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Research Breakthroughs

Modern batteries power everything from cars to cell phones, but they are far from perfect – they catch fire, they perform poorly in cold weather and they have relatively short lifecycles, among other issues. Now researchers from…
Inexpensive Organic Material Gives Safe Batteries a Longer Life
If there’s one thing Yan Yao gets a charge out of, it’s the idea of creating a better battery. The Cullen College assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering is known for being the most current in the battery…
Yan Yao Amps Up His Game: Becomes a Scialog Fellow
That exciting feeling you get when you've made a breakthrough discovery and you know that something that seemed impossible yesterday is now completely clear – that's the feeling that Stanko Brankovic, professor of electrical and…
For Stanko Brankovic, Life is Speeding Up
In 2010 graphene took center stage when the Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded to two scientists in the UK "for groundbreaking experiments regarding the two-dimensional material graphene." At the UH Cullen College of Engineering…
Rotating and Aligning Graphene Flakes – A UH Engineer's Discovery Opens Doors to Progress
Blood testing is the standard option for checking glucose levels, but a new technology could allow non-invasive testing via a contact lens that samples glucose levels in tears. “There’s no noninvasive method to do this,” said Wei…
UH Engineers Invent Glucose-Sensing Contact Lens
A multidisciplinary research team led by University of Houston scientist Jarek Wosik has developed a high-temperature superconducting coil that allows magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scanners to produce higher resolution images…
New Superconducting Coil Improves MRI Performance
Researchers from the University of Houston have reported the first explanation for how a class of materials changes during production to more efficiently absorb light, a critical step toward the large-scale manufacture of better…
UH Researchers Discover Key Mechanism for Producing Solar Cells
Three years after his discovery of porous gold nanoparticles – gold nanoparticles that offer a larger surface area because of their porous nature – a UH Cullen College of Engineering researcher is continuing to explore the…
UH Researcher Pursues New Applications for “Hot” Electrons
UH engineers have reported a new technique to determine the chemical composition of materials using near-infrared light. The work could have a number of potential applications, including improving downhole drilling analysis in…
UH Researchers Discover New Chemical Sensing Technique
Researchers have created a new method for screening cells used in immunotherapy cancer treatments, allowing high-performing immune system cells to be studied in isolation and potentially expanding  the number of patients for whom…
Engineering Researchers Develop Advanced Cell Screening Technology for Cancer Immunotherapy
Researchers at the UH Cullen College of Engineering have synthesized and characterized a novel metallic monolayer catalyst with far superior catalytic properties than those currently used in industry. Stanko Brankovic, professor…
UH Engineers Discover Superior Metallic Monolayer Catalyst
Two UH engineering professors have developed novel optical probes with potential applications in improving diagnosis and treatment for patients with kidney disease. Exciting new results on the two probes were recently published…
UH Engineers Develop Optical Probes for Better Diagnosis and Treatment of Kidney Disease
Hydrocephalus is a nightmarish medical condition. Accumulating fluid in the skull ratchets up pressure on the brain and can cause lifelong mental disabilities. Current treatment requires physicians to cut through the skull and…
Paper on Medical MRI-powered Millirobots Attracts Conference Attention
Researchers at the University of Houston have created an optical lens that can be placed on an inexpensive smartphone to amplify images by a magnitude of 120, all for just 3 cents a lens. Wei-Chuan Shih, assistant professor of…
UH Researchers Create Lens to Turn Smartphone into Microscope
Peng Peng, an electrical and computer engineering alumnus of the Cullen College of Engineering at the University of Houston, is pioneering mass production of large-area graphene film based on groundbreaking research that started…
Engineering Alumnus Pioneers Large-area Graphene Film
Researchers at the University of Houston have reported developing an efficient conductive electron-transporting polymer, a long-missing puzzle piece that will allow ultrafast battery applications. The discovery relies upon a “…
UH Researchers Discover N-Type Polymer for Fast Organic Battery
A research team from the University of Houston has created an algorithm that allowed a man to grasp a bottle and other objects with a prosthetic hand, powered only by his thoughts. The technique, demonstrated with a 56-year-old…
Researchers Build Brain-Machine Interface to Control Prosthetic Hand
Yan Yao, assistant professor in the Cullen College’s electrical and computer engineering department, is developing alternatives to popular lithium-ion batteries, which are used to power much of the modern world. Now, a recent…
Magnesium-ion Batteries in the Fast Lane
In April of 2013, President Obama announced the launch of the BRAIN (Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies) Initiative, an ambitious “grand challenge” aimed at vastly increasing our understanding of the…
Novel Neural Probe Helps to Unlock Mysteries of the Brain
In research aimed at determining how babies and toddlers begin to understand the actions of others, a University of Houston research team is studying brain activity triggered by playtime interactions. The study involves children…
Baby See, Baby Do? UH Research Targets Youngest Subjects