Fall 2024 Seminar Schedule
Seminars are held in HLC 2.1550 at 6:00 PM
Come early for FREE FOOD!
No registration required.
Wednesday, November 6th | 6:00 PM | HLC 2.1550
Jean Anne Incorvia | Associate Professor, The Chandra Family Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Dr. Incorvia develops nanodevices for the future using emerging physics and materials. This includes research in spintronics (electronics that uses magnetism and spin to encode information), nanomagnetism, bio-inspired neuromorphic computing, in-memory computing devices and circuits, 2D materials-based computing, computing in extreme environments, and application of new materials to health, energy, and security.
Dr. Incorvia has earned the Engineering Foundation Endowed Faculty Fellowship in Engineering
Brain-Inspired Computing using Magnetic and Atomically Thin Materials
ABSTRACT: Neuromorphic computing is a new class of efficient computing for artificial intelligence that uses co-design from materials through devices, circuits, systems, and applications. The device requirements vary drastically depending on application, e.g. radiation-tolerant circuits for edge computing in space, and bio-compatible materials for in-sensor computing for medicine and health. I will present on our results using magnetic spin textures to function as artificial neurons that are noise-resilient, synapses that have high stability, and artificial neurons that can mimic higher-order neuronal functions. Turning to neuromorphic computing for health, I will show our results building artificial neurons and synapses from bio-compatible graphene. These results show the promise of an across-the-stack approach to computing AI tasks.
Thursday, November 14th | 6:00 PM | HLC 2.1550
Brian Belardi | Assistant Professor, McKetta Department of Chemical Engineering
Dr. Belardi focuses on probing, perturbing, and re-programming biological barriers across length scales. Metazoans - which include humans - have evolved to assemble exquisite semi-permeable membrane structures that regulate the flux of select material in and between cells and tissues. The complex, multi-component topologies and mesh-like architectures of biological barriers are rich sources of biological information and often deteriorate in pathological conditions. His group studies epithelial cells and tissue, extracellular matrix, and cell membrane interfaces to gain a quantitative and mechanistic understanding of these barriers. Leveraging these fundamental insights, researchers in his lab design smarter molecules, materials, and cells for improving drug bioavailability in the gut and brain, detecting and repairing cancerous tissue, and for regenerative medicine applications.
Dr. Belardi is the holder of the Lyondell Chemical Company Endowed Faculty Fellowship in Engineering
Dynamic Synthetic Tissue: Controlling Junctional Assembly In Situ with Responsive Protein Switches
ABSTRACT: Multicellular tissue – the hallmark of all animals – exhibits an exquisite array of morphological structures and material properties. The three-dimensional geometries and physical properties of living tissue are, however, far from static as they can adapt and evolve during developmental programs and when exposed to biological insults. When compared to common organic and inorganic inanimate structures, tissues possess surprising characteristics that offer unique and distinct advantages as materials, including high surface area morphologies, active elasticity, long-distance communication, vectorial transport, and self-repair, for a wide range of applications. By dynamically tuning tissue’s physical properties, synthetic tissue would be a promising new form of smart implants, adhesives, filters, and protective coatings. However, the lack of tools to control tissue properties dynamically with user-defined inputs remains a bottleneck. Here, my lab presents a strategy for controlling synthetic tissue properties by manipulating junctional assembly in situ with responsive protein switches. While individual cells are considered the fundamental unit of tissue, it is the junctions and their cytoskeleton that define macroscopic tissue properties. In this presentation, we describe the use of intramolecular association to engineer protein switches capable of controlling actin binding at cell junctions, which we term controllable actin-binding switch tools (CASTs). After introduction of a stimulus, such as a peptide, small molecule, or light, the conformation of the CAST changes to yield a functional binding partner for actin. With different stimuli, we present switching activity on single minutes, tens of minutes, and hours long timescales. We also describe installing CASTs into native proteins at cell junctions, which enables the dynamic modulation of tissue properties.
Seminar Location
Seminars are hosted at ACC's HLC Campus in Bldg 2000, Rm 1550.
ACC Highland Address:
6101 Highland Campus Dr.
Austin, TX 78752
The closest free parking for CREATE seminars is available at the HLC South Garage which is accessible via entrances on Wilhelmina Delco Dr. and Clayton Ln.
To reach the CREATE seminar location, please enter through the designated entrance marked by the red arrow on the map and use the nearest stairs or elevator to access Level 1 of Building 2000. The seminar venue is situated directly below the specified entrance, at the art mural space next to Room 1550.
For a detailed map of HLC Bldg 2000 Level 1 and alternative routes from other HLC buildings, please click on the provided map to expand.
For more info, please contact CREATE@cm.utexas.edu