School Notes: School of Engineering & Applied Science
July/August 2016

Professor wins award from Google

Amin Karbasi, assistant professor of electrical engineering & computer science, received the Google Research Award. He focuses on turning big data into smaller, but representative, data—research that could potentially making sorting out the incredible amount of data generated by the Internet. To do so, he’s developing algorithms that can quickly summarize the data. One method Karbasi is looking at involves choosing elements from a particular dataset that fall into a category, but aren’t overly similar. Performing the same task with classical algorithms, he said, would take a very long time. With his lab’s computer resources, it took only a few hours and could potentially take only a few seconds.

Drug delivery system to be tested

An immunotherapy drug delivery system developed by Tarek Fahmy, associate professor of biomedical engineering and immunobiology, is heading toward its first phase of clinical trials for a possible new treatment for cancer. The delivery system is a nanogel that can be used for multiple combinations of drugs for many different cancers and some immune disorders. The platform is designed to deliver multiple drugs with different chemical properties. A single particle can carry hundreds of drug molecules that concentrate in the tumor, increasing the efficacy of the drug combination while decreasing its toxicity. The first use of this delivery system will be a multi-pronged treatment for metastatic cancer.

YUAA presents aeronautic projects

The Yale Undergraduate Aerospace Association (YUAA) held its annual Aeronautica, an event showcasing its four ongoing projects. These include the organization’s first biology-related project, a rocket that collects air samples during its flight. Members are also working on the group’s first multi-year project, a small satellite that will go into lower orbit and take high-resolution photos of Earth from space. The team is also building an optical telescope, which will feature a high-resolution camera to capture images of deep space. A fourth project involves building a high-performance unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) with a blended wing design that will collect data while in flight.