A WIN member was recently honoured by the National Academy of Sciences of America for research involving a gel-like robot, inspired by sea slugs and snails, that is steerable by light.
Hamed Shahsavan, who joined Waterloo as a professor of chemical engineering last year, was lead author of a paper chosen as a finalist for a Cozzarelli Prize recognizing the top work published by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) in 2020.
To a scientist, trial and error are common in laboratories to refine new tests and methods and look for potential problems on the small scale. But what happens when these techniques are meant for human tissues, such as for surgeries, medical tests, and treatments, where multiple different trials are not possible?
Researchers studying two-dimensional crystalline materials have observed an electromagnetic effect, called the nonlinear anomalous Hall effect, of unprecedented size. Their finding opens the door to exploring other quantum materials using their techniques and hints at promising applications in spintronic devices.
