On Sunday, Sept. 29, Earth welcomed 2024 PT5, a “mini-moon” temporarily captured by the planet’s orbit that’s set to depart on Monday, Nov. 25.
(Image: Courtesy of NASA/JPL)
Takeaways: The new mini moon
Last month Earth welcomed a visitor known as 2024 PT5. To learn more about this celestial guest, Penn Today caught up with two astronomers in the School of Arts & Sciences, Gary Bernstein and Bhuvnesh Jain.
By combining the power of autonomous systems and medical expertise, a team of engineers and physician scientists from Penn are tackling the challenge of mass casualty triage.
On a breezy, overcast early fall day, members of the Penn community gathered to dedicate the University’s new center for data science and artificial intelligence: Amy Gutmann Hall.
Wharton’s Peter Conti-Brown, a financial historian focused on central banking and policy, discusses the Fed’s recent, and likely last, key decision before the presidential election.
(Image: AP Photo/Richard Drew)
First Fed rate cuts in four years
Wharton’s Peter Conti-Brown, a financial historian focused on central banking and policy, discusses the Fed’s recent, and likely last, key decision before the presidential election.
Marija Drndić of the School of Arts & Sciences and Dimitri Monos of the Perelman School of Medicine and Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia led a team of researchers who developed a new nanostructure platform that allows for more precise detection and control of biomolecules, such as DNA and proteins. This exciting new platform signals a new era of synthetic biology, paving the way for enhanced DNA sequencing and protein conformation detection.
(Image: Courtesy of artist)
Novel coupled nanopore platform offers greater precision for detecting molecules
An interdisciplinary team of researchers from Penn have created the first ever reusable coupled nanopore platform for detecting and guiding molecules, findings could pave the way for much improved DNA sequencing and molecule identification.
Under the guidance of Yue Jiang(left), a Ph.D. candidate in the Charlie Johnson research group in the School of Arts & Sciences, Vincent Kerler (right) conducted this work through the Penn Undergraduate Researching Mentoring Program, a 10-week opportunity from the Center for Undergraduate Research and Fellowships. The program provides rising second- and third-year students with $5,000 awards to work alongside Penn faculty.
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Boosting the frequency of sound waves to make the next generation of wireless devices
Vincent Kerler, a second-year student in the College of Arts and Sciences, spent the summer running simulations as part of Charlie Johnson’s research on topological insulators.
(On homepage) Students walk through the Norris Square Neighborhood Project’s community garden.
(Image: Eric Sucar)
How food moves around cities
Domenic Vitiello, an urban and regional planning expert, teaches classes that invite students to locations in and around Philadelphia to better understand how its denizens dine.
In a collaborative interdisciplinary study, Michael Mitchell of the School of Engineering and Applied Science, Wei Guo of the School of Arts & Sciences, and Drew Weissman of the Perelman School of Medicine show that solid tumors can block drug-delivery mechanisms with a “forcefield-like” effect but certain genetic elements that can effectively “shut down” the forcefield. Their findings hint at new targets for delivering cancer treatments that use the body’s immune system to fight tumors.
(Image: iStock / CIPhotos)
Understanding the cellular mechanisms driving solid tumors’ robust defense system
Researchers from Penn have identified a “forcefield-like” defense system in solid tumors and the genetic elements that can switch it off.
Penn Ph.D. student Xinlan Emily Hu leads a group of budding engineers and social scientists who study communication across teams. The group has developed a new toolkit aimed at helping researchers analyze and measure teamwork.
Jen Wilcox has returned to the Kleinman Center for Energy Policy at the Stuart Weitzman School of Design and to the School of Engineering and Applied Science following three years in at the U.S. Department of Energy, where she served in the Biden Administration as the principal deputy assistant secretary for the Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management.
(Image: Courtesy of Jen Wilcox)
A climate expert’s return to Penn
Jen Wilcox, an expert on direct-air capture, is the inaugural faculty appointment in the Kleinman Center and served for three years as principal deputy assistant secretary for the Office of Fossil Energy in the U.S. Department of Energy. She discusses her time away and her return to Penn.
