Transient Electronics – From Bioelectronic Medicines to Environmental Monitors

A remarkable feature of modern integrated circuit technology is its ability to operate in a stable fashion, almost indefinitely, without physical or chemical change. Recently developed classes of electronic materials and manufacturing approaches create an opportunity to engineer the opposite outcome, in the form of ‘transient’ devices that dissolve, disintegrate, degrade or otherwise physically disappear at triggered times or with controlled rates. Water-soluble transient electronic devices serve as the foundations for applications in zero-impact environmental monitors, 'green' consumer electronic gadgetry and bio-resorbable medical implants. This talk describes the essential concepts in bio/ecoresorbable electronics methods to form them in 2D and 3D layouts with a range of functions. Wireless temporary pacemakers that minimize risks after cardiac surgeries and passive microfliers that enable tracking of environmental processes represent some recent system level examples.

Professor John A. Rogers obtained BA and BS degrees in chemistry and in physics from the University of Texas, Austin, in 1989. From MIT, he received SM degrees in physics and in chemistry in 1992 and the PhD degree in physical chemistry in 1995. From 1995 to 1997, Rogers was a Junior Fellow in the Harvard University Society of Fellows.He joined Bell Laboratories as a Member of Technical Staff in 1997 and then served as Director of the Condensed Matter Physics Research Department from the end of 2000 to 2002. He then spent thirteen years on the faculty at University of Illinois, most recently as the Swanlund Chair Professor and Director of the Seitz Materials Research Laboratory. In the Fall of 2016, he moved to Northwestern University where he is Director of the recently endowed Querrey-Simpson Institute for Bioelectronics.He has co-authored nearly 900 papers and he is co-inventor on more than 100 patents, more than 70 or which are licensed to large companies or to startups that have emerged from his labs.His research has been recognized by many awards, including a MacArthur Fellowship (2009), the Lemelson-MIT Prize (2011), the Smithsonian Award for American Ingenuity in the Physical Sciences (2013), the MRS Medal from the Materials Research Society (2018), the Benjamin Franklin Medal from the Franklin Institute (2019), a Guggenheim Fellowship (2021) and the IEEE Biomedical Engineering Award (2024). He is a member of the National Academy of Engineering, the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Medicine and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Harnessing AI for Societal Good

Artificial Intelligence is expected to impact all spheres of our lives profoundly, and as we set out to harness this technology it is important to channelize its use for greater good, for all. How can AI be harnessed to help achieve the goal of societal prosperity? What regulatory guard rails need to be put around this technology? What are the exciting research opportunities available to students, researchers and industry in order to harness the potential of AI? Drawing upon the experiences at AI Singapore and NUS AI Institute, we will discuss several examples of how AI can be used positively. Given that AI also has the potential for harm, we will also briefly discuss some of our recent research in mitigating the negative impact of AI. We will end with some of the challenges and open research questions in the field.

Mohan Kankanhalli is Provost's Chair Professor of Computer Science at the National University of Singapore (NUS), where he is the Director of the NUS AI Institute. Mohan obtained his BTech from IIT Kharagpur and MS & PhD from the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Mohan’s research interests are in Multimodal Computing, Computer Vision, and Trustworthy AI. He has made fundamental contributions in the areas of image and video understanding, visual saliency, content authentication, privacy, and trustworthy AI. As Director of NUS AI Institute, he leads initiatives on multimodal models and trustworthy machine learning. He is also engaged in leadership roles in multimedia computing such as being the Senior Editor of ACM Transactions on Multimedia Computing journal and the Associate Editor-in-Chief of IEEE Multimedia magazine. He is on the editorial boards of Springer Multimedia Systems and Springer Journal on Big Data. Mohan is a member of World Economic Forum's Global Future Council on the Future of Artificial Intelligence. He is an IEEE Fellow.

Intersection of Engineering and Biology across the Scales: Opportunities for Personalized Diagnostics and Printing Cellular Machines

Integration of biology, medicine, and engineering and especially fabrication methods at the micro and nano scale offers tremendous opportunities for solving important problems in biology and medicine and to enable a wide range of applications in diagnostics, therapeutics, and tissue engineering. Specifically, microfluidics and Lab-on-Chip can realize applications in detection of disease markers, counting of specific cells from whole blood, and for identification of nucleic acids using sensitive and specific, point-of-care and personalized technologies. The implication of these technologies for advancing personalized medicine for diagnosis of infection and stratification of sepsis would be discussed. Moving up the scale from nanotechnology and microfluidics, 3D bio-fabrication methods for biohybrid polymer devices can also be used to develop instrumented tissues for drug screening and biohybrid robotics. As these cellular machines increase in capabilities, exhibit emergent behavior, and potentially reveal the ability for self-assembly and self-repair, important questions can also arise about the ethical implications for this direction of research, which are very important to consider and address. These cellular systems present many opportunities in the next decade and beyond with potential applications in drug delivery, power generation, and other biomimetic systems.

Professor Rashid Bashir is the Dean of the Grainger College of Engineering and a Grainger Distinguished Chair in Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where he is also a Professor of Bioengineering. Previously, he held key roles at UIUC, including Executive Associate Dean and Chief Diversity Officer at the Carle-Illinois College of Medicine, Head of the Bioengineering Department, and Director of the Micro and Nanotechnology Laboratory. Before UIUC, he was a faculty member at Purdue University and worked as Sr. Engineering Manager at National Semiconductor Corporation. Professor Bashir holds a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from Purdue University and has authored over 250 journal papers, delivered 120+ invited talks, and holds 45 patents. He has received multiple awards, including the NSF Faculty Early Career Award and the IEEE EMBS Technical Achievement Award. He is a fellow of IEEE, AIMBE, AAAS, and other prestigious organizations. His research focuses on bio-nanotechnology, BioMEMS, and lab-on-chip technologies, aiming to advance precision medicine and 3D bio-fabrication to address major health challenges like cancer and sepsis.

State-of-the-Art (S)TEM: Quantifying Structures and Controlling Kinetics on the Atomic Scale

Over the past 20 years, aberration-corrected (S)TEM has evolved into an essential tool for observing materials at the atomic scale. Beyond traditional imaging, advances like 4D STEM and spectroscopic methods such as EELS now enable precise mapping of compositions, local fields, and electronic structures. Cutting-edge developments are incorporating temporal resolution and in-situ controls, aiming to observe atomic diffusion events and kinetics. These techniques are vital for studying processes in heterogeneous catalysis, energy storage, and advanced materials under extreme conditions. As these methods progress, the ability to image both inorganic and biological systems converges, expanding the applications across engineering and medical sciences. This presentation will demonstrate the Albert Crewe Centre's (ACC) current capabilities at the University of Liverpool, including the construction and research goals of the Relativistic Ultrafast Electron Diffraction and Imaging (RUEDI) UK national facility. Additionally, the work on compressive sensing and AI, which aims to create self-correcting and self-driving microscopes will be discussed, and the potential of future microscopy experiments will be explored during the session.

Professor Browning is the Chair of Electron Microscopy at the University of Liverpool’s Schools of Engineering and Physical Sciences. He earned PhD from the University of Cambridge (1991). He has held positions at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (1992-1995), Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (2003-2006), Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (2006-2011) and most recently was Laboratory Fellow and Chemical Imaging Initiative Lead at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (2011-2017). Prof. Browning is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the Microscopy Society of America (MSA). He received the Burton Award from the MSA in 2002 and the Coble Award from the American Ceramic Society in 2003 for the development of atomic resolution methods in scanning transmission electron microscopy. With his collaborators, he also received RD 100 and Nano 50 Awards in 2008, and a Microscopy Today Innovation Award in 2010 for the development of the DTEM. He has over 380 publications (h-index=84) and has given over 300 invited presentations in advanced electron microscopy.

A smart vision for a sustainable future: SMaRT technologies and MICROfactories™ creating sustainable materials and products from waste

To achieve future sustainability, essential materials must be harnessed from waste and used as feedstock for manufacturing, rather than being discarded. This shift to a circular economy aligns manufacturing and recycling, creating supply chains, local jobs, and significant environmental benefits. By using advanced technologies, waste materials can be re-manufactured into the components and infrastructure needed for the future, promoting prosperity and sustainability. This presentation highlights how "end-of-life" waste can be transformed into valuable materials for remanufacturing, with examples from advanced manufacturing and resource recovery industries. The UNSW Sustainable Materials Research and Technology (SMaRT) Centre has developed innovative technologies, such as the Green Steel Polymer Injection Technology, which uses waste polymers to produce hydrogen and carbon for metal production, reducing the reliance on mined resources. SMaRT’s MICROfactories™ drive local solutions for hi-tech waste recycling, creating new supply chains and skilled jobs. These technologies offer a pathway to close the loop between waste and manufacturing, supporting the transition to a circular economy and the creation of value-added materials from waste resources.

Australian Research Council (ARC) Laureate Professor Veena Sahajwalla is a globally recognized materials scientist, engineer, and inventor, known for revolutionizing recycling science through high-temperature waste transformation into ‘green materials.’ As the founding Director of the Centre for Sustainable Materials Research and Technology (SMaRT) at the University of New South Wales, she pioneered the world's first e-waste and plastics microfactories. Veena leads the ARC Industrial Transformation Research Hub for ‘green manufacturing,’ collaborating with industry to translate new recycling science into environmental and economic benefits. In 2019, she was appointed the inaugural Director of the Circular Economy Innovation Network by the NSW Government. Her internationally commercialized EAF ‘green’ steelmaking process, which uses waste tyres as a replacement for coke, exemplifies her innovative approach to turning challenging waste streams into valuable resources. Veena is one of Australia’s Most Influential Engineers and a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science. She has published over 380 peer-reviewed papers and delivers keynote speeches across Australia and worldwide.

Feeling Smart: Why our Emotions are More Rational Than We Think

"Feeling Smart" is the title of Eyal Winter's book that appeared 2015 with Perseus Books Group. The book deals with the relationship between our emotional being and our rational one, and the implications of this relationship to areas such as economics, business, romance and the social interactions. We shall address the following questions: Are emotions and rationality two separate systems? Can we synthesize emotions? What is the difference between autonomous and interactive emotions, What is the role of altruism in promoting self‐interest? We shall also mention recent research findings on the "love hormone" Oxytocin, and in particular the implications for economic and social interactions.

Eyal Winter is the Andrews and Brunner Professor of Economics at Lancaster University and the Silverzweig Professor of Economics at the Hebrew University. He is specializing in behavioral economics, Decision Making and in Game Theory. He is a member of the Center for the Study of Rationality and headed the center for four years. Winter was awarded the Humboldt Prize for excellence in research by the German government in 2011. He is an elected council member of the International Game Theory Society, and an elected fellow of the Economic Theory Society. Winter held senior positions at Washington University, Manchester University and the European University Institute. His book "Feeling Smart: Why our Emotions are More Rational than We Think" appeared in 2015. The book appeared in nine languages and was endorsed by several Nobel laureates. His papers appeared in leading journal such as Econometrica, AER, Review of Economics Studies, JPE, APSR, JET, Management Science, Psy Science and more. His press essays appeared in Time Magazine, Forbes, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, Guardian, the Independent, Jewish Chronicle, Haaretz and more. He has advised governments and corporations including, Microsoft and Google on behavioral economics and decision making.