Title: "Design for Discovery: Structural Shape & Topology Optimization in the Age of 3D Printing"
Topology optimization is a powerful optimization-based method for generating optimal designs without relying on designers' intuition, experience, or inspiration. As 3D printing technology continues to advance, topology optimization will become increasingly important in the automotive, aerospace, and machine industries. In this presentation, the speaker will provide a brief overview of the state of the art and introduce a level-set-based topology optimization framework. This framework represents the design boundary implicitly as the zero level set of a higher-dimensional level set function, allowing for flexibility in topological changes such as boundary merging or splitting during the design process while maintaining a clear definition of the design boundary. The speaker will then discuss some recent advances in this framework, including the design of magnetic soft robots, the optimal design of the magnets in the wind generators, the integrated design and additive manufacturing of composite mechanical metamaterials, and the conformal topology optimization of structures.
Bio:
Professor Shikui Chen is an Associate Professor at the State University of New York (SUNY) Stony Brook and the Director of the Computational Modeling, Analysis, and Design Optimization (CMADO) laboratory. His research focuses on developing new methodologies and tools to enable systematic design innovation and efficient additive manufacturing in engineering products, using topology optimization, applied mathematics, and computer science. Professor Chen's interests include structural shape and topology optimization for nonlinear, dynamic, multimaterial,
and multiphysics problems, with applications to the design of soft robots, metamaterials, and flexible electronics. His research has been funded by various US government and industry grants, including the National Science Foundation (NSF), National Institutes of Health (NIH), GE, Ford, Toyota, Stratasys, and SUNY Materials and Advanced Manufacturing Network of Excellence. Professor Chen currently serves as an Associate Editor for the ASME Journal of Mechanical Design (JMD), the Journal of Engineering Optimization, and a Review Editor for Structural and Multidisciplinary Optimization (SMO).
Date: Tuesday, March 7, 2023
Time: 1pm-2pm
Location: Special Collections Seminar Room, E-2340, second floor of the Melville Library
Title: "Understanding quantum computing advantages"
Across the globe different entities are in a race to build quantum computing architectures with the goal of harnessing the power of quantum mechanics to solve problems, potentially much faster than traditional computers. Some entities have already managed to build small scale working quantum computers and in the coming years these architectures will be scaled up. Thus a very interesting question is to understand for which problems quantum computations would potentially outperform traditional classical computing devices and in general how to take advantage of quantum properties such as the 'quantum entanglement', ‘quantum no-cloning theorem’ to securely design various functionalities which are classically either intractable or impossible. In this talk, we will take a close look at these topics and see how our group is investigating these questions.
Bio:
Dr. Supartha Podder is an assistant professor of the Department of Computer Science, Stony Brook University. He works in quantum algorithms, complexity theory and cryptography. Supartha earned his PhD in computer science from the Centre for Quantum Technologies, National University of Singapore. He holds masters in computer science from École Normale Supérieure de Cachan (ENS de Cachan) and Chennai Mathematical Institute (CMI). Prior to joining Stony Brook, Podder was a postdoc at the University of Ottawa and at UT Austin.
Date: Tuesday, April 11, 2023
Time: 1pm-2pm
Location: Special Collections Seminar Room, E-2340, second floor of the Melville Library
Title: "Winter mercury patterns in lake ecosystems and our future environmental health risks"
The health risks and benefits of eating fish are expected to change through the future, as climate change alters fish contaminant levels. However, scientists do not fully understand the influence of climate on fish contaminants, including mercury. Patterns of mercury bioavailability and transfer through the food chain during the winter are unknown compared to other seasons, despite their potential sensitivity to climate warming. Dr. Karimi will show new findings that demonstrate how mercury bioavailability in lake ecosystems can be highest in winter compared to other seasons. Dr. Karimi will discuss future scenarios as winters continue to warm, the implications for health risks to different subpopulations, and broader considerations for the future risk-benefits of fish consumption.
Bio:
Dr. Roxanne Karimi is a Research Scientist in the School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences. She studies how environmental factors influence aquatic pollutants in freshwater and marine ecosystems, and how those pollutants impact human health. Dr. Karimi was trained in Ecology and Environmental Health at the University of Pennsylvania and Dartmouth College. Her research has been supported by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, the United Nations Environment Programme, New York Sea Grant, and Lake Champlain Sea Grant.
Date: Tuesday, May 2, 2023
Time: 1pm-2pm
Location: Special Collections Seminar Room, E-2340, second floor of the Melville Library
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