UW2020 grants fund research on quantum emitters, electrical bandage, water research facility

Three College of Engineering researchers are leading projects that have secured UW2020: WARF Discovery Initiative grants.

Proposals from Assistant Professor of Materials Science and Engineering Jason Kawasaki, Professor of Materials Science and Engineering Xudong Wang and Assistant Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering Matthew Ginder-Vogel earned selection in the fifth round of awards.

The UW2020 initiative aims to stimulate and support highly innovative research at UW-Madison and to support acquisition of shared instruments or equipment that will foster significant advances in research.

Kawasaki and Wang drew awards for research projects.

Kawasaki and his collaborators are applying their expertise in state-of-the-art materials growth and microscope capabilities to create materials called optical quantum emitters, which possess the unique property of emanating light one single photon at a time. Such materials could be used in ultrafast quantum computers, highly secure communication technologies and super-high resolution microscopes.

Wang’s project builds on previous work on a bandage that accelerates healing with gentle electrical pulses. His UW2020 effort seeks to generate preclinical data on wound healing mechanism and efficacy under the influences of such a device.

Ginder-Vogel, meanwhile, will head up a campus infrastructure project: establishing the Core Facility for Advanced Water Analysis. The facility will feature new instrumentation and create opportunities for collaboration among water researchers across the UW-Madison campus. The Department of Civil and Environmental will administer the facility, which will be based in the Water Science and Engineering Laboratory, with additional instrumentation in Engineering Hall.

James Hurley, professor of civil and environmental engineering and director of the Aquatic Sciences Center, and Christy Remucal, associate professor of civil and environmental engineering, are co-principal investigators. Steven Loheide, professor of civil and environmental engineering, and Trina McMahon, Vilas Distinguished Achievement Professor of civil and environmental engineering, are collaborators on the project.

The UW2020 initiative is funded by the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research and Graduate Education and the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation. The Graduate School also supplies direct support for some research assistants.