These are a few of my favorite things - The Braude College of Engineering 16th Research Conference

 

[candies*]

Multi-disciplinary research conferences create certain feelings - among them ignorance and wonder. Researchers in many different fields present their ongoing projects to colleagues in non-related fields. The curious result is most of the audience doesn’t fully understand some or all aspects of the presentation. At the same time, the listeners, or at least I, gain an appreciation of new topics and, no less important, the brilliant minds of their colleagues.

As a mere English lecturer without a science background, all of the topics were new to me with quite a few being quite incomprehensible except for the main idea, partly because my knowledge of math is rather limited. Still, these presentations opened previously unknown worlds and perspectives and gave me hope for practical solutions for important current problems in the foreseeable future. Among those presentations that I was able to follow, I wish to highlight several that especially piqued my interest, notably those discussing developments in health care and environmental solutions as well as a few that related to more obscure but still potentially relevant issues.

In the area of health, Dr. Iris Weitz discussed the use of copper oxide nanoparticles as a tool in healing and preventive health. Similar to gold and silver, she and her colleagues discovered that copper has certain properties even in a nanoparticle form that can help the body fight illnesses. At the same particle level, Prof. Sarit Sivan presented research on how nanoparticles containing pain killers can be used to ease eye pain and allow proper rest for patients in the first 72 hours after laser surgery. In the both of these lectures in TedTalk form, both the science and implications were quite clear and thought-provoking

In regards to environment issues, Associate Prof. Essam Sabah, in conjunction with several European colleagues, presented research that shows how it may be possible to use jelly fish mucus, which the animal uses to clean the water around it, to capture and bind nanoparticles of plastic and improve water treatment systems. In another lecture, Dr. Lilach Lasur Kruh explained how the search for the original DNA in wild humus plants may help fight mushroom infections in cultured plants and the challenges involved in implementing the solution. These lectures reinforced the notion that science does not always have to reinvent the wheel, only find where it is buried.

On a more esoteric but no less useful note, Dr. Anat Dahan presenting findings on research demonstrating how cooperation synchronizes brains. The testing involved monitoring brain activities when two individuals worked on the same task together. The implications of such development could be far reaching. Dr. Elad Denenberg discussed creating algorithms that would allow satellites to automatically avoid the rapidly-increasing quantity of space garbage floating around the earth. The major challenge is to make the calculation simple enough that the satellite can make the calculations autonomously and minimize waste of fuel in maneuvering. The need for research in these fields seem obvious now.

The pleasure of college research conferences is the magnificent combination of incredible knowledge with the ability and experience in expressing this knowledge. All the presenters expanded and enlightened the minds of the listeners. I merely presented a few of my favorite things. I wish to thank the College and the conference organizers for the event. I am looking forward to next year’s session.

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