News Archive

ChatGPT has fascinated the public as we begin to explore how generative artificial intelligence (AI) can be useful in our everyday lives. On the back end, scientists are continually advancing AI for potential applications so vast that it may change life as we know it by accelerating scientific and technological developments.

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute has established the Office of Strategic Alliances and Translation, a new area within the university that incorporates a number of key translational activities at RPI, including intellectual property and technology licensing, large-scale corporate partnerships, initiation and growth of start-up ventures, and translational campuses, including the Rensselaer Technology Park, as well as translational activities in New York City.

What if microgravity holds the key to preventing the overheating of advanced electronics? That’s one idea behind an International Space Station (ISS) National Laboratory-sponsored investigation that recently launched to station on Northrop Grumman’s 19th Commercial Resupply Services mission (NG-19). This week, the ISS crew is working on the experiment, which aims to improve the efficiency of heat transfer devices used in various technologies, from laptops to NASA’s Hubble Telescope.

— The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) recently announced $26 million in funding geographically and institutionally diverse awardees, including Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI), who will engage with additional partners and communities to further the conversation around consolidated interim storage of spent nuclear fuel.

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s Steven Cramer, William Weightman Walker Professor of Polymer Engineering, and Todd Przybycien, professor of chemical and biological engineering, will contribute to a three-year research program led by faculty at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) that aims to design the world’s first fully integrated, continuous mRNA manufacturing platform. Both Cramer and Przybycien are members of Rensselaer’s Shirley Ann Jackson, Ph.D. Center for Biotechnology and Interdisciplinary Studies. The platform is part of an $82 million effort funded by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research.

A team of researchers led by Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s Jonathan S. Dordick, Ph.D., Institute Professor of Chemical and Biological Engineering, has illuminated a new possibility for the treatment and prevention of COVID-19 in research published in Communications Biology.

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) researchers Amir Hirsa, professor of mechanical, aerospace, and nuclear engineering, and Patrick Underhill, professor of chemical and biological engineering, have received a new three-year grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) for $452,847 to study the physics of protein solutions using the ring-sheared drop module aboard the International Space Station.

Today, it was announced that Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute will become the first university in the world to house an IBM Quantum System One. The IBM quantum computer, intended to be operational by January of 2024, will serve as the foundation of a new IBM Quantum Computational Center in partnership with Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI). By partnering, RPI’s vision is to greatly enhance the educational experiences and research capabilities of students and researchers at RPI and other institutions, propel the Capital Region into a top location for talent, and accelerate New York's growth as a technology epicenter.

Antoinette Maniatty ’87, Ph.D., has been named head of the Department of Mechanical, Aerospace, and Nuclear Engineering (MANE) at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI). MANE is one of the largest academic departments at RPI, with 53 faculty members and over 1,400 students.

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s Ge Wang, Ph.D. — Clark & Crossan Endowed Chair Professor, director of the Biomedical Imaging Center within the Shirley Ann Jackson, Ph.D. Center for Biotechnology and Interdisciplinary Studies, and this year’s winner of the Wiley Distinguished Faculty Award — and Albany Medical College’s Joshua Goldwag ’20, a medical student and previously Ge Wang’s research student at Rensselaer, have jointly published an article in Nature Machine Intelligence on the DishBrain experiment and its applications. Last October, Cortical Labs revealed that they “taught” human and mouse cells in a dish to work together to play the Pong game by providing feedback to the cells. They called it DishBrain. It was the first time that scientists stimulated biological cells in a structured/feedback-driven way.

The iconic Brooklyn Bridge was opened to the public 140 years ago, on May 24, 1883. Since, millions of vehicles, pedestrians, and cyclists have crossed the Brooklyn Bridge as they travel into Lower Manhattan.

Researchers from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) and Albany Medical College were awarded a $3.3 million grant over five years by the National Cancer Institute to use artificial intelligence (AI) to improve targeted drug therapy in HER2-positive breast cancer treatment. HER2-positive breast cancer tends to grow and spread quickly, but targeted treatments improve outcomes.

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute President Martin A. Schmidt ’81 presided over the 217th Commencement Ceremony, his first as president. During the ceremony, which was held at the East Campus Athletic Village, Rensselaer awarded a total of 1,988 degrees — 152 doctoral degrees, 390 master’s degrees, and 1,446 bachelor’s degrees — to 1,957 students, some of whom earned multiple degrees. Approximately 1,500 students attended the ceremony.

When most people think of crystals, they picture suncatchers that act as rainbow prisms or the semi-transparent stones that some believe hold healing powers. However, to scientists and engineers, crystals are a form of materials in which their constituents – atoms, molecules, or nanoparticles – are arranged regularly in space. In other words, crystals are defined by the regular arrangement of their constituents. Common examples are diamonds, table salt, or sugar cubes. 

High school students in upstate New York have their pick of colleges and universities within driving distance, and some choose to head to nearby states such as Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont, or New Hampshire. However, many students choose Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI), a technological research institution with a global reach that also happens to be local.

Beginning at 9:30 a.m. on May 20, 2023, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute will award a total of 1,988 degrees — 152 doctoral degrees, 390 master’s degrees, and 1,446 bachelor’s degrees — to 1,957 students, some of whom have earned multiple degrees. Approximately 1,500 students will attend the ceremony.

With graduation season in full swing, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) is hosting the Lavender Graduation and Garnet D. Baltimore Students of Color Graduation ceremonies to celebrate the cultural diversity of the Class of 2023 graduates.

We all remember 2020. At the grocery store, toilet paper shelves were empty. Cleaning supplies and disinfectants were treasured finds. Rattled consumers, concerned that they would run out of essential items, swiftly stockpiled products until they disappeared from shelves. In the media, it was referred to as “panic buying.”

There are more than 80,000 sheep and lambs living on over 2,000 farms in New York State. Their wool has many uses including clothing, carpets, furniture, bedding, insulators, fertilizers, and more. However, about 10-15% of wool is wasted during the sorting and cleaning processes. Researchers from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute are aiming to turn that waste into a new profit source for farmers, and produce an eco-conscious, high-performance yarn in the process.

Building on novel experiments with amyloid fibrils — a type of protein aggregate associated with diseases like diabetes, Alzheimer’s, and Parkinson’s —  a new set of experiments using serum albumins, the primary constituents of blood protein, was sent to the International Space Station (ISS) in March aboard SpaceX 27. This is the fourth time the experiment is being conducted on the ISS.