Announcements

Seven biomedical engineering students will be honored with Rensselaer's Founders awards. The award recipients are: Senior: Tyler Graf, Rachael Melita Graduate Student: Anthony D'Amato, Lars Gjesteby, Christopher Johnson, Troy Vargason, Alexis Ziemba The Founders Award of Excellence was established in 1994 to honor students who embody qualities of creativity, discovery, leadership, and the values of pride and responsibility at Rensselaer. The award consists of a special certificate, recognition by faculty, staff, and peers at the Honors Convocation ceremony, and a cash prize.

Sez-Jade (Kathleen) Chen, a doctoral student in the Functional and Molecular Optical Imaging lab of Dr. Xavier Intes, has received a Poster Award at the World Molecular Imaging Congress (WMIC) in New York City. The WMIC is a competitive international conference, featuring experts in molecular imaging from academia and industry.

Dr. Ryan Gilbert is guest editor of an upcoming issue of the journal Cells, Tissue, and Organs. The special issue highlights engineering approaches for the treatment of spinal cord injury. The issue consists of articles written by alumni Abby Koppes, Ryan Koppes, and Jonathan Zuidema. Graduate students Christopher Johnson and Anthony D'Amato also contributed an article to the special issue.

Dr. Deva Chan has joined the biomedical engineering department as an Assistant Professor. Deva received her BS degree in Bioengineering from UC Berkeley (2004), a MS in Biomedical Engineering from UC Davis (2008) and a PhD in Biomedical Engineering from Purdue University (2012). She has been working as a postdoctoral researcher at the Rush University Medical Center (2013-2015) and more recently as a Research Fellow in the Center for Neuroscience and Regenerative Medicine at the Henry M. Jackson Foundation for the Advancement of Military Medicine.

Eric Ledet has been selected to receive the Rensselaer Alumni Association Teaching Award for 2016.

Rensselaer student-athlete Emily Laurilliard ’16 has been selected to receive the ITA/Arthur Ashe Leadership and Sportsmanship Award for the Northeast Region. The prestigious honor is given annually to collegiate students who have shown great achievements on and off the court. The award takes into account a player’s tennis accomplishments, scholastic achievements, and extracurricular endeavors.

The RPI Board of Trustees has approved Leo Wan's promotion to Associate Professor with tenure. Leo received both B.S. and M. Eng. degrees in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Science and Technology of China (USTC), and a PhD in Biomedical Engineering from Columbia University, where he became a post-doc on stem cells and tissue engineering.

The RPI Board of Trustees has approved Dr. Xavier Ines' promotion to Professor. Xavier received his Ph.D. degree in 1998 in physics from the University of Bretagne Occidentale (France) for his contributions in characterization of propagation of optical scalar waves in highly diffuse medium. He then joined Prof Britton Chance laboratory in 1999 as a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Pennsylvania.