April 5, 2023
SDSU assistant professor awarded nearly $500K grant to develop measurement technology BROOKINGS and WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. — While air quality within and around swine farms, and how it impacts individuals near these facilities, are commonly studied environmental health issues, there is a lack of technology that can measure the particulate levels reliably and objectively. Two agricultural organizations, with the help of two professors, including one from South Dakota State University, are working to change that. In an effort to measure and continuously improve air quality in and surrounding swine production facilities, the Foundation for Food & Agriculture Research, in partnership with the National Pork Board, is launching the Improving Swine Production Air Quality Program — FFAR is providing $500,000 in grant funding, with matching funding from NPB for a total $1 million investment. The program is developing objective particulate matter measurement technologies for large-scale assessments of particulate levels on and near swine farms. As part of this program, FFAR and NPB awarded grants to Xufei Yang, assistant professor of agricultural and biosystems engineering at SDSU, and Jiqin Ni, professor of agriculture and bioengineering at Purdue University.
April 4, 2023
An increasing number of U.S. interstates are set to try out a Purdue University invention that could save millions of taxpayer dollars and significantly reduce traffic delays. The invention, a sensor that allows concrete to “talk,” decreases construction time and how often concrete pavement needs repairs while also improving the road’s sustainability and cutting its carbon footprint. Embedded directly into a concrete pour, the sensor sends engineers more precise and consistent data about the concrete’s strength and need for repair than is possible with currently used tools and methods.
Study Shows Concrete Talk Aides Prevent Traffic Jams And Cut Carbon Emissions
April 4, 2023
Improved Pharma is pleased to announce the return of this popular and informative workshop. Registration and additional information can be found here: SPS-XRPD Workshop. Over 20 guest lecturers have been gathered to present on the following topics: Regulatory aspects Role of polymorphism in intellectual property rights Synchrotron advanced instrumentation and applications in pharma Electron diffraction, SAXS, and complementary techniques Pair Distribution Function instrumentation and applications A tutorial section will be held at the beginning of the workshop to provide a primer on the topics of polymorphism, synchrotron XRPD, and Pair Distribution Function. In addition, round table discussions will be held throughout the workshop to discuss the various topics. The full schedule can be found here. We are extremely grateful for the generous support of our sponsors, especially Materials Development Inc. for supporting the attendance of several students. “Pharmaceutical development has benefited greatly from synchrotron techniques,” remarked Professor Stephen Byrn of Purdue University and CSO of Improved Pharma. “We are pleased to be able to gather once again to share and discuss the latest advances in this very exciting field.”
Improved Pharma announces registration now open for Spring Pharmaceutical Synchrotron XRPD Workshop
March 30, 2023
A Purdue University team led by Jiqin Ni has received a $500,000 grant from the Foundation for Food & Agriculture Research to document air-quality issues surrounding pork production in partnership with the National Pork Board.
$500,000 grant targets lack of air-quality data in swine production
March 30, 2023
Purdue University announced that it received a $500,000 grant from the Foundation for Food & Agriculture Research to document air-quality issues surrounding pork production in partnership with the National Pork Board. The team at Purdue, led by Jiqin (JQ) Ni, will study the issue of particulate matter (PM) at high concentrations which can affect the health of workers, animals and people living and working in neighboring areas.
Purdue, NPB receive grant for pork production air quality study
March 29, 2023
Research presentations at the 2023 Center for Produce Safety’s Research Symposium have been announced. The event is set for June 20-21 at the Grand Hyatt Atlanta in Buckhead, Ga., according to a news release. The release said scientists presenting final reports on June 20 include: Kelly Bright, University of Arizona: When the E. coli hits the fan! Evaluating the risks of dust-associated produce cross contamination. Mohit Verma, Purdue University: Field evaluation of microfluidic paper-based analytical devices for microbial source tracking.
Research presentations set for CPS Produce Safety Research Symposium
March 28, 2023
Purdue University released an article about a research review focused on “unanswered questions” about how COVID-19 affects domestic dogs. According to the article, at the pandemic’s onset researchers doubted whether COVID could infect dogs. As a result, there’s an unfortunate—and sizable—data gap about canine transmissibility. At the time, researchers like Mohit Verma believed dogs were resistant to COVID. “As the virus evolved,” said Verma, “… there seem to be more instances of potentially asymptomatic dogs.” Notably, Verma said these instances could also be due to increased “surveillance technology.” As a result, Verma—an assistant professor of agricultural and biological engineering—along with Mohamed Kamel and two others, led a review of current literature pertaining to COVID in dogs.
Purdue experts have ‘unanswered questions’ about how COVID affects dogs
March 23, 2023
Nine US states with concrete interstate highways will test sensors developed by Purdue University that tell engineers when a section of road is ready for heavy traffic. Attached to rebar or formwork and buried under the pour, the sensors send data about the concrete’s condition directly to engineers’ phones. The point of the so-called “talking concrete” is to let engineers know exactly when a stretch of road has cured sufficiently. Current methods – in use for more than a century – use lab testing of a given concrete mix to calculate how long that mix should cure before opening the road. But discrepancies between lab and outdoor site conditions can give inaccurate estimates, leading to premature openings and early road damage. Concrete roads are more difficult to repair than asphalt ones. Civil engineering professor Luna Lu, acting head of Purdue’s Lyles School of Civil Engineering, started developing the sensors in 2017.
US states line up to see how ‘talking concrete’ can cut repairs
March 20, 2023
Early COVID-19 pandemic suspicions about dogs’ resistance to the disease have given way to a long-haul clinical data gap as new variants of the virus have emerged. “It is not confirmed that the virus can be transmitted from one dog to another dog or from dogs to humans,” said veterinarian Mohamed Kamel, a postdoctoral fellow at Purdue University. During the pandemic’s early days, dogs seemed resistant to the coronavirus, showing little evidence of infection or transmission, said Mohit Verma, assistant professor of agricultural and biological engineering and Purdue’s Weldon School of Biomedical Engineering. “As the virus evolved, or maybe the surveillance technology advanced, there seem to be more instances of potentially asymptomatic dogs.”
Lack of canine COVID-19 data fuels persisting concerns over dog-human interactions
March 20, 2023
College of Engineering: Deva Chan, Assistant Professor of Biomedical Engineering, Young Faculty Award, Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency Elsje Pienaar, Assistant Professor of Biomedical Engineering, NSF Career Ward College of Health and Human Sciences: Monica Kasting, Assistant Professor of Public Health, Public Health Education and Health Promotion Early Career Award, American Public Health Association College of Science Lauren Ann Metskas, Assistant Professor of Biological Sciences, DP2 (New Innovators Award) from NIAID/NIH
