chirping sound. When the players miss, they receive negative feedback in the form of a buzzing tone.

Engineering honors for Yale alum

Eric Fossum ’84PhD (engineering) was named a corecipient of the Queen Elizabeth Prize for Engineering—often referred to as the equivalent of the Nobel Prize for the field of engineering. The award is for technology he developed known as complementary metal-oxide semiconductor, which makes possible everything from selfies to dental x-ray cameras. The £1 million prize is awarded for groundbreaking innovations that benefit humanity. Now a professor at the Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth College, Fossum developed the technology when he was at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and was charged with finding a way to miniaturize the interplanetary spacecrafts’ cameras.