Georgia Tech and Shepherd Center recently awarded four seed grants totaling nearly $200,000 to researchers focusing on projects that will advance discoveries in neurorehabilitation, including acquired brain injury, spinal cord injury, multiple sclerosis, chronic pain, and other neurological conditions. 

The Georgia Tech-Shepherd Center Seed Grant Program is part of an ongoing partnership between the two institutions that started in 2023 with the goal of advancing rehabilitative patient care and research.

“The seed grant program is intended to stimulate new interdisciplinary research collaborations by providing seed funding to obtain preliminary data or prototypes necessary for the submission of an external grant or industry opportunities,” says Deborah Backus, vice president of Research and Innovation at Shepherd Center. “As two leading research institutions, we know the potential for advancing rehabilitation therapies is even greater when we work together. We look forward to the solutions, treatments, and therapies that emerge from these initial seed grants.” 

Experts from both institutions evaluated and scored seed grant applications based on the research’s innovation, approach, and potential for training opportunities, as well as its anticipated impact, prospects for commercial translation, and strategy for securing continued funding. This year, each awardee team received close to $50,000.

“We are very excited to launch this new seed grant program, which will spur ideas and propel research forward,” said Michelle LaPlaca, professor in the Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering and the Georgia Tech lead of the Collaborative. “The complementary expertise of Georgia Tech and Shepherd Center researchers, combined with the motivation to find solutions for individuals with neurological injury and disability, is a winning formula for innovation.”

"Offering new hope for neurorehabilitation patients requires bringing together interdisciplinary researchers to explore new and creative ideas,” adds Chris Rozell, Julian T. Hightower Chaired professor in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering and the inaugural executive director of the Institute of Neuroscience, Neurotechnology, and Society (INNS) at Georgia Tech. “I'm excited to see the talent at these world class institutions coming together to develop new solutions for these complex problems."

This year’s seed grants were awarded to the following projects:

• Proof of Concept Development of the Recovery Cushion – Stephen Sprigle, professor, School of Industrial Design and School of Mechanical Engineering, Georgia Tech; Jennifer Cowhig, research physical therapist, Shepherd Center.
• Paving a Smooth Path from Hospital to Home: A Feasibility Study of an Integrated Smart Transitional Home Lab to Support Stroke Rehabilitation Patients’ Transition to Home – John Morris, senior clinical research scientist, Shepherd Center; Hui Cai, professor in the School of Architecture, executive director of the SimTigrate Design Center, Georgia Tech.
• A Comparative Analysis of Lower-Limb Exoskeleton Technology for Non-Ambulatory Individuals with Spinal Cord Injury – Maegan Tucker, assistant professor, School of Electrical and Computer Engineering and School of Mechanical Engineering, Georgia Tech; Nicholas Evans (AP 2023), clinical research scientist, Shepherd Center.
• Improving Accessibility and Precision in Neurorehabilitation at the Point of Care with AI-Driven Remote Therapeutic Monitoring Solutions – Brad Willingham, clinical research scientist, director of Multiple Sclerosis Research, Shepherd Center; May Dongmei Wang, professor, Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering, Georgia Tech.

In Georgia, where chickens are the biggest agricultural product with an annual state economic impact of over $28 billion, maintaining the right temperature and moisture levels in a poultry house is crucial for bird health and efficiency. However, this can be challenging due to changing weather, bird density and size, and high energy costs.

The Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) is addressing these challenges with two technologies: the Broiler House Integrated Guided-Motion Excreta Saturation System (BHIG-MESS) and a protective chicken enclosure known as “chicken bubble.” BHIG-MESS addresses moisture concerns by removing poultry waste from the house regularly and automatically, which helps reduce ventilation needs and energy consumption. “Chicken bubble” uses an inflatable barrier to reduce the volume of air that needs conditioning, lowering energy expenses that are among the highest costs for farmers.

“One of the biggest challenges for poultry houses and farmers is maintaining the internal environment of the house,” said GTRI Principal Research Scientist Alex Samoylov. “While issues related to feed and water have been more or less resolved, creating an optimal environment within the house is still very much an art rather than an exact science.”

Poultry house energy costs are primarily driven by heating fuel and electricity for essential needs like keeping chickens warm, providing adequate lighting and powering ventilation systems. 

“How well farmers manage their energy costs directly impacts the health and productivity of the birds – and by extension, their profitability,” Samoylov said. 

BHIG-MESS consists of a specially designed tiled floor where manure falls through into a tray beneath, allowing for daily removal. In traditional houses, wood shavings absorb manure and it remains in place for the flock's entire stay. By clearing out the manure every day, BHIG-MESS significantly reduces moisture levels inside the house and, consequently, the need for intensive ventilation.

The “chicken bubble” system’s inflatable technology reduces the amount of air that needs to be ventilated and conditioned. By displacing a significant portion of air inside the house, farmers could cut these air requirements by at least half, Samoylov said. 

GTRI has conducted trials of BHIG-MESS at the University of Georgia’s (UGA) Poultry Experimental Center. During the trials, researchers replaced half of the floor with GTRI’s system and the other half remained traditional wood shavings. The birds were raised for seven weeks and GTRI collected data on manure accumulation, bird health and weight distribution. 

They observed that the birds on GTRI’s flooring system had significantly fewer instances of footpad dermatitis, a condition in chickens where the skin on the bottom of their feet becomes inflamed and irritated, often caused by wet and dirty litter. The system also demonstrated that it did not cause more chicken deaths compared to traditional methods. Chickens on the new system also had similar weight patterns and, in some cases, were healthier than those raised on the traditional wood shavings. 

GTRI plans to test “chicken bubble” in 2026, starting in controlled environments before moving to larger poultry houses. This project has been supported by GTRI’s Agricultural Technology Research Program (ATRP).Once more testing has been completed, GTRI plans to partner with commercial entities that would manufacture and distribute these technologies. Samoylov said his team envisions a partnership where these companies would handle production and installation while GTRI continues focusing on further research and technical refinement. 

“Our focus is on enhancing sustainability and profitability for the poultry industry,” he said. “By creating innovative solutions, we aim to secure food supply and help growers thrive.” 

Writer: Anna Akins 
Photos: Sean McNeil 
Additional Photo Credit: Alex Samoylov 
GTRI Communications
Georgia Tech Research Institute
Atlanta, Georgia

For more information, please contact gtri.media@gtri.gatech.edu. 

To learn more about GTRI, visit: Georgia Tech Research Institute | GTRI

Overly acidic soils can mean the difference between feeding a region and famine. Each crop needs the right soil pH to thrive, and acidic conditions, produced primarily by industrial emissions and application of fertilizers, can harm growing conditions. It has recently been estimated that sub-Saharan Africa, for example, loses billions of dollars annually in crop yield because of poor agricultural conditions. But there is a possible solution — and it could even help the Earth’s climate. 

For centuries, farmers have neutralized soil acidity with a practice called liming. It involves mixing crushed calcium- or magnesium-rich rocks, known as limestone, into the soil to balance pH. But liming has long been an assumed tradeoff in which removing acid also meant increasing carbon emissions into the atmosphere.

New research from Georgia Tech shows that the opposite may be true. Agricultural liming can actually reduce atmospheric carbon dioxide and improve crop yield. 

“The current thinking about liming is that farmers must choose between doing something that could benefit them economically or reducing their greenhouse gas emissions,” said Chris Reinhard, an associate professor in the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences. “But this is often a false choice. They can do both.”

The researchers published a new framework for the potential role of liming in food security and greenhouse gas mitigation in August in the paper, “Using Carbonates for Carbon Removal,” in Nature Water. 

Collecting Carbon Data

The framework is based in part on ongoing work Reinhard and his collaborators are pursuing on the impacts of agricultural liming in the Upper Midwest’s Corn Belt for a Department of Energy study. With funding from the Grantham Foundation, they’re now turning their attention to local farms in southern Georgia and North Carolina. 

For each farm, the researchers measure data that most farmers would collect already, like soil pH and nutrients. But the team also tracks more specialized measurements, including trace elements and greenhouse gas fluxes in the soil. All this data is matched to a high-resolution, machine learning grid of the farm’s geography to determine exactly which crops might benefit. 

The researchers are using the data to build a computer model that predicts how carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases will move through any particular soil system. Liming won’t universally absorb carbon dioxide — or if it does, there may be an occasional time delay between carbon emissions and absorption — which is why the researchers factor soil, crop rotation, climate, and other management practices into their calculations.

“Our goal is to develop a way that farmers can monitor and plan cheaply, and largely through techniques they are already using, so we don't have to send out a whole team to gather data,” Reinhard said. “We are trying to develop a predictive model architecture for planning agricultural practice across scales, but it’s important that the techniques required on the field are actually feasible for farmers.”

This data could be pivotal for farmers, and it could also help policymakers as they address farming subsidies and foreign aid funding. Globally, food-insecure regions like sub-Saharan Africa could become more self-sufficient with more liming. Farmers in parts of the U.S. could also improve their yields and, in effect, their profits, if they limed more fields. 

The added benefit of lowering carbon could get even more farmers on board, and there is extensive exploration and implementation of agricultural practices already on voluntary and governmental carbon markets. Carbon dioxide is only one greenhouse gas that liming can lower; researchers are also exploring how liming can reduce methane and nitrous oxide — the latter of which is a key climate impact of human agriculture and is often considered a “hard-to-abate” emission. 

Liming may be a centuries-old practice, but its applications are potentially much wider than initially believed. In the future, farming may be part of the answer to reducing carbon emissions, instead of part of the problem. 

When Hurricane Katrina struck in 2005, it wasn’t just another storm — it was one of the deadliest hurricanes in U.S. history. Entire neighborhoods disappeared, families were scattered, and lives were split into “before” and “after.” Nearly 20 years later, the haunting images of submerged rooftops and boat rescues remain vivid.

The Surge That Shattered New Orleans

On Aug. 29, 2005, early reports claimed New Orleans had “dodged the bullet.” But offshore winds funneled water into the city’s canals, triggering multiple catastrophic levee failures. The Lower Ninth Ward, where most fatalities occurred, was devastated as many residents, misled by comparisons to Hurricane Camille, chose not to evacuate. 

“Katrina’s storm surge was exceptional,” says Hermann Fritz, a civil engineering professor at Georgia Tech. “In some areas, we saw water levels over 27 feet — that’s like a three-story building.”

While much attention focused on New Orleans’ levee failures, Fritz points out that the surge’s sheer height and energy would have overwhelmed even more robust defenses in some areas. “Katrina showed us that nature can produce forces beyond our engineering designs,” he says.

A Disaster of Inequality

The storm didn’t strike evenly; it exposed and deepened existing social and economic inequalities. “The disaster hit lower-income Black neighborhoods hardest,” says Allen Hyde, associate professor of history and sociology. He notes how years of segregation, disinvestment, and discriminatory housing policies left these communities uniquely vulnerable. Hyde continues, “Many homes were in low-lying, flood-prone areas, and residents often lacked access to reliable transportation, making evacuation difficult or impossible.”

Georgia’s Changing Landscape: Migration and Impact

Katrina displaced hundreds of thousands and claimed a staggering toll of more than 1,800 lives. Georgia quickly absorbed many evacuees, reshaping its demographics and infrastructure. “Hurricane Katrina led to one of the largest displacements of people due to a natural disaster,” says Shatakshee Dhongde, a professor of economics. “It changed the demographics of Georgia in measurable ways, from school enrollment to the labor market.”

The U.S. Census Bureau tracked this migration, noting spikes in Louisiana-born residents in metro Atlanta. Local school districts enrolled hundreds of new students almost overnight, while housing markets saw increased demand from families looking for permanent homes. The arrival of so many displaced residents didn’t just strain schools and housing — it reshaped the state’s economy. Dhongde notes that evacuees often brought new skills, business ideas, and networks. At the same time, the state and local governments faced the financial burden of expanding social services, healthcare, and housing assistance. 

Dhongde adds, “The impact of a disaster doesn’t stop at the water’s edge. It travels with people, and those effects can last for years.” While the influx strained services, it also enriched Georgia’s cultural and economic fabric.

Hyde notes, “Gentrification made many neighborhoods unaffordable for former residents,” and adds that many Black evacuees didn’t return to New Orleans due to economic barriers and post-Katrina gentrification. Cultural communities scattered across cities like Atlanta, Houston, and Baton Rouge.

Lessons the Levees Still Teach

For Fritz, Katrina remains a wake-up call for coastal preparedness.  “We can’t stop hurricanes,” he says, “but we can improve how we design and maintain our defenses, and how we evacuate people before it’s too late.” He warns that climate change, with its potential to intensify storms, makes those improvements even more urgent.

Dhongde sees a parallel need for social and economic planning. “Disaster preparedness isn’t just about sandbags and levees,” she says. “It’s also about ensuring the communities receiving evacuees have the resources and support systems to integrate them successfully.”

Finally, Hyde stresses the importance of engaging youth and communities in preparedness efforts. “Youth advocacy programs, like those we’re piloting in Georgia, empower young people in marginalized neighborhoods with knowledge and agency to build long-term resilience. Disaster planning must be a community effort, inclusive and forward-looking.”

Fast charging a battery is supposed to be risky — a shortcut that leads to battery breakdown. But for a Georgia Tech team studying zinc-ion batteries, fast charging led to a breakthrough: It made the battery stronger. This result could revolutionize how we power homes, hospitals, and the grid.

By flipping a foundational belief in battery design, Hailong Chen, an associate professor in the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering, and his team found that charging zinc-ion batteries at higher currents can make them last longer. The surprising result, recently published in Nature Communications, challenges core assumptions and offers a path toward safer, more affordable alternatives to lithium-ion technology. 
 

Why Zinc-Ion Batteries? 

Zinc-ion batteries have several key advantages over lithium-ion batteries, the most commonly used rechargeable battery technology:

• Abundant: Zinc is one of the most abundant metals on Earth, and it’s mined in many countries.
• Low cost: Zinc is significantly cheaper than lithium and doesn’t rely on scarce materials.
• Nonflammable: Unlike lithium, zinc batteries won’t catch fire — a critical safety benefit.
• Environmentally safer: Zinc is less toxic and easier to recycle than lithium-based materials.

However, until Chen’s discovery, zinc-ion batteries had one major drawback. The growth of dendrites, the sharp metal deposits that form during charging, can eventually short-circuit the battery. 

“We found that using faster charging actually suppressed dendrite formation instead of accelerating it,” Chen said. “It’s a very different behavior than what we see in lithium-ion batteries.”

With this approach, the zinc doesn’t build up into dendrites. Instead, it settles into smooth, compact layers — more like neatly stacked books than splintered shards — a structure that not only avoids short circuits but also helps the battery last longer.

“It goes against the conventional thinking that fast charging shortens battery life,” Chen said. “What we found expands people’s understanding of fast charging that could rewrite how we think about battery design and where they can be used.
 

Solving Half of the Problem

Even breakthroughs have limits. Chen was quick to point out that while his discovery solves a major issue, it only fixes one half of the battery.

A battery has two main ends, the anode and the cathode. Chen’s team made the anode last much longer. Now, the cathode must catch up. He is working to improve the cathode so the whole battery performs reliably over time. His team is also experimenting with mixing zinc with other materials to make zinc-ion batteries even more durable.

Testing Everything at Once

Chen’s team didn’t just stumble on these results. They built a novel tool that allowed them to watch how zinc behaved under different charging rates in real time, studying many samples simultaneously.

That real-time, side-by-side view was important. Traditional battery experiments usually test one variable at a time. But this novel approach allowed researchers to test hundreds of conditions at the same time, speeding up discovery and revealing patterns that would have been easy to miss.

“We weren’t just seeing whether the battery worked or not; we were watching the structure of the material evolve as it charged,” Chen noted. Using their new tool, he and his team uncovered for the first time why fast charging makes zinc settle into smooth, tightly packed layers instead of dangerous, needle-like spikes. No one had ever experimentally mapped out this process before.

It’s an approach that combines efficiency with insight.
 

Charging Into the Future

Chen’s team didn’t reinvent the battery. They challenged the status quo — and the data took them somewhere no one imagined. That unexpected result could redefine battery science.

“You can imagine these zinc-ion batteries being used to store solar energy in homes, or for grid stabilization,” Chen said. “Anywhere you need reliable, affordable backup power.”

With growing demand for clean energy, unstable lithium supply chains, and safety concerns over flammable batteries, the need for alternatives has never been more urgent.

If all goes well, Chen hopes zinc-ion batteries could be ready for everyday use in about five years.

 

 

Chen’s research was supported by Yifan Ma, ME 2024; Josh Kasher, associate professor in the School of Materials Science and Engineering; and the U.S Department of Energy National Laboratories. The study was funded by Novelis through the Novelis–Georgia Tech Research Hub, with additional funding from the National Science Foundation. Two Novelis researchers, Minju Kang and John Carsley, are co-authors on the paper.

 

 

The inaugural cohort of Georgia Tech’s Research Leadership Academy (RLA), a distinguished group of researchers selected from a highly competitive pool of applicants across campus, has been announced.

These outstanding faculty members were chosen for their exceptional research accomplishments, demonstrated leadership, and ability to drive high-impact, interdisciplinary initiatives. Representing a wide range of academic disciplines, they embody the depth, innovation, and collaborative spirit that define Georgia Tech’s research community.

Over the next year, this inaugural cohort will engage in a dynamic, immersive program designed to cultivate strategic research leadership through mentorship, experiential learning, and cross-campus dialogue. Their work through the RLA will not only strengthen Georgia Tech’s research enterprise but also help shape its trajectory for years to come.

Please join us in celebrating and congratulating these remarkable scholars as they embark on this exciting journey. 

• Steve Diggle – Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience; School of Biological Sciences
• Marta Hatzell – Institute for Matter and Systems; Renewable Bioproducts Institute; Strategic Energy Institute; George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering
• Ada Gavrilovska - Institute for Data Engineering and Science; School of Computer Science
• Margaret Kosal – Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience; Strategic Energy Institute; Institute for Matter and Systems; Sam Nunn School of International Affairs
• Sheng Dai – Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience; Strategic Energy Institute; School of Civil and Environmental Engineering
• Yuguo Tao – George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering; Nuclear and Radiological Engineering; and Medical Physics
• Chris Wiese – Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience; Institute for Data Engineering and Science; Institute for People and Technology; School of Psychology
• Mathieu Dahan – Institute for People and Technology, H. Milton Stewart School of Industrial and Systems Engineering
• Thackery Brown – School of Psychology
• Charlotte Alexander – Tech AI, Scheller College of Business; Law and Ethics
• Jeff Young – Institute for Data Engineering and Science; Partnership for Advanced Computing Environments; Office of Information Technology
• Meltem Alemdar – Center for Education Integrating Science, Mathematics, and Computing
• Kamran Paynabar – Georgia Tech Manufacturing Institute; Institute for Data Engineering and Science; Renewable Bioproducts Institute; H. Milton Stewart School of Industrial and Systems Engineering
• John A. Christian – Daniel Guggenheim School of Aerospace Engineering
• Farzaneh Najafi – Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience; School of Biological Sciences
• Dave Flaherty – Strategic Energy Institute; School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
• Eunhwa Yang - Institute for Matter and Systems; Strategic Energy Institute; School of Building Construction
• James Tsai – Strategic Energy Institute; School of Civil and Environmental Engineering
• Jennifer Hirsch – Brook Byers Institute for Sustainable Systems; Center for Sustainable Communities Research and Education; Strategic Energy Institute

Researchers from Georgia Tech have created a material inspired by seashells to help improve the process of recycling plastics and make the resulting material more reliable.

The structures they created greatly reduced the variability of mechanical properties typically found in recycled plastic. Their product also maintained the performance of the original plastic materials.

The researchers said their bio-inspired design could help cut manufacturing costs of virgin packaging materials by nearly 50% and offer potential savings of hundreds of millions of dollars. And, because less than 10% of the 350 million tons of plastics produced each year is effectively recycled, the Georgia Tech approach could keep more plastic out of landfills.

Aerospace engineering assistant professor Christos Athanasiou led the study, which was published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). 

Read the Q&A of the findings, and see a video of the testing, on the College of Engineering website. 

Beginning this fall, The Institute for Matter and Systems (IMS) will offer graduate students immersive, hands-on experience in its world-class core facilities, and the opportunity to work alongside leading scientists and engineers through the new IMS Graduate Apprenticeship Program for Georgia Tech graduate students.

“This unique program is designed to support graduate students in their education while equipping them with valuable skills necessary for the workforce,” said Eric Vogel, IMS executive director. 

The IMS Graduate Apprenticeship Program offers a structured, hands-on research apprenticeship in the IMS fabrication and characterization core facilities. Students will gain in-depth training with advanced instrumentation and tools for materials analysis, micro/nanoscale fabrication, spectroscopy, manufacturing, and process development — skills and experience that can directly transfer to their own research projects.

This initiative aims to cultivate the next generation of scientific leaders by integrating rigorous academic coursework with practical, systems-level problem-solving. Apprentices will contribute to cutting-edge projects in materials science, complex systems, and emerging technologies, gaining valuable skills and mentorship along the way.

Applications are now open for the inaugural cohort of the IMS Graduate Apprenticeship Program. Applications are due August 31st.