Take a Look at Our Numbers
FACULTY
Instructional Faculty
Tenure Track
ENROLLMENT
Term
Research Faculty
Academic year 2024-25 promises to be another high-water mark for enrollment across many programs. The college continues as a top producer of tech talent in Virginia, and 27 percent of all students at George Mason are enrolled at the College of Engineering and Computing (CEC).
RESEARCH
Among public universities the college’s National Science Foundation Higher Education Research and Development Survey ranking is in the top 50 for engineering and the top 20 for computer and information sciences.
$83.7M IN EXPENDITURES
$62.8M IN AWARDS TOTAL OF $430M IN PROPOSALS
$13.4M
Looking ahead, Fiscal Year (FY) 2024’s strong performance in proposals should turn into robust expenditure growth in FY25, and several large opportunities now being pursued have the potential to strongly aid FY25 performance.
From the Dean
Dear Alumni and Friends,
The theme of our 2024 Annual Report is, “Take look at us now!” When you do, you’ll see a dynamic, forward-thinking college with dedicated people tackling society’s grand challenges who are committed to making the world cleaner, safer, and more prosperous. Within these pages are stories about our educational endeavors, our research enterprise, our talented students, and our new facilities told through the lens of our areas of expertise.
Take a look at our new facilities. New labs opened this year, on each of our three Virginia campuses: the Mason Autonomy and Robotics Center in Fairfax, the Renewable Energy Lab at Mason Square (Arlington), and the Nanofabrication Facility on the SciTech Campus (Prince William County). Each provides outstanding space and equipment for exploring emerging and expanding areas, including AI, robotics, power engineering, and microfabrication. The labs supply equipment for researchers to experiment and for students to receive hands-on training.
Take a look at our ground-breaking research. We experienced strong performance in grant funding as researchers submitted a record-breaking number of proposals. Research informs our teaching and learning and changes lives. Our teams address issues from the tiniest structures at the nanoscale level to the global effects of climate change, and from the ethical challenges of AI to the mysteries of space.
Take a look at our new educational initiatives. As teachers and scholars we seek new ways to transmit knowledge to our students and prepare them for work and life after college. With industry input, we developed new courses, certificates, and degree programs in growing fields like naval ship design, responsible AI, and microfabrication.
Take a look at our tough and ambitious students. Known for their grit and determination, our outstanding students push boundaries and test barriers to excel on campus and off. They come to George Mason with a desire to learn, conquering the obstacles of challenging class assignments and demanding projects to succeed at innovative capstone experiences and career-enhancing internships.
Many of the stories in this report reveal that the discovery process often leads us in new and surprising directions. A student discovers that a cancer diagnosis gives life new meaning, a research team looking for a way to study nanoparticles without using toxic substances finds a novel use for coffee grounds, or a professor constructs courses that allow computer science students to study abroad.
Whatever the discovery, we know that the pace of change accelerates every year. So, take a look at us now! Next year will surely be All Together Different. I can’t wait to see all that we accomplish throughout the 2024-25 academic year!
Best wishes,
Ken Ball, PhD, PE Dean, College of Engineering and Computing
BIG DATA
George Mason researchers are inventing systems that organize, analyze, and learn from complex fields of information. These applications and systems are helping with everything from national security and defense to health care and education.
Why Big Data Means Safer Driving
Once, transportation officials made decisions based on household surveys performed roughly once per decade, which asked selected households to record their travel behavior on a given day. Now, with an increasing number of connected vehicles on the road, that data is available in nearly real time. Sid and Reva Dewberry Department of Civil, Environmental, and Infrastructure Engineering (CEIE) Associate Professor Shanjiang Zhu is embracing this shift. With funding from the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT), Zhu and his research team, Anand Vidyashankar from the Department of Statistics and Chenfeng Xiong from the Villanova University Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, will reconcile the travel data from three different sources—surveys, smartphones, and connected vehicles—into invaluable information.
Zhu explained, “Based on survey information, you understand, on average, where people have traveled, in what mode, with whom, and spent how much time there, what is the purpose for the trip, etc. Using that information, you can develop a model that basically can predict future scenarios, like how congested the network could be in 2040; and that drives all the investment decisions and policy debates.” This method introduces problems of timeliness, as it can skip major events such as the COVID-19 pandemic, and human error, as those surveyed may not remember every detail of their travel on a given day.
The introduction of widespread smartphone use made the available data much denser, said Zhu, resulting in about one data point every three to five minutes. Nevertheless, this method introduced a bias problem, as not everyone owns a smartphone and not everyone uses them often.
Zhu’s team is working with VDOT to make the best possible use of connected vehicle data, basically newer vehicles like those with an “SOS” button installed. On average, this data is rich and accurate, providing one data point every three seconds, but one drawback is connected vehicles currently make up a small share of vehicles on the road, noted Zhu. His colleague Vidyashankar will be reviewing the data fusion of VDOT’s survey, smart phone, and connected vehicle data to ensure a rigorous statistical approach.
Zhu’s team is working with VDOT to make the best possible use of connected vehicle data.
Zhu foresees data from connected vehicles becoming increasingly important as more and more people adopt the technology. He said, “Now we are investing in the methodology part and seeing how we can make this connection more productive, to improve the driving environment, to make our roads safer, to make the driving experience better.”
Shanjiang Zhu, associate professor, Sid and Reva Dewberry Department of Civil, Environmental, and Infrastructure Engineering
Statistics Department and Inova Health System Develop Innovative Postdoctoral Program
Apartnership between the Department Statistics and Inova has entered its fifth year and continues to grow. The partnership has motivated a new initiative: a postdoc program for Inova researchers interested in developing skills in statistics and data science. It is run jointly by the statistics department and Global and Community Health. Mohamad Bahij Moumneh, MD, and Jason F. Goldberg, MD, are the program’s standing inaugural members.
“As a fresh Lebanese medical graduate interested in expanding his acquired skills in the field of research, especially cardiology, and academia, the joint program provided me with this golden opportunity,” said Moumneh. He added, “By maximizing the resources of each institute, enhancements in the overall picture and quality of research and healthcare education occur.”
The partnership was supported by a contract between George Mason and the health care system via a parent award from National Institutes of Health (NIH) to the iTHRIV partnership. It supported the experts in George Mason’s Statistics Collaboration Core (SCC) to work with colleagues from Inova on research projects involving statistics or data science.
“The Statistics Collaboration Core (SCC) is a platform that supports and facilitates statistical collaborations with internal and external investigators or seekers for evidenced-based research, or statistical, biostatistical, or data science support to decision-making,” explained Jiayang Sun, chair of the Department of Statistics. Sun is a principal investigator on the new grant establishing the postdoc program, alongside co-PI Carolyn Drews-Botsch, chair of the Department of Global and Community Health in George Mason’s School of Public Health.
“The partnership between Inova and George Mason will help with our research efforts aimed at prolonging life after heart transplantation,” said Goldberg.
Sun notes the five-year partnership between the statistics department and Inova has been fruitful and produced additional grants, publications in the health and medical sector, and new grant proposals. She added that it serves as a welcome opportunity for both tenure-track and term faculty to perform original research and collaborate with colleagues dealing with real-world problems. Research projects from the partnership have covered such important topics as opioid use, sepsis, heart failure, and the spread of COVID-19 among children in Northern Virginia.
Sun, Moumneh, and Goldberg are likewise optimistic about the new joint postdoc program.
“Researchers can collaborate on various projects that eventually might lead to medical breakthroughs. One could say that the joint program fosters an environment of innovation and growth.
The joint program fosters an environment of innovation and growth.
Mohamad
Bahij Moumneh, MD
assistant professor, Department of Information Sciences and Technology
Bridging the Gap Between Research and Policy
Finding accurate information about disability services presents a challenge to people with disabilities and their families in the face of misinformation. Through the Mapping Information Ecology project, Myeong Lee, an assistant professor of information science and the director of the Community Informatics Lab at George Mason University, worked with the Virginia Board of People with Disabilities (VPBD) to study the issue and report potentially meaningful policy changes. His work resulted in a report included in VBPD’s 2024 Assessment Report Series, “Assessment of Virginia’s Disability Services System: Information Ecology of the Disability Services System.”
“This report series is used as key resources for many Virginia government agencies in making meaningful changes in their policies about disabilities,” said Lee. His report maps the system that manages and disperses information regarding disability services and makes recommendations about how to improve the management of the commonwealth’s disability services.
Lee, whose past research has focused on information access issues in local communities, explained, “At the community level, if information is fragmented across different sources and in different forms, then those structural factors make people’s access difficult.” Lee’s research approach involved finding a way to measure these structural challenges and mitigate their negative impact.
The project aimed to understand information provision and management practices from both information provider and user perspectives. Lee’s team employed a mixed-method approach, conducting interviews with providers and surveying their information sharing patterns to uncover both managerial and structural challenges.
Based on network analysis of information-sharing patterns, key findings from the project extended the understanding of obstacles faced by individuals with disabilities and their family members, such as the lack of customized information for diverse populations, outdated information, and reliance on informal sources, such as social media, leading to exposure to misinformation.
Lee’s team designed and ran a survey to further understand both information providers’ and users’ practices. Using information from the survey, he explained, “We want to visualize those networks— how information is circulated and shared.” The data visualization helped Lee and his team to identify “hot spots” and “cold spots” where improvements could be made.
“We want to provide information systems strategies, structural recommendations, and related policy recommendations to the state. That’s our goal,” said Lee.
Despite the project’s ending in May 2024, Lee envisions continued collaboration between his team and the VBPD. Looking ahead, he sees potential applications of their approach beyond disability-
Myeong Lee,
related issues. Ultimately, Lee hopes to create metrics and tools for assessing information availability and fragmentation at the state level to assist policymakers in understanding the complicated issue of information access.
Lee’s work exemplifies a holistic approach to information access, bridging the gap between research and policy to empower marginalized communities. He concluded, “It’s not just about making recommendations—it’s about building systems and developing assessment metrics that empower users and inform policymakers for years to come.”
We want to provide information systems strategies, structural recommendations, and related policy recommendations to the state. That’s our goal.
Myeong Lee, assistant professor of information science and the director of the Community Informatics Lab at George Mason University
CYBER SECURITY
Because we hold one of the longest track records of information security advancement in the United States, we’re ready to thwart more sophisticated cyberattacks and future threats before they happen. Our location within the nation’s epicenter of security technology makes us an incubator for the newest networks, systems, and trained experts.
Hacking the Hacker’s Brain
As the prevalence and severity of cyberattacks continue to grow, the Intelligence Advanced Research Project Activity (IARPA) has turned its focus on how to exploit the weakest link in cyberattacks: the human factor.
A team of George Mason University researchers is probing the psychology behind cyberattacks as part of a U.S. intelligence community program aimed at turning the tables on hackers.
Under a new IARPA program, researchers hope to better understand cyber attackers’ cognitive vulnerabilities and decision-making biases and use those vulnerabilities to derail future attacks.
Researchers Daniel Barbará, Giuseppe Ateniese, and Gerald Matthews were selected as part of a broader team of computer science, cybersecurity, and psychology experts to forge new research pathways and deliver cutting-edge technology as part of IARPA’s Reimagining Security with Cyberpsychology-Informed Network Defense, or ReSCIND, program.
The team of researchers will build defensive tools that first home in on hackers’ human limitations and use those weaknesses to delay or derail the attack while it is underway.
“You want to make them waste their time,” said Department of Computer Science Professor Daniel Barbará. “The more they waste their time, the least damage they’re going to do.”
This can be accomplished by luring hackers with decoys such as false networks or documents to distract them.
But the trick is two-fold. The decoys must first and foremost appear to be real. They also need to entice the hackers away from their original aim. The latter is where understanding the psychological factors that influence hackers is essential.
As part of the first phase of the ReSCIND program, researchers will aim to fill gaps that exist in the current understanding of human cognition and decision making that influence cyber attackers’ behavior.
“It’s a challenging topic to address because hackers, of course, tend to be somewhat secretive,” Matthews, a professor of psychology, said. “There aren’t many opportunities to study hacker psychology.”
Matthews said the current understanding of hackers’ behavior that provides the baseline for their research comes from several areas of study in psychology. Key among those areas is human performance and in particular how emotional states might influence performance.
“There’s a certain amount of psychology that allows you to link the emotional reactions that hackers might have to cognitive biases and other vulnerabilities in performance,” Matthews said. “So, in this first part of the research, we’re trying to sketch out what some of those vulnerabilities might be.”
You want to make them waste their time—the more they waste their time, the least damage they’re going to do.
Daniel
Barbará, professor, Department of Computer Science
As part of the second phase, researchers will further define when cyberpsychology-informed defenses can best be used and how to determine the success of those defenses. The final phase will focus on modeling, adapting, and automating those defenses.
Ateniese, a computer science professor and eminent scholar in cybersecurity, said the ReSCIND program reflects the growing importance of cyberpsychology research in shaping emerging technology.
George Mason Competitive Cyber Welcomes Everyone— No Experience Necessary
Students choose George Mason University for a variety of reasons. Computer science student Jax Dunfee came here because of the strong competitive cyber club. He said, “When I was looking for colleges, I saw that Mason had a competitive cyber team. So, I investigated it, thought it was cool, looked into it more, and joined when I got here. I’ve always been into cybersecurity, and competitive cyber is a great way to improve my skills.”
The George Mason Competitive Cyber (MCC) Club is open to all, and though it mostly comprises students in technical majors, the club welcomes everyone. The group meets twice weekly—virtually on Wednesdays and in person on Fridays. The Friday meeting sometimes includes presentations or talks from industry sponsors or professionals.
The club also competes in person at events sponsored by other universities like Virginia Military Institute (VMI) and Virginia Tech (VT). In September 2023, MCC hosted its own international Capture the Flag (CTF) event that attracted more than 3,000 participants and over 1,600 teams. Students who are looking for the heart and soul of MCC will find it at CTFs. These competitions are also about hacking and cybersecurity.
“The events are how we put theory in practice,” said Dunfee. “In classes, a lot of times you learn programming that builds a baseline for what you’ll be doing in the industry, but frequently you don’t have a lot of time to do that—put that theory into practice. But with CTF you get hands-on activities with your teammates and others.”
Dunfee describes CTF as a variety of challenges that can range from web app exploitation, binary exploitation, cryptography, or reverse engineering forensics. Teams receive a challenge and a description, that they must solve and then get a flag, and the flags are redeemed for points. The team with the most points wins.
“The Mason Competitive Cyber Club has been competing in CTFs, and winning, since they formed in 2016. The club leadership and members do an excellent job learning from each other and teaching skills to new members, so as older students graduate and new students roll in, they just keep getting better and have a great time doing it. Club alumni are getting excellent jobs in the cybersecurity world, and they regularly give back to the organization by visiting, talking to members, and hiring our graduates,” said Jim Jones, associate professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering.
Students who are interested in learning more about MCC can check out the website or attend one of the meetings. “We’re always looking for members,” said Dunfee. No experience necessary.
Club alumni are getting excellent jobs in the cybersecurity world, and they regularly give back to the organization.
Jim Jones, associate professor, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
24 Competitions
2023
National Cyber League Spring 2024 2nd place nationally
VMI CyberFusion 2024 1st place
CyberForge 2024 1st, 2nd, and 4th place (sent three teams)
Capture The Future 2023 1st and 3rd place (sent two teams)
National Cyber League Fall 2023
18th nationally
Patriot CTF 2023
3,031 participants globally, 1,364 teams, and 40,592 unique Idea Platforms
VT Summit CTF 2023 2nd place
VMI CyberFusion 2023 3rd place
2023 Top 100 CTF team
Internationally top 20 in the nation (student and professional teams)
NSA Recognizes George Mason’s Cyber Expertise
George Mason University was recently redesignated by the National Security Agency (NSA) as a National Center of Academic Excellence (NCAE) in Cybersecurity. This recognition continues a designation that has been in place since 1999 and makes the College of Engineering and Computing eligible for special funding opportunities.
George Mason was redesignated in two categories: Cyber Defense (CAE-CD), valid through 2027, and Research (CAE-R), valid through 2028. The university is one of only seven schools that received a designation with the original cohort in 1999. The CAE in Cyber Defense is the longest-running designation of any program in the country.
NSA has curriculum requirements that a program must meet, involving a rigorous, peer-reviewed, multi-step application. Massimiliano (Max) Albanese, an associate professor and associate chair for research in the Department of Information Sciences and Technology and the associate director of the Center for Secure Information Systems, helps to lead the efforts in securing the designation.
To be eligible for the research designation, a school must have a PhD program preparing students for research in cybersecurity, which at George Mason is the PhD in information technology. Albanese added that the university is currently preparing an application to also validate the college’s master’s in applied information technology.
“In addition to the prestige,” Albanese said, “an advantage of the designation is that we have access to exclusive funding opportunities. We’ve been receiving funds for the Cyber Security Scholarship Program (CySP) for many years, for example, which covers tuition, health insurance for doctoral students, laptops, a stipend, and more.” The program brings about $150,000 to $200,000 annually for our students.
NSA funding that George Mason receives for other cyber-based projects is also contingent on the school having the CAE designation.
Albanese said, “George Mason’s NCAE designation isn’t just a badge of honor, it’s a testament to our commitment to excellence in cybersecurity education and research. Beyond the obvious financial benefits, being part of the CAE community is a catalyst for innovation and collaboration. The innovative Virginia Cyber Navigator Internship Program (VA-CNIP), managed by a coalition of NCAE-designated Virginia universities, is a prime example of how being part of this community translates into impactful initiatives and real-world experiences for our students.”
NSA funding that George Mason receives for other cyber-based projects is also contingent on the school having the CAE designation.
Associate Director of the Center for Secure Information Systems Massimiliano Albanese, associate professor and associate chair for research in the Department of Information Sciences and Technology
GLOBAL ENGAGEMENT
Our location at the doorstep of the nation’s capital attracts students and faculty from around the world and allows access to international experiences. Our study of global challenges provides solutions to society’s grand challenges by meeting people where they are and offering our knowledge and expertise.
Students Give Peace a Chance
Today’s college students are increasingly concerned with social justice, conflict resolution, and sustainability, byproducts of being raised in an interconnected, interdisciplinary world, where they’ve learned to consider downstream consequences of their actions and decisions.
In response, CEC and the Carter School for Peace and Conflict Resolution are now collaborating on a minor in peace engineering. The minor’s germination comes from numerous places but was pushed forward initially by Liza Wilson Durant, George Mason’s associate provost for strategic initiatives and community engagement. “I advised students in George Mason’s Engineers for International Development chapter on developing engineered solutions to community problems in remote lands in Central America,” she said. “The engagement with community members and the work to understand the needs of a vast number of community stakeholders was as important as the final engineered solution. It occurred to me that we could bring that kind of understanding to the classroom for more engineering students through collaboration with the Carter School.”
Jane Walker, director of undergraduate student services for the Carter School, said the minor is ideal for students at both colleges. “The engineering students will better understand culture and people and Carter School students will understand systems thinking and engineering design. The process of design helps them problem-solve.”
It helps that the Carter School dean, Alpaslan Ozerdem, is an engineer by training and sees the needs of a changing world. “When I pursued my civil engineering degree in Istanbul during the late 1980s, our curriculum offered limited engagement with socio-economic and cultural issues,” he said. “Although we had the opportunity to select a few
electives that touched upon these topics, the primary focus remained on the technical and structural aspects of civil engineering.”
Rajesh Ganesan is an associate professor in the systems engineering and operations research department explained how systems engineering approaches are useful. “As we look at conflict on the whole from a global perspective and think of all the huge factors that play a role in any crisis, we want to incorporate systems thinking into conflict analysis. It’s important for our students to have those systems-thinking approaches.”
He added that increasingly students are asking for courses related to things like climate change, global conflicts, and energy sustainability. He said, “These words were nonexistent previously. If you had asked me six or seven years ago, nobody spoke about these things, but now the students are asking for them, along with other pushes, like from the Dean’s Advisory Board.”
As we look at conflict on the whole from a global perspective and think of all the huge factors that play a role in any crisis, we want to incorporate systems thinking into conflict analysis.
Rajesh Ganesan, associate professor, Department of Systems Engineering and Operations Research
Özerdem has a strong vision for the minor. “In the coming years, we hope to see it become a flagship program attracting a diverse and dynamic cohort of students from across the university,” he said.
Elise Miller-Hooks, professor, and chair Sid and Reva Dewberry Department of Civil, Environmental, and Infrastructure Engineering, Bill and Eleanor Endowed Chair in Infrastructure Engineering
Cool Lessons From Utqiaġvik, Alaska
Last summer computer modeling and the Arctic ecosystem converged at the top of the world. George Mason Professor Celso Ferreira, Professor Elise Miller-Hooks, and a team of National Science Foundation (NSF) Navigating the New Arctic researchers convened at the Barrow
Arctic Research Center in Utqiaġvik, Alaska, some 320 miles north of the Arctic Circle to attend the Permafrost and Infrastructure Symposium.
The symposium brought together scientists, regional planners, village leaders, project managers, and federal and local policymakers.
The people of Utqiaġvik live on top of permafrost, and they fish and whale in the surrounding seas, as they have for centuries. Whaling is not a hobby or for profit. They whale to survive. It is their food supply and more.
“[Whaling] is their culture. It is what they raise their kids to do. It’s what their songs and dances are about. It’s truly everything. They say that if you take that away from them, it’s like killing them,” said Miller-Hooks. All of this could be threatened by more shipping traffic as the polar ice caps shrink and Arctic Sea ice diminishes.
Miller-Hooks’s research focuses on forecasting and modeling shipping and maritime transportation changes that will come as the permafrost thaws and sea levels rise. She found the experience life changing.
“What I learned from the community and tribal leaders was invaluable. I learned that they really want co-production. They want to be heard. They want us to understand what they know and bring it into our research. We must not ignore their experience and try to push research findings on them, but instead learn together and jointly develop solutions.”
RESEARCH SPONSORS: Funding for the symposium came from the NSF Arctic Sciences program, the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Center for Safety Equity in Transportation, and UIC Science, a subsidiary of the Ukpeaġvik Iñupiat Corporation providing logistical support to scientists and researchers working in Alaska’s Arctic.
This idea crystalized after Miller-Hooks presented her research at the symposium. After her presentation, one of the village leaders expressed concern and skepticism about the math.
He said he thought she was looking at the wrong thing. He told her that more shipping in the Arctic would harm the whales and could harm whaling.
Miller-Hooks explained that her research creates the tools that can help forecast changing Arctic traffic, and how these projections and analyses can be used to help make cases to mitigate the impact on the whales and their breeding, other marine life, whale hunting, and Indigenous people’s subsistence way of life.
“Now I have a much better understanding of the power of our findings, and how they can be used from many new angles that I hadn’t thought of,” she said. Miller-Hooks continues to collaborate with the local communities and work with them to uncover how increased maritime traffic and related industrial activity in the region will impact their way of life, and how the United States and other Arctic nations can prepare to do the right thing.
Celso Ferreira, professor, Sid and Reva Dewberry Department of Civil, Environmental, and Infrastructure Engineering, explores the permafrost underground in Alaska. PHOTO PROVIDED
Study Abroad Combines Tourism and Tech
When most people think of Vienna, Austria, they imagine the seat of the Habsburg Empire, elegant baroque palaces, and a world-class opera and symphony. In the twenty-first century, however, the City of Music is fast becoming a European tech hub. So, in summer 2024, Rob Pettit, a professor and associate chair of the Department of Computer Science, led a pioneering study abroad program in Vienna. Designed for undergraduate computer science (CS) students, this initiative is among the first faculty-led study abroad opportunities specific to computer science in the country.
Pettit said, “I attended one of the top study-abroad universities in the United States, yet I was unable to participate in those opportunities due to the rigid structure of the CS curriculum. This is a challenge
for many CS students, as study abroad programs often don’t align with the credit requirements for their major.” Pettit found a solution by creating a program aligned with George Mason’s CS curriculum and by traveling with the students to teach the courses.
Pettit and the students lived as locals in Vienna’s dynamic 6th district. The students attended classes at the renowned Vienna University of Technology (TU Wien). Pettit held lectures for CS 321 Software Engineering and students gained hands-on experience with team-based agile software development practices to prepare for their transition to industry.
“CS 321 is a project-based course and part of the required curriculum for the BS CS and BS ACS degrees,” said Pettit. “For their projects, students
Rob Pettit, associate chair, in the Department of Computer Science (on far left) led a study abroad program Vienna, Austria in the summer of 2024. PHOTO PROVIDED
were required to incorporate elements of their study abroad experience into a deliverable software application.” In addition to CS 321, students also earned credit for CS 399 Exploration of the Global Software Engineering Industry. Together, this combination provided six credits of coursework directly applicable to the computer science major.
For their final projects student teams developed a variety of apps which integrated social, cultural, and historical experiences. They looked at challenges encountered in their travels and developed original apps to solve a specific problem a visitor might have. These included two scavenger hunt apps, another that encourages travel journaling, a food searching app that helps the users search for a type of food based on location, and an adventure game set in post-World War II Vienna.
“Studying abroad is not just about combining academics with travel,” said Pettit. “It’s a transformative experience that expands horizons, fosters cultural understanding, and builds a global perspective. Given today’s interconnected world, studying abroad equips students with unique skills and insights, preparing them to navigate and contribute to a diverse and dynamic global community. ”The program included organized excursions and industry interactions to enhance the students’ cultural and historical understanding of the region.
By creating a study abroad program tailored to CS students, Pettit said he provided a unique opportunity to broaden their perspectives, enhance their global competencies, and apply their technical skills in diverse, international contexts. The next CS study abroad program—to the United Kingdom—will happen in January. Pettit said the applications are already streaming in.
Bioengineering Majors Prepare to Study Abroad, Develop Prosthetics, in Ecuador
Agroup of bioengineering undergraduate students will travel to Quito, Ecuador, in May 2025 for a new study abroad experience. They will participate in BENG 417 Engineering World Health-Prosthetics in Ecuador, led by Ketul Popat bioengineering department chair. In the course, rising juniors and seniors will design and fabricate prosthetics for under-served populations in Ecuador.
The need for affordable and effective prosthetics in developing countries is significant. The World Health Organization states 80 percent of the world’s amputees live in developing countries, and only two percent have access to prosthetic care. This study abroad experience, which the department is running in partnership with nonprofit health care organization the Range of Motion Project (ROMP), provides an opportunity for students to gain international, hands-on experience and to participate in developing solutions for these underserved and high-need populations in Ecuador.
Students will solve problems at the interface of engineering and the life sciences as individuals and team members experience cultural immersion via excursions to Quito, the Mindo cloud forest, a chocolate farm, and more. Before leaving for study abroad, they will prepare with meetings, a Spanish crash course, and safety trainings.
HEALTH CARE TECHNOLOGY
Recognized for their groundbreaking discoveries, our students and researchers blend hard science and compassion to create tools and systems that solve complex biological and medical problems.
Cancer Scare Motivates Mason Grad
Dulcce Valenzuela wasn’t going to say she would want to go through it again. But of her diagnosis, fight, and success beating back cancer as a teenager, she said, “I wouldn’t change it for the world.”
That’s because the George Mason University alum, who graduated in December 2023 with a bioengineering degree, used the episode as a foundation for her life’s purpose.
“How can I help other people?” she said. “How can I leverage my skills to help somebody else?”
For Valenzuela, 30, from Stafford, Virginia, a transfer student from Germanna Community College, that means medical school, a career in aerospace medicine, perhaps in the U.S. Air Force, and building off her research in George Mason’s Applied Biosensing Laboratory.
There, under the mentorship of Associate Professor Parag Chitnis, Valenzuela is part of an effort to develop wearable ultrasound technology for the quantitative assessment of musculoskeletal injuries in military service members.
At the same time, Valenzuela is working part time for Inova as a rehabilitation technician. She previously worked part time for Mary Washington Healthcare as a patient safety attendant.
“Dulcce is an exemplary student who not only achieved high academic standing in our classes but also made the most of the diverse research opportunities George Mason Bioengineering has to offer for our undergrads,” Chitnis said. “In my lab, she independently developed a method for characterizing the performance of novel, wearable ultrasound sensors, which has now become part of our standard protocol. This was an impressive accomplishment considering that she had no prior experience in this area.”
“Once you’re out of the waters with something like cancer, your body is very much in fight or flight mode, and you’re just kind of surviving for a little bit,” said Valenzuela, who underwent two years of treatment to overcome Ewing sarcoma, which began in the soft tissue and bones of her shoulder and spread to her lungs. “Now I’m doing things with intention.”
It is that grit—including coming to the United States at 13 with her mother and sister from their native Honduras for her cancer treatments—that made Valenzuela such a perfect match for George Mason’s culture, said Shani Ross, associate chair of undergraduate programs in the bioengineering department.
“She is a good citizen of George Mason,” Ross said. “From a diverse background, a transfer student, a good human being. And through her own struggles, really wants to help people.”
Valenzuela said George Mason helped pull the best out of her.
She said she immediately felt at home at the university during a field trip to the Fairfax Campus with other Germanna students. She appreciates the university’s diversity and the “tons of opportunities” for research with faculty who are “very open to having students in their labs so we can get some experience.”
“I feel I’m coming out with good relationships, good connections,” Valenzuela said. “I feel pretty ready to take my next steps.”
That includes beginning an accelerated master’s program at George Mason in spring 2024, continuing her research in the Applied Biosensing Lab, studying for the MCAT, and eventually applying to medical schools.
Dulcce Valenzuela, a December 2023 graduate, is now working on a master’s degree in bioengineering
Students Launch New VR Platform for Physical Rehab
As a capstone to the bachelor’s in bioengineering program, senior students complete a team-based, two-semester design project developing solutions to real-world biomedical and/or clinical problems.
Many people around the world need lower limb rehabilitation to regain function, including more than 101 million stroke patients and many athletic injury patients, yet only 36 percent of these patients complete their care plans and achieve maximum results. Virtual reality (VR) has proven to be more effective at improving gait and balance in stroke and rehabilitation patients when compared to traditional therapy. Patients also consider VR more exciting and engaging. While some VR rehabilitation tools currently exist, they are often inaccessible due to size, cost, and complexity. This team’s goal was to create a portable, inexpensive, and engaging VR lower-limb rehabilitation platform that could be set up in a range of locations and used by patients in their own homes to regain mobility, muscular strength, and balance.
As a team, the students discussed interests, strengths and weaknesses, and passions, and settled on this project. They all had a strong background in coding, and loved the idea of using code and VR to improve patient outcomes. Through interviews with rehabilitation patients and physical therapists, they were inspired by the need to make rehabilitation more engaging.
The team’s greatest success was leveraging clinical information to engineer critical aspects of their virtual reality rehabilitation platform. Through interviews with physical therapists and patients undergoing physical therapy for lower limb rehabilitation, they gathered invaluable insights. The information encompassed aspects such as initial patient assessments, patient monitoring metrics, exercise efficacy, range of motion requirements, patient engagement strategies, and challenges faced in physical therapy. Armed with this comprehensive data, they enhanced the design of virtual environments and refined the overall design, marking a pivotal success in the project.
This team’s goal was to create a portable, inexpensive, and engaging VR lower-limb rehabilitation platform that could be set up in a range of locations and used by patients in their own homes.
Finding a space large enough to base the project and one that was secure and quiet enough to allow for an optimal development environment was one of the team’s great challenges. They had to repurpose a room that was intended for storage space. A dedicated research space would equip them with the tools they need to have a successful final design, as well as a testing space.
Students demonstrated virtual reality technology at the Fuse topping out.
Having a massive database leads to better outcomes and measurably better outcomes for those victims downstream in terms of their care and in terms of their outcomes in the criminal justice system.
David Lattanzi, associate professor, Sid and Reva Dewberry Department of Civil, Environmental, and Infrastructure Engineering
Researchers (left to right) Janusz Wojtusiak, Katherine Scafide, and David Lattanzi.
PHOTO BY RON AIRA, OFFICE OF UNIVERSITY BRANDING.
Building A New Tool To Tackle Health Disparities
When people ask Associate Professor David Lattanzi why a civil engineer is working in forensic nursing science, he can only say, ‘Why not?’ Lattanzi is a co-principal investigator on research to develop a tool that will help clinicians and others assess bruises on victims of violence, particularly those with darker skin tones.
This work, led by principal investigator Katherine Scafide, associate professor in the College of Public Health, received a $4.86 million gift from an anonymous donor which extends the findings of an earlier U.S. Department of Justice grant that began more than three years ago.
The team’s multidisciplinary research combines Scafide’s work with alternate light source technology, co-PI Janusz Wojtusiak’s expertise in informatics, and Lattanzi’s knowledge of computer vision and deep learning to address challenges of identifying bruises and other injuries in victims of domestic violence.
“When I started at George Mason 10 years ago, I never imagined that my work could have a societal impact like this,” said Lattanzi, and the university has proved to be the perfect place to nurture his research. A structural engineer by training, he spent his early years as a bridge and tunnel inspector. After seeing too many close calls while working on inspection sites, he thought there must be a better way. So he began using drones and imaging to address the next generation of infrastructure-inspection technologies—and make bridge inspection less dangerous.
Though drones aren’t part of this research, he and the team are using the image-based diagnostic techniques that began a decade ago. Now Lattanzi is enhancing these tools with artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning to examine human skin structures damaged by incidents of domestic violence.
According to a statement from the university, one in three women worldwide experience some form of violence. In the United States, more than 10 million women and men deal with interpersonal violence each year. These numbers tell only part of the story; because bruises are difficult to detect on darker skin tones, many victims miss out on getting the help they need.
The tool these researchers will build needs a large enough database to identify skin tones “accurately and equitably,” said Lattanzi. One of the important goals of the project, therefore, is to build a unique data repository that combines images of bruises and other injuries, with measurements, clinical and demographic information about the victim, and information inferred by artificial intelligence. Currently, the platform includes about 30,000 images of bruises collected using visible and alternative light sources.
“Having a massive database leads to better outcomes and measurably better outcomes for those victims downstream in terms of their care and in terms of their outcomes in the criminal justice system,” Lattanzi said.
The tool the researchers are building could be an app on a smartphone that clinicians can use to assess the age of bruises. Lattanzi said they hope to have a prototype in a year and possibly have the technology available for use in a couple of years.
ROBOTICS AND AUTONOMOUS SYSTEMS
Robots and autonomous systems are changing everything from writing poems to driving cars.
Our engineers and computer scientists are at the forefront of this revolution, pushing the boundaries while ensuring that these systems are designed and deployed responsibly.
Trusting George Mason to Contribute to Trustworthy AI
George Mason University has joined more than 200 of the nation’s leading artificial intelligence (AI) stakeholders to participate in a U.S. Department of Commerce initiative to support the development and deployment of trustworthy and safe AI. Established by the U.S. Department of Commerce’s National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), the U.S. AI Safety Institute Consortium (AISIC) will bring together AI creators and users, academics, government and industry researchers, and civil society organizations to meet this mission.
George Mason will bring its expertise in AI and leadership in emerging technologies to the initiative.
“George Mason researchers look to solve complex problems that demand creativity, transdisciplinary collaboration, and a sustained passion for digital innovation for good. We look forward to working with the consortium to achieve these goals,” said Amarda Shehu, vice president and chief artificial intelligence officer (CAIO) and professor in the Department of Computer Science. George Mason is the only Virginia university in the consortium.
Through the establishment of the AISIC, NIST aims to help equip and empower others in collaboratively establishing a new measurement science that will enable the identification of proven, scalable, and interoperable measurements and methodologies to promote development of trustworthy AI and its responsible use.
Amarda Shehu, associate vice president and chief artificial intelligence officer for George Mason
Professor Leigh McCue (on left) and student Ze Li test the new robot in the water near the Potomac Science Center.
Surface Water Robot Improves Access and Efficiency
When R. Christian Jones, director of George Mason University’s Potomac Environmental Research and Education Center (PEREC) and a professor in the College of Science, found he was spending too much time hauling boats, he turned to an engineering colleague for a solution.
That colleague was Leigh McCue, chair of the Department of Mechanical Engineering, who also works at the Potomac Science Center (PSC) where PEREC is housed. Jones approached McCue and undergraduate student Ze Li with an idea: a machine that could go out on the pond, skim for plankton samples and collect water samples, and return to shore—all while the researcher remains on land.
This project is part of a larger grant from the National Science Foundation for Persistent and Accessible Maritime Monitoring (PAMM), of which McCue is the lead investigator. The multiyear grant—awarded in 2022 for more than $500,000—focuses on increasing educational, research, and robotics operations and development. The grant aims to improve the applications of and expanded use of unmanned marine vehicles. It also includes making such vehicles more accessible for individuals with motion limitations, which in turn can increase accessibility for all researchers. It is designed for students ranging from sixth grade to graduate level.
“Researchers around the globe are utilizing robotics to conduct maritime research, which is an increasingly critical field of study,” explained McCue. “Through this grant, we’re developing more affordable maritime research tools to improve access for great science, whether citizen science or research-grade science. This project fit nicely into that mission.”
The autonomous surface vessel constructed by Li used a publicly available 3D printable remote control trash collecting boat (https://www.drewbuildsstuff. ca/plans/rc-trashboat) as a starting point and built upon it to allow for water sampling and mid-pond plankton sampling.
“We thought it was more beneficial to create something new by developing our design around an opensource hull model,” Li said. “There’s more opportunity for us to iterate on the prototype.”
The team hopes to continue to improve the machine’s design, now that it’s being field-tested by Jones: improved autonomous capabilities and controls are both on the short list of potential improvements. Li also sees a potential for expanded testing of such data points as water temperature, turbidity, and salinity.
Jones predicts that this machine will be a boon for both access and efficiency. “The number of accessible ponds will increase dramatically with this, and we’ll be able to sample up to eight in a day instead of just one or two,” Jones said.
The machine will also allow for more immediate responses to sudden, unpredictable, and time-sensitive events, like taking samples immediately after storms. Jones even sees possible uses for this machine to take samples during major pollution events, keeping the researchers safe from exposure to harmful chemicals while still acquiring necessary data.
Jones emphasized that this project was made possible by the collaboration between the two colleges. “At a place like PSC where we’re all working together, seeing each other’s labs and hearing about research, this sort of collaboration comes naturally,” he said. “It’s a beautiful opportunity for us all to become better researchers and do better science.”
PHOTO BY
Room For Robots: New Center for Autonomy, Robotics, and Responsible AI Opens
An audience of faculty and VIPs gathered at the opening of the Mason Autonomy and Robotics Center (MARC), but the star of the show was a Boston Dynamics quadruped. As the bright yellow doglike robot held one end of the green ribbon, George Mason University president Gregory Washington, MARC co-directors professors Missy Cummings and Jesse Kirkpatrick cut it. Afterward, it roamed the event, opening doors for attendees and demonstrating its capabilities.
“MARC is the focal point for our research in autonomy, robotics, and AI. George Mason truly is a pace-setter in these areas,” said Dean Ken Ball of the College of Engineering and Computing.
The new facility in George Mason’s Research Hall on the Fairfax Campus includes a 1,649-square-foot, two-story aviary for testing drones, areas for lab experiments, offices, collaboration and study areas, and a student lounge.
During her remarks, Cummings addressed robots’ evolving role in society. “People don’t want autonomy to do their creative jobs,” she said. “They want to do their art, they want to write their stories…what they want is the robot maid. Once we hit world peak population in 55 years, we won’t have enough people to do the jobs we need. The dull, dirty, dangerous jobs are a great place for robots.”
The university’s strides with AI are unique in its focus on creating and using the technology responsibly—and also teaching our students the same principles. A graduate certificate in that field launched in fall 2024.
“We’ve been at the forefront of a whole host of outcomes and technologies that have benefited this state and this region,” said Washington. “Right here in engineering, we established the first-in-the-country cyber security engineering program, so there’s a real lineage of innovation here. George Mason will be the only Virginia university to join more than 200 of the nation’s leading AI stakeholders to participate in the U.S. Department of Commerce’s initiative to support the development of trustworthy and safe AI.”
“We do autonomy, we do robotics, we do AI…but we do it responsibly, and that’s in our core,” said Kirkpatrick. “It’s in our principles, policies, practice, and people. It’s across the research enterprise, and it’s in our teaching. The leaders of today, tomorrow, and the day after have to get this right because it’s so absolutely critical.”
“Not just for engineering, MARC will be used by numerous colleges and departments across the university for many multidisciplinary projects. This is a collaborative space for our students to work,” said Ball. “And it’s really important they have the opportunity to work in close proximity to our faculty.”
MARC’s opening demonstrates how George Mason’s STEM leadership attracts corporate partners. Venkat Potapragada of 22nd Century Technologies said, “I’m here because this is a strategic relationship for us and a key component of our overall growth strategy. We depend on talent, and Mason will help us achieve our growth goals. In the D.C. region, Mason is a name to be reckoned with.”
PHOTO BY JOHN BOAL
Students attending the MARC Ribbon-Cutting Reception enter Research Hall with the Boston Dynamics quadruped.
SUSTAINABILITY
Our civil engineers tackle big-picture problems using the latest technologies, such as virtual reality, artificial intelligence, robotics, and remote sensing, to improve construction safety, identify structural deficiencies, and predict changing weather patterns. They are also investigating nature-based solutions to create sustainable solutions needed to address big civil engineering challenges.
American Dream to Dream Job
From childhood, Eduardo Vazquez appeared destined to work in construction. His father, who relocated their family to Northern Virginia from Mexico in 2001, has for years helped build Inova facilities and frequently tinkered around the house with Ed at his side. They even built a backyard shed together, from the foundation up. Vazquez, who graduated in May with a civil engineering degree from the College of Engineering and Computing, was back on campus in June wearing a different hat—a hard hat. He is now a project engineer with Hoar Construction and was there to break ground on George Mason’s new Activities Community Wellness Building on the Fairfax Campus. Hoar will build the 25,000-square-foot concrete and tension fabric structure, located behind the Recreation Athletic Complex, with Powers Brown Architecture and civil engineer IMEG Corp., scheduled for completion in 2025.
Vazquez planned to attend George Mason after entering the university’s Early Identification Program (EIP), a partnership with area schools to prepare middle and high school students who will be the first in their families to attend college. In EIP, Vazquez received a full-ride scholarship and enrolled in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences for a brief time before transferring to engineering.
Vazquez attended George Mason, under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) policy; a status that left him unable to receive public financial aid. Switching majors and giving up his scholarship was significant, in that it meant he would have to fund his education, something he determined was a worthwhile price for pursuing his passion.
That decision paid off. Vazquez was attending his first-ever career fair in Dewberry Hall and wandered to the back of the room, where he saw the Hoar Construction booth just as he was ready to leave.
“I’m pretty knowledgeable about the contractors around here because of my dad’s work, and I’d
PHOTO BY RON AIRA, OFFICE OF UNIVERSITY BRANDING.
Eduardo Vazquez, College of Engineering and Computing ’24, Early Identification Program alumnus, works for Hoar construction. Vazquez attended the groundbreaking ceremony for the Activities Community Wellness Building on the Fairfax Campus.
never heard of them but stopped anyway,” he said. “The vice president was there, which is something you don’t get with the bigger companies. I got along with them right off the bat and left my resume.”
He interned at Hoar in the summer of 2023 and made a good enough impression to get a job offer. It didn’t hurt that the company was hoping to secure a contract with the university.
“At one point they asked me if I had a picture I could give them,” he said. “They said they were bidding on a project for Mason. It was their first [Mason] project, and they wanted to make sure the university knew they had one of their students on the team.”
Vazquez is excited to work on the project. He said it will be George Mason’s first tensile-fabric structure built. He imagines bringing his own children to campus someday and being able to point to the structure and say, “I helped build that.”
It will be a legacy—one started by his immigrant father putting up drywall day after day so his children could enjoy the American dream.
Mushrooming Feats of Engineering
It’s important not to crowd mushrooms in a pan, otherwise they won’t cook properly, according to well-known American chef Julia Child. But Child likely didn’t realize that those mushrooms crowded together can accomplish impressive feats of engineering within concrete structures.
Xijin “Emma” Zhang, assistant professor in civil engineering, is working on exploring the use of fungi spores within infrastructures. The practice is relatively new, and Zhang is the first professor within George Mason’s Sid and Reva Dewberry Department of Civil, Environmental, and Infrastructure Engineering to work on incorporating fungi materials for sustainable building purposes.
“The research I’m very passionate about is exploring how to utilize natural resources to solve challenges within civil engineering,” Zhang said. “Although I am not a biologist, studying these natural solutions to engineering can help make complex solutions to infrastructure challenges simple.”
In Zhang’s research, the fungal fibers that make up the “stem” part of the mushroom get mixed into the concrete mixture before the building process starts. If cracks later generate within the concrete structure, the air and moisture seeping through the cracks activate the fungi spores. The fungi fibers bloom and produce chemical minerals. The strong fungal fibers and the chemical minerals help heal the cracks.
“The healing of the cracks is facilitated by the growth of the fungal fibers and the fungi’s productions of chemical minerals,” Zhang said. “This self-healing technology saves expensive and timely repairs to the structures.”
The fungi’s hydrophobic surface means just that— it repels water. This additional benefit prevents water from infiltrating concrete, deterring water-related distresses and improving the durability of the infrastructure.
Zhang is working on cultivating different fungi spores and testing what works best, as not all classes of fungi would necessarily work for cracks. She has discovered the fungi spores within oyster mushrooms have resilient fibers and can be developed to provide excellent properties in thermal insulation, while being safe for human beings to come in contact with.
The healing of the cracks is facilitated by the growth of the fungal fibers and the fungi’s productions of chemical minerals. This self-healing technology saves expensive and timely repairs to the structures.
Xijin Zhang, assistant professor, Sid and Reva Dewberry Department of Civil, Environmental, and Infrastructure Engineering
She sees George Mason as a hub of rich resources in research, collaboration, and connections. Being fairly new to the College of Engineering and Computing, Zhang is excited to partner with fellow colleagues in various fields, who are also interested in exploring the uses of fungi as a solution, beyond civil engineering.
“Fungi have many unknown properties, and I’m looking forward to exploring these types of green technology solutions,” she said.
Illustration of fungus (above) and photo of enlarged fibers (below).
AWS Partners on Renewable Energy Lab and Sustainable Data Center Engineering Concentration
The significant demand for data centers and their impact on global energy requires new models for renewable and sustainable energy systems. Working with Amazon Web Services (AWS), George Mason University unveiled the Power System and Smart Grid Lab within Fuse at Mason Square and launched a companion curriculum concentration in sustainable data center engineering in fall 2024.
“We are very appreciative of our continuing partnership with AWS,” George Mason President Gregory Washington said. “Because of their support, we are providing our students and faculty with cutting-edge technology and tools that unite our researchers across many disciplines to further their knowledge
about data centers. With this level of education and experience, our students are well prepared to enter the tech workforce.”
“Investing in expanded laboratory experiences for students is critical,” Nicholas Lee-Romagnolo, program lead of workforce and economic development at AWS, said. “George Mason students from all disciplines will have access to real-world technologies and hands-on simulations. This type of immersive learning complements the breadth of new programs offered to students and helps ensure they have the opportunity to develop the skills needed to fill high-demand jobs across the region.”
Liling Huang (on left) teaches students about power engineering in the recently opened Power Systems and Smart Grid Lab.
The new concentration in sustainable data center engineering will offer training and hands-on experience in renewable energy generation, storage, and distribution. The program builds upon the Data Center Engineering course launched last year that develops student expertise in data center infrastructure design, operations, efficiency, cooling, and decarbonization.
With advanced equipment and software tools funded by AWS, George Mason’s new Power System and Smart Grid Lab allows students to explore, analyze, and simulate data related to renewable energy sources as well as to the complex design and operation of microgrids. The lab replicates real-world equipment such as power grids, wind power plants, and other renewable energy sources.
“AWS’s investment in the renewable energy lab provides another critical piece to Mason’s experiential ecosystem designed to prepare the next generation of engineers for roles that did not exist 10 years ago. George Mason will now expand the number of students in our power engineering and data center
engineering programs with hands-on skills development, which is essential to bridge between the classroom and industry practice,” said Liza Wilson Durant, associate provost for strategic initiatives and community engagement.
The new lab, housed in Van Metre Hall, is part of a broad partnership with Amazon. This lab also strengthens George Mason’s participation in the Tech Talent Investment Program (TTIP), a statewide program that aims to increase the number of undergraduate and graduate students completing degrees in the fields of computer science, applied computer science, computer engineering, and software engineering.
Kamaljeet Sanghera, executive director for the Institute for Digital Innovation (IDIA) in the university added, “Mason consistently delivers on its promise to foster collaboration across disciplines and industries not only to deliver the best student experience but also to advance critical solutions to the nation’s grandest challenges.”
PHOTO BY RON AIRA, OFFICE OF UNIVERSITY BRANDING.
SIGNALS AND COMMUNICATIONS
Our researchers are making dynamic inroads in the analysis, modeling, processing, transmission, and reception of information in areas that affect our national defense, information security, biotechnology, transportation, and economy.
Protecting America’s Critical Infrastructure: George Mason Mapping the Way
George Mason University is partnering with the National Guard to work on a capability to protect America’s critical infrastructure from attacks on the nation’s vulnerable Global Positioning Satellite (GPS) System. Called NITRO (Nationwide Integration of Time Resiliency for Operations), this domestic positioning, navigation, and timing (PNT) capability will protect our critical infrastructure.
“We’re proud to be part of the NITRO project,” said Ken Ball, dean of the College of Engineering and Computing. “While GPS has and continues to serve us well, we need to ensure America’s critical infrastructure is protected with a resilient and robust technology. We need to capitalize on our innovative spirit as commercialization of the space domain brings with it new vulnerabilities to GPS and other space assets previously assumed to be secure.”
Almost all critical infrastructure relies on precise timing signals, currently provided by the GPS system, to work correctly. The GPS system is a single-pointof-failure, meaning that if it were to be compromised, the things that rely on it would be affected. We should be concerned that GPS signals are weak, susceptible to interference, can be spoofed, and are increasingly targeted by cyber threats, and there is no cohesive backup capability.
The consequences of a failure would be enormous: communications systems would fail, financial markets would fall into chaos, air traffic would be grounded, and other parts of critical infrastructure would not work as normal, if at all.
NITRO could be the answer. It synchronizes PNT data from multiple sources, including GPS, and unifies domestic incident response to assure vital public
services. It aligns to the National Response Framework (NRF) used to prevent, prepare for, respond to, and recover from attacks and emergencies. And, PNT anomalies are integrated into the National Incident Management System (NIMS), which guides all levels of government during significant incidents to enable whole of government and whole of community responses.
NITRO directly supports the five NRF mission areas—prevention, protection, mitigation, response, and recovery—and protects supply chains, the industrial complex, and critical infrastructure used to move personnel and cargo to and from “forts to ports,” enabling mission assurance for the Department of Defense and federal agencies.
China and Russia have similar capabilities to NITRO and are no longer fully dependent on GPS. To date, only 10 states and territories currently use NITRO. We are behind other nations on providing non-space based PNT alternatives.
Investing in NITRO, we safeguard critical infrastructure that underpins our way of life, making our nation not only more connected but also more secure. George Mason and our partners will continue working to support NITRO’s wider adoption.
Peter Pachowicz, associate professor in George Mason’s Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, will be leading the team responsible for the satellite’s payload.
PHOTO BY RON AIRA,
OFFICE OF UNIVERSITY BRANDING.
Bright Future for Artificial Star
George Mason University will be the home of the $19.5 million Landolt NASA Space Mission that will put an artificial “star” in orbit around the Earth. This star will allow scientists to calibrate telescopes and accurately measure the brightness of stars ranging from those nearby to the distant explosions of supernova in far-off galaxies. By establishing absolute flux calibration, the mission will address several open challenges in astrophysics, including the speed and acceleration of the universe’s expansion.
Scientists know the universe is expanding, measured by calculating the brightness of stars and by the number of photons-per-second they emit. According to Peter Plavchan, a George Mason associate professor of physics and astronomy and the Landolt Mission Primary Investigator, more accurate measurements are needed for new breakthroughs.
Named for late astronomer Arlo Landolt, in 2029 the mission will launch a light with a known photonemission rate, and the team will observe it next to real stars to make new stellar brightness catalogs. The satellite will have eight lasers shining at ground optical telescopes designed to calibrate them for observations.
The star will orbit earth 22,236 miles up, far enough away to look like a real star to telescopes back on Earth. At this orbit it moves at Earth’s rotation speed, keeping it in place over the United States. “This is considered an infrastructure mission for NASA, supporting science in a way we’ve known we needed to do, but with a transformative change in how we do it,” Plavchan explained.
The payload—the size of the proverbial bread box— will be built in partnership with the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), a world leader
in measuring photon emissions. “This calibration under known laser wavelength and power will remove effects of atmosphere filtration of light and allow scientists to significantly improve measurements,” explained Peter Pachowicz, associate professor in George Mason’s Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, who is leading this component of the mission.
George Mason faculty and students from the College of Engineering and Computing and the College of Science will work with NASA, NIST, and nine other organizations on this a first-of-its-kind project for a university in the Washington, D.C., area. Pachowicz added, “This is an incredibly exciting opportunity for George Mason and our students. Our team will design, build, and integrate the payload, which— because it’s going very high into geostationary orbit—must handle incredible challenges.”
With mission control based at George Mason’s Fairfax Campus, the team includes Blue Canyon Technologies; California Institute of Technology; Lawrence Berkeley National Lab; Mississippi State University; Montreal Planetarium and iREx/ University of Montreal; the University of Florida; the University of Hawaiʻi; the University of Minnesota, Duluth; and the University of Victoria.
Experts will use the improved data to enhance understanding of stellar evolution, habitable zones or exoplanets in proximity to Earth, and refine dark energy parameters, setting a foundation for the next great leaps in scientific discovery. “When we look at a star with a telescope, no one can tell you today the rate of photons or brightness coming from it with the desired level of accuracy,” Plavchan said. “We will now know exactly how many photonsper-second come out of this source to .25 percent accuracy.”
ADVANCED MATERIALS AND EMERGING AREAS
Our researchers are launching projects designed to develop new, innovative, inexpensive and sustainable solutions needed for industry and society. As our research enterprise continues to expand, we expect growth in these areas.
Tiny Structures With A Big Impact
Pei Dong, an assistant professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, was recently awarded a National Science Foundation (NSF) CAREER award for $559,755 for her work on the multi-scale manufacturing of carbon nanostructures.
“While porous carbon structures have been manufactured for decades, it remains difficult to manufacture these structures with pre-specified porosity.” said Dong. “This grant aims to address this challenge and will have a huge impact in the areas of energy, water, and carbon capture.”
Her proposed research will result in pioneered manufacturing processes that enable the creation of advanced-material devices, which perform more effectively and are critical for future energy and water demands. These structures could be used for water treatment, solar cells, supercapacitors, batteries, and carbon capture.
The CAREER award is reserved for the nation’s most talented up-and-coming researchers. From the NSF website: “The Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Program offers NSF’s most prestigious award in support of early-career faculty who have the potential to serve as academic role models in research and education and to lead advances in the mission of their department or organization.”
Leigh McCue, chair of the Department of Mechanical Engineering, said, “Pei has been a tremendous asset. As one of the first tenure-track faculty hired into our young department, she has been a pioneer and leader from day one. It is great to see her talents recognized with this prestigious award.”
Dong credits the George Mason culture in helping her in her early-career success. “George Mason is great. I highly appreciate all the support I get from my colleagues, the department, the college, and the university. I enjoy being in the lab and classroom and working with students and also our outreach activities where we interact with the local K-12 community. George Mason gives faculty a bigger platform, since we’re such a huge university.”
She’s also encouraged at how excited her students are to be part of this research. “The students’ enthusiasm is truly remarkable as they recognize the profound impact of our research efforts and are wholeheartedly engaged in the pursuit of a sustainable society. They are eager to tackle these challenges head-on, determined to find solutions and make a meaningful difference.”
The grant will run for five years, wrapping up in 2029.
Pei Dong, associate professor, Department of Mechanical Engineering
PHOTO BY RON AIRA, OFFICE OF UNIVERSITY BRANDING.
Department
Ethan Ahn, associate professor in the
of Electrical and Computer Engineering (center) meets with students in the Nanofabrication Facility. Ahn taught George Mason’s first-ever nanoelectronics fundamentals course in spring 2024.
Fabulous Nanofabrication Lab Opens
Nanotechnology is taking the world by storm, and George Mason is poised to harness the storm’s energy. Everyday products like light bulbs, paints, computer screens, fuels, and biotech include revolutionary nanomaterials. From the tiniest smartwatch to large solar panels, even in the human body, nanomaterials are everywhere.
With so many uses proper fabrication requires increasingly sophisticated equipment and a highly skilled workforce. College of Engineering and Computing faculty and researchers are prepared to conduct state-of-the-art research and to help train the next generation of innovators in the newly opened Nanofabrication Facility (NFF) on the SciTech Campus in Manassas, Virginia.
Ethan Ahn, associate professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering sees the new facility as a perfect opportunity to give students the chance to receive hands-on experience in a nanofabrication lab. Ahn taught George Mason’s first-ever Nanoelectronics Fundamentals course during the spring 2024 semester. In the class students created electronic devices in the NFF Class 1000 cleanroom.
The NFF is the only cleanroom facility and resource for partners in Northern Virginia and offers hands-on nanofabrication workforce training in groundbreaking research and emerging research applications that will accelerate growth of high-tech companies.
“Hands-on experience in this field is invaluable, especially because students can become familiarized with the equipment that they may encounter in their future careers,” said Ahn.
“By investing in top faculty, new programs and facilities, and partnerships, George Mason is connecting learning and market advancement to drive innovation for all across the state,“ said George Mason’s Vice President for Research, Innovation and Economic Development Andre Marshall. “We are leading regional collaborations across sectors to bring a better tomorrow.“
NEW GRAD CERTIFICATE IN MICROFABRICATION
• Launched spring 2024
• Addresses the growing demand for multidisciplinary training in the manufacturing sector
• Focuses on practical training opportunities using new cleanroom facility
• Prepares students for rewarding careers filling societal needs and industry demands
Contact Assistant Professor Pei Dong at pdong3@gmu.edu for more information.
Engineers Develop “Rusty” Coffee Grounds To Remove Pollutants From Water
The most elegant solutions are sometimes the simplest, like using one waste product to eliminate another. By combining spent coffee grounds with iron oxide (aka rust), mechanical engineers have created CoffeeBots, which can bind to several different pollutants in seawater before being removed via magnets.
High school lab assistant Tarini Basireddy, postdoc Amit Kumar Singh, and Assistant Professor Jeff Moran published their findings in Nanoscale demonstrating how their invention, which they call “CoffeeBots,” can effectively remove three types of pollutants from seawater: methylene blue, oil, and microplastics.
Singh proposed creating CoffeeBots as a way for Basireddy to gain hands-on experience without having to interact with the many dangerous chemicals in Moran’s laboratory, which focuses mainly on developing artificial, self-propelled microparticles for different medical and environmental applications.
Coffee grounds have a porous, irregular surface, so they have ample surface area to which pollutants can bind, even with (much smaller) iron oxide nanoparticles attached, Moran explained. Moreover, because iron oxide is magnetic, a simple handheld magnet can both drive CoffeeBots through polluted water and remove them once they have absorbed the pollutants.
While using coffee grounds to clean up oil spills is not entirely new, the George Mason team is the first to show that moving CoffeeBots outperform stationary ones at removing pollutants, since moving CoffeeBots encounter pollutant molecules more often than
stationary coffee grounds do. Making the coffee grounds magnetic has another benefit: Once the CoffeeBots are recovered, they can be reused several times with little loss in water-cleaning efficacy.
Basireddy emphasized the potential simplicity of a CoffeeBots-based solution to methylene blue pollution, a carcinogen used in dyed textile production, since several countries that struggle with water pollution are also big producers of both dyed textiles and coffee. Singh added that, while other (perhaps more expensive) techniques exist for remediating oil spills and removing chemical pollutants from water, developing a technique to make microplastic removal more efficient is an exciting new development. In water, microplastics cling to coffee grounds for the same reason that oil does: each substance is hydrophobic.
“One reason why microplastics and nanoplastics are such a tricky environmental problem is that they’re so small, and that makes it difficult to locate them just to remove them,” said Moran. “By driving the CoffeeBots through the water, the hydrophobic interactions cause the microplastic particles to build up and accumulate on the surface of the coffee grounds.”
The team has applied for a patent to protect the technology and are excited to determine the full capabilities of their potentially simple, inexpensive solution to water pollution. While Basireddy has moved on to her freshman year at Johns Hopkins University, Singh and Moran look forward to finding further applications for CoffeeBots and possibly improving them.
A magnet attracts CoffeeBots in a beaker of water with methylene blue (top left); a CoffeeBots binds to microplastics (top right); from left to right, Moran, Singh, and Basireddy hold a vial of coffee grounds, a magnet, and a vial of CoffeeBots, respectively (bottom left and bottom right).
Where others see challenges, we see opportunities. We are problem solvers, creators, and innovators who ask questions, seek answers, and educate the next generation.
Become part of our campaign and help us Power the Possible, because our time is NOW.
Promote Excellence
DOUBLE THE NUMBER OF ENDOWED POSITIONS
ENDOWED POSITIONS (Chair, Professor, Fellow) increase faculty recruiting and retention efforts and draw visibility to their accomplishments with endowed faculty positions.
>$4.38M
DONOR AND INDUSTRY PARTNER CONTRIBUTIONS
This fellowship will enable me to integrate cutting-edge research and sustainable practices into the curriculum and inspire students to excel not only in their technical proficiency but also in understanding their pivotal role in mitigating climate change through responsible and innovative engineering practices.
Associate Professor Liling Huang, named the Dominion Energy Faculty Fellow in Power and Energy Engineering in 2024
Accelerate Achievement
OFFER MORE DONOR-FUNDED AND ENDOWED SCHOLARSHIPS that remove barriers to education and empower students to achieve their goals.
64
DONOR-FUNDED SCHOLARSHIPS IN FY24
109
STUDENTS RECEIVED FUNDS IN FY24
Your belief in my potential is not just a financial boost; it’s an emotional one too. It’s giving me the confidence to pursue my dreams wholeheartedly. I’m diving into my studies with renewed enthusiasm, inspired by your kindness and support. Civil Infrastructure Engineering Endowed Scholarship recipient
Cultivate Collaboration
CAPITAL PROJECTS
Fuse
Designed with partnership at its core, with multiple stakeholders including students, faculty, industry partners, and community-based programming, Fuse at Mason Square is slated to open in 2024. Fuse will be a destination for scholars, students, researchers, and policy and business developers working together to accelerate the pace of change and solve our grand challenges.
FAST FACTS
• 35+ faculty moving in beginning 2025
• Classes starting in fall 2025
• 345,000 gross square feet above grade
• 146,000 gross square feet of underground parking
• 225,000 square feet for George Mason-led innovation, programming, and community engagement
• 120,000 square feet for innovation labs, offices, and developer and partner programming
• 15,000 square feet of retail amenities
With Fuse, we are one step closer to having a destination to collaborate with partners on development of new technologies.
Liza
Wilson Durant, associate provost for strategic initiatives and community engagement
Life Sciences Engineering Building
The Life Sciences Engineering Building (LSEB) will promote collaboration and enhance learning. The building features highly specialized instructional labs, classrooms, support spaces, and work areas. LSEB will serve an increasingly multidisciplinary curriculum focused on science, technology, engineering, and health.
FAST FACTS
• Located on SciTech Campus
• Opening January 2025
• 133,000 square feet four-story building
The instructional laboratories in LSEB will provide terrific opportunities for hands-on learning in materials characterization, thermodynamics, fluid mechanics, advanced manufacturing, sustainable engineering, robotics, and aerospace engineering. This building will be a key enabler for preparing our students for the wide range of careers available to mechanical engineers.
Leigh McCue, professor and chair, Department of Mechanical Engineering
• $85 million construction budget
• CEC spaces primarily on 1st and 2nd floors
• Labs include: wet, dry, instructional computer, virtual reality, and human performance spaces.
Artist’s rendering of Fuse at Mason Square.
Artist’s rendering of the Life Sciences Engineering Building on the SciTech Campus.
Forge Connections INDUSTRY
PARTNERS
FOR NEARLY 20 YEARS, the CEC Industry Partner Program has helped connect students, faculty, and industry employees.
Companies can join, engage with faculty and students, create leadership opportunities, collaborate with career services, attend exclusive events, and discover student talent. Their employees gain access to graduate programs’ fast-track application. The partners earn recognition by having their company logo featured on the second-floor wall of the Nguyen Engineering Building on our Fairfax Campus.
Partners can join by committing to donate $25,000 annually to CEC for three years, contributing to one or more of our initiatives: endowed scholarships, laboratories, programs, faculty positions, or the CEC Dean’s Excellence Fund.
For more information on the CEC Industry Partner Program visit cec.gmu.edu/alumni-and-giving/industry-partners
Ignite Innovation RESEARCH AND PROGRAM SUPPORT
INNOVATIVE SOLUTIONS and novel research need specialized equipment and spaces. The pace of change in engineering moves fast and our new spaces demand robust funds for equipment and programming. These funds ensure that faculty and students have world-class facilities for their groundbreaking research.
Cyber Innovation Lab at Mason Square houses a space for state-of-the-art equipment for students and researchers.