Digital Magazine 2022-2023

Transforming teaching labs, shaping accessible tech with the Internet of Things, finding inspiration in the arts, and expanding expertise in robotics

Biomedical Engineering

conceptual illustration of neural engineering

Customizing the Duke BME Master’s Degree

Certificates in neural engineering and biomedical data science help Master of Science students pursue specialized research as they earn their degree

Aaron Kyle

Introducing Aaron Kyle

New faculty member Aaron Kyle hopes to expand and enhance the biomedical engineering design programs for students inside and outside Duke

microscope image of kidney cells

Detecting How COVID-19 Can Directly Infect and Damage Human Kidney Cells

A fortuitous collaboration between Duke BME’s Samira Musah and the Duke Human Vaccine Institute’s Maria Blasi helps illuminate why COVID is so adept at attacking kidney cells

Students conduct an experiment in the Duke BME wet lab space

Engineering the Duke BME Wet Lab Space

Expanding spaces and cutting-edge tools have transformed Duke BME’s lab spaces into impressive biological makerspaces

Civil & Environmental Engineering

illustration of mobile app

How the Internet of Things is Shaping Accessible Tech

Discover how IoT is making technology more accessible, as Duke researchers develop low-cost sensor networks for real-world challenges like disaster detection.

Schaad's "Engineering the Planet" class poses for a photo atop Duke Chapel

Thinking Outside the Classroom

From the stairs of Duke Chapel to the most remote parts of the world, civil engineering students discover the fun in seeing practical knowledge put to work.

water coming out of a sink tap in North Carolina

Engineering the End of Forever

A tale of two Duke CEE researchers working to identify and obliterate the “forever chemicals” tainting North Carolina’s drinking water.

purple bacterial community

Welcome to the Microbial Revolution

Say the word “microbe” and many people reflexively reach for a bottle of disinfectant. But where most see an adversary to be destroyed posthaste, Claudia Gunsch has always seen potential. She believes that microbiomes — the communities of microorganisms thriving all around us — can be engineered to serve both environmental and human health.

Electrical & Computer Engineering

Guillermo Sapiro

Beyond the Pinnacle

With the addition of Guillermo Sapiro in 2022, Duke ECE now has four faculty members who belong to the National Academy of Engineering (NAE). Not ones to rest on their laurels, Duke ECE’s four NAE members still engineer in service to society. Here’s what they’ve been working on recently.

CT scanned image of a callimico

SMIF—Thinking Small

Duke’s Shared Materials Instrumentation Facility cultivates a collaborative and empowering environment for engineers who work at the tiniest scales

photo of Claudia Chapman dancing by Lee Gumbs

Not All Who Wander Are Lost

Engineering students find inspiration in the arts, becoming creative problem solvers.

researcher wearing AR headset practices using medical instrument on plastic head

The Dawning of the Age of the Metaverse

Enabling the visionary future of the Metaverse requires research projects of many levels, ranging from AI-accelerating hardware to localized computing networks that can tackle complex software in the blink of an eye.

Mechanical Engineering & Materials Science

conceptual illustration of robot head with ones and zeros

The Roboticists Are Coming

Already boasting a strong team focused on areas such as precision robotic aids for clinical applications, controlling complex swarms of robots collaborating on a single mission, and securing autonomous systems from nefarious attacks, Duke Robotics is expanding its areas of expertise with the hiring of Siobhan Oca and Boyuan Chen.

Metasurface

AI-Powered Golden Sheet Pushes the Boundaries of Soft Materials

Duke engineers have created a soft surface that adapts and reshapes itself to match a wide array of objects and motions.