Research Breakthroughs

Researchers Study How Underserved Farmers Can Improve Crop, Impact Climate Change
March 14, 2023
University of Houston researchers are developing a program to teach small-scale, underserved and limited resources (SULR) farmers how to improve their crop production by reducing greenhouse gas emissions and increasing carbon… 		Xiaonan Shan.
ECE's Hien Van Nguyen developing AI with a human touch
February 28, 2023
Despite the remarkable progress in artificial intelligence (AI), several studies show that AI systems do not improve radiologists' diagnostic performance. In fact, diagnostic errors influence 40,000 to 80,000 deaths annually in U… 		Hien Van Nguyen, University of Houston associate professor of electrical and computer engineering, is developing next-gen artificial intelligence to improve medical diagnostics.
Hien Van Nguyen wins NIH award for human-AI diagnosis research
February 22, 2023
Hien Van Nguyen, Ph.D., an Associate Professor in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department at the University of Houston's Cullen College of Engineering, has received a significant R01 award of $1.2 million from the… 		Hien Van Nguyen, Ph.D., an Associate Professor in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department at the University of Houston's Cullen College of Engineering, has received a significant R01 award of $1.2 million from the National Cancer Institute, National Institutes of Health (NIH).
UH Team Develops Novel Microscope To Design Better High-Performance Batteries
February 9, 2023
Lithium-ion batteries have transformed everyday lives – almost everyone has a smartphone, more electric vehicles can be spotted on the roads, and they keep power generators going during emergencies. As more portable electronic… 		As Assistant Professor Xiaonan Shan observes, recent UH graduate Guangxia Feng works on the operando reflection interference microscope (RIM) inside a “glove box,” since the lithium-ion battery electrolyte is flammable.
ECE Researchers Charging the Future with Modern Aqueous Batteries
December 12, 2022
Lithium-ion batteries, which today power everything from the smartphones we carry in our pockets to the electric vehicles we drive, are projected to capture 80 percent of the rechargeable battery market in the coming years. There… 		Researchers Yan Yao and Yanliang “Leonard” Liang.
ECE's Brankovic earns $300k grant for ferromagnetic alloy research
December 6, 2022
Stanko R. Brankovic, Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the Cullen College of Engineering, has received a $300,000 grant to continue his research into creating a new magnetic alloys with superior properties for… 		Stanko R. Brankovic, Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the Cullen College of Engineering, has received a $300,000 grant to continue his research into creating a new magnetic alloys with superior properties for induction application.
ECE's Chen, Shan part of new research on converting methane to hydrogen
November 3, 2022
A pair of professors from the Cullen College of Engineering are partnering with a colleague from Howard University to spur clean energy development via the use electromagnetic energy assisted hydrogen generation from fossil fuels… 		Jiefu Chen.
Researchers Report Major Advance in Semiconductor Materials
July 21, 2022
High Carrier Mobility in Cubic Boron Arsenide Offers Promise for Next-Gen Electronics Researchers have for the first time experimentally discovered that a cubic boron arsenide crystal offers high carrier mobility for both… 		Zhifeng Ren and Jiming Bao, principal investigators at the Texas Center for Superconductivity at UH, have for the first time experimentally discovered that a cubic boron arsenide crystal offers high carrier mobility for both electrons and holes, suggesting a major advance for next-generation electronics.
ECE's Yao, Research Team Develop Sodium Glassy Electrolytes Capable of Supporting Long-Duration Grid-Scale Energy Storage
June 1, 2022
Lithium-ion batteries are currently the preferred technology to power electric vehicles, but they’re too expensive for long-duration grid-scale energy storage systems, and lithium itself is becoming more challenging to access.… 		Yan Yao (left) and Ye Zhang work with all-solid-state sodium batteries.
UH Researchers Look to Disrupt Energy and Health Care Industries with Miniature Pulsed Power System
April 13, 2022
High-density Energy Storage Machine Less Expensive, More Reliable than Current Technology   Pulsed power systems accumulate and store large amounts of energy for a certain period of time to be released instantaneously later. The… 		Researchers at the University of Houston plan to develop a miniaturized pulsed power system that will power mobile hand-held MRI machines.
ECE's Shan Developing Imaging Technique to Understand How Dendrites Form in Batteries
February 24, 2022
As the world lessens its dependence on fossil fuels, industries and manufacturers are turning to lithium-ion batteries to power the machines that make modern life possible. These batteries power electric vehicles, mobile phones,… 		Xiaonan Shan and his team have developed a “novel in-situ” 3D microscopy to image and study the localized electrochemical environments and understand where dendrites start forming in batteries.
UH Researcher Develops New Fluid That Light Can Cut
November 29, 2021
** See video of scientists in the Bao lab shaping water with lasers into a familiar shape.** Jiming Bao, professor of electrical and computer engineering at the University of Houston, has developed a new fluid that can be cut… 		Jiming Bao, professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the Cullen College of Engineering, has developed a new fluid that can be cut open by light with potential applications in adaptive optics, mass transport and microfluidics manufacturing and molding of micro and nanostructures.
UH Researcher Creates Real-Time COVID-19 Infection Risk Assessment System
November 23, 2021
In this pandemic era, have you ever wondered when the best time to go run an errand might be, maybe when your grocery store is the least crowded, so you could reduce the chance of being exposed to a contagious disease?   Well,… 		Albert Cheng, professor of computer science and electrical & computer engineering at the University of Houston, presented his plans for real-time risk assessment at the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) conference HPC (High Performance Computing) for Urgent Decision Making.
Boosting the Economy Through UH Engineering Technology
September 13, 2021
A coveted technology, while attractive to established defense companies like Rockwell in Thousand Oaks, California, and others around the country, made its home in Sugar Land, putting millions into the greater Houston economy.… 		Stock image of a researcher from CasarsaGuru/E+/Getty Images.
Paper from CML outlines new Approach for Management of Cushing's disease
September 7, 2021
Researchers from the Cullen College of Engineering are exploring ways to automate the administration of medicine for patients suffering from Cushing's syndrome, with a proposal establishing architecture for that recently… 		Researchers from the Cullen College of Engineering, including doctoral student Hamid Fekri Azgomi, are exploring ways to automate the administration of medicine for patients suffering from Cushing's syndrome, with a proposal establishing architecture for that recently published in Frontiers in Neuroscience.
New Smartwatch Technology Uses Sweat on Skin to Infer Brain Stress
August 24, 2021
The old adage “never let them see you sweat” doesn’t apply in the electrical and computer engineering lab of Rose Faghih, Assistant Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering in the University of Houston Cullen College of… 		Rose Faghih, assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering, is reporting the first steps toward monitoring brain responses using wearable devices.
UH Licenses Cutting Analysis Software to Optimize Drilling Operations
August 9, 2021
Drilling can be a challenging and expensive operation and the industry is always looking for ways to innovate and make the operation more efficient and safer. Two assistant professors in the University of Houston College of… 		UH Licenses Cutting Analysis Software to Optimize Drilling Operations
Altered Microstructure Improves Organic-Based, Solid State Lithium EV Battery
June 17, 2021
Only 2 percent of vehicles are electrified to date, but that is projected to reach 30 percent by 2030. A key toward improving the commercialization of electric vehicles (EVs) is to heighten their gravimetric energy density –… 		Yan Yao, Ph.D., is a professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Houston's Cullen College of Engineering.
New research method from Faghih, Amin allows more reliable brain information inference using electrodermal activity
May 13, 2021
A new paper from Rose Faghih, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering and the Director of the Computational Medicine Laboratory, and her doctoral student Rafiul Amin describes how they have developed a… 		A new paper from Rose Faghih, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering and the Director of the Computational Medicine Laboratory, and her doctoral student Rafiul Amin describes how they have developed a novel inference engine to obtain brain information from raw electrodermal activity (EDA) recordings, eradicating previous challenges from earlier methods.
Stanko leads multi-department research into synthesis via SLRR reaction
May 3, 2021
Cullen College of Engineering professor Stanko R. Brankovic, Ph.D., of the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department, is the corresponding author for a new, multi-department perspective paper on potential advancements in… 		Diagram of Dr. Brankovic's work