Category: Research & Innovation

When a team of researchers from the University of Florida unveiled new technology that allows someone to hack into a nearby touchscreen-enabled device using what they call an “invisible finger,” those in the field of cybersecurity took notice.

Adam Watson and Ziynet Boz, two UF/IFAS professors in the agricultural and biological engineering department, have been rethinking the power of 3D printers, specifically their ability to print food.

The University of Florida will lead a $25 million, 16-university team of 31 scientists and engineers in the development of new techniques and the training of future specialists in nuclear forensics, which identifies and tracks nuclear materials to support global safety.​​ 

University of Florida scientists will use artificial intelligence technology to quantify damage to fruits and vegetables caused by extreme weather events, such as Hurricane Ian.

A team of scientists including researchers from UF were awarded a $2.5 million grant from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to support the development of new state-of-the-art water quality data and models to better predict and manage harmful algal blooms (HABs) in Lake Okeechobee and the St. Lucie and Caloosahatchee River watersheds.

A multidisciplinary University of Florida research team, headed by Lakiesha Williams, Ph.D., will test what researchers hope will be a dural graft option less likely to succumb to structural compromise and harmful immunological outcomes.

Chris A. Malachowsky (UF BSEE ’80) co-founder and NVIDIA Fellow of visual computer graphics vanguard NVIDIA, has made a philanthropic commitment to position UF as a national leader in AI education and research.

Each researcher was awarded a five-year, $1.8+ million award. MIRA awards provide investigators with greater stability and flexibility in funding, while enhancing their ability to take on ambitious scientific projects and approach problems more creatively.

Denise R. Simmons, Ph.D., associate professor in the Department of Civil & Coastal Engineering and associate dean for Workforce Development in the Herbert Wertheim College of Engineering, is the leading principal investigator for the $1.28 million, four-year project “Critical Conversations: Systemic and Agentic Empowerment of Black Ph.D. Students and their Faculty Advisors in Engineering,” which is sponsored by the Racial Equity in STEM Education program, an initiative of the National Science Foundation’s Education and Human Resources (EHR) division that supports racial equity in STEM.

Kiley Graim, Ph.D., assistant professor in the Department of Computer & Information Science & Engineering, is leading a $1.5 million National Institutes of Health (NIH) National Cancer Institute study with co-investigator James Cahill, Ph.D., an assistant instructional professor in the Department of Environmental Engineering Sciences. Their grant seeks to create a valuable tool that will allow researchers to diagnose human cancers, potentially leading to earlier clinical interventions.