College of Engineering announces 2020 Moonshot winners

The College of Engineering is pleased to announce that the College will fund two Moonshot proposals as winners of the Moonshot 2020 competition, as well as one College of Engineering Planning Award.

The awarded Moonshot projects are at the forefront of the next generation of research, tackling the most daunting problems of today and beyond, through existing or emerging areas of engineering research that benefit from convergent approaches. Through this call for proposals, the College sought to identify and foster the next set of bold, high-potential, cross-cutting, emerging research directions.

Congratulations to the 2020 Moonshot winners:

Intelligent symbiotic systems

Led by Carmel Majidi, Clarence H. Adamson associate professor of mechanical engineering, and Mohammad Islam, professor of materials science and engineering, the proposed Intelligent Symbiotic Systems initiative is dedicated to pioneering new classes of intelligent programmable matter that will have transformative impact on robotics and human computer interactions (HCI).  The outcome of this long-term effort will be a new paradigm in bio-inspired engineering in which autonomously reconfigurable robotic functionality—integrated sensing, actuation, learning, decision making, self-repair, and energy storage—is intrinsically achieved at the materials level with limited or no dependency on traditional machines, motors, or computing hardware.

Autonomous technologies for livability and sustainability

Led by Mario Bergés, professor of civil and environmental engineering, the proposed Autonomous Technologies for Livability and Sustainability initiative is dedicated to target a big societal challenge and shifts that need to occur on engineering intelligent and autonomous systems that engage with the world sustainably without leaving anyone behind.  The outcome of this team effort will be development of autonomous systems, from sensing layer to decision-making, which are equitable and sustainable by design.

The College is also awarding a Planning Grant in recognition of the research potential and team composition to:

Center for Engineered Neuro-Integrative Systems (CENS)

Led by Burak Ozdoganlar, Ver Planck professor of mechanical engineering, the proposed Center for Engineered Neuro-Integrative Systems initiative is dedicated to revolutionizing healthcare by utilizing engineered solutions to measure and modulate the nervous system.  The mission of this team effort to design, evaluate, and implement engineering systems that will integrate/interface with neurobiological systems by better understanding the brain and nervous system functions for both healthy functioning and disease/disorder conditions, and create new medical capabilities for the diagnosis and treatment through closed-loop neurosensing and neuromodulation.