Cover of Summer 2024 Georgia Forestry Magazine
Georgia Forestry Association members receive Georgia Forestry Magazine four times per year. The magazine brings together writers and leaders from the Georgia Forestry Association, Georgia Forestry Commission, and Georgia Sustainable Forestry Initiative. The magazine’s dynamic content is focused on keeping its audience connected to resources and empowered to make good decisions about their forestland asset.
In the Summer 2024 issue, the magazine has featured the Georgia Tech Renewable Bioproducts Institute and its faculty researchers Anthony J. “Bo” Arduengo, professor of practice in the School of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Matt McDowell, Carter N. Paden, Jr. Distinguished Chair and associate professor in the School of Materials Science and Engineering, and Meisha Shofner, professor in the School of Materials Science and Engineering. The feature titled ‘The Green Gusher: How Wood-Based Innovations Are Revolutionizing Sustainability and Technology,’ was written by John Casey and discussed how wood-based innovations are revolutionizing sustainability and technology in the forestry industry and included Georgia Tech’s forestry in focus video that included interviews with the three researchers.
News Contact
Priya Devarajan || RBI Communications Program Manager
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has awarded Georgia Tech researchers a $4.6 million grant to develop improved cybersecurity protection for renewable energy technologies.
Associate Professor Saman Zonouz will lead the project and leverage the latest artificial technology (AI) to create Phorensics. The new tool will anticipate cyberattacks on critical infrastructure and provide analysts with an accurate reading of what vulnerabilities were exploited.
“This grant enables us to tackle one of the crucial challenges facing national security today: our critical infrastructure resilience and post-incident diagnostics to restore normal operations in a timely manner,” said Zonouz.
“Together with our amazing team, we will focus on cyber-physical data recovery and post-mortem forensics analysis after cybersecurity incidents in emerging renewable energy systems.”
As the integration of renewable energy technology into national power grids increases, so does their vulnerability to cyberattacks. These threats put energy infrastructure at risk and pose a significant danger to public safety and economic stability. The AI behind Phorensics will allow analysts and technicians to scale security efforts to keep up with a growing power grid that is becoming more complex.
This effort is part of the Security of Engineering Systems (SES) initiative at Georgia Tech’s School of Cybersecurity and Privacy (SCP). SES has three pillars: research, education, and testbeds, with multiple ongoing large, sponsored efforts.
“We had a successful hiring season for SES last year and will continue filling several open tenure-track faculty positions this upcoming cycle,” said Zonouz.
“With top-notch cybersecurity and engineering schools at Georgia Tech, we have begun the SES journey with a dedicated passion to pursue building real-world solutions to protect our critical infrastructures, national security, and public safety.”
Zonouz is the director of the Cyber-Physical Systems Security Laboratory (CPSec) and is jointly appointed by Georgia Tech’s School of Cybersecurity and Privacy (SCP) and the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE).
The three Georgia Tech researchers joining him on this project are Brendan Saltaformaggio, associate professor in SCP and ECE; Taesoo Kim, jointly appointed professor in SCP and the School of Computer Science; and Animesh Chhotaray, research scientist in SCP.
Katherine Davis, associate professor at the Texas A&M University Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, has partnered with the team to develop Phorensics. The team will also collaborate with the NREL National Lab, and industry partners for technology transfer and commercialization initiatives.
The Energy Department defines renewable energy as energy from unlimited, naturally replenished resources, such as the sun, tides, and wind. Renewable energy can be used for electricity generation, space and water heating and cooling, and transportation.
News Contact
John Popham
Communications Officer II
College of Computing | School of Cybersecurity and Privacy
Eight Georgia Tech researchers were honored with the ACM Distinguished Paper Award for their groundbreaking contributions to cybersecurity at the recent ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS).
Three papers were recognized for addressing critical challenges in the field, spanning areas such as automotive cybersecurity, password security, and cryptographic testing.
“These three projects underscore Georgia Tech's leadership in advancing cybersecurity solutions that have real-world impact, from protecting critical infrastructure to ensuring the security of future computing systems and improving everyday digital practices,” said School of Cybersecurity and Privacy (SCP) Chair Michael Bailey.
One of the papers, ERACAN: Defending Against an Emerging CAN Threat Model, was co-authored by Ph.D. student Zhaozhou Tang, Associate Professor Saman Zonouz, and College of Engineering Dean and Professor Raheem Beyah. This research focuses on securing the controller area network (CAN), a vital system used in modern vehicles that is increasingly targeted by cyber threats.
"This project is led by our Ph.D. student Zhaozhou Tang with the Cyber-Physical Systems Security (CPSec) Lab," said Zonouz. "Impressively, this was Zhaozhou's first paper in his Ph.D., and he deserves special recognition for this groundbreaking work on automotive cybersecurity."
The work introduces a comprehensive defense system to counter advanced threats to vehicular CAN networks, and the team is collaborating with the Hyundai America Technical Center to implement the research. The CPSec Lab is a collaborative effort between SCP and the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE).
In another paper, Testing Side-Channel Security of Cryptographic Implementations Against Future Microarchitectures, Assistant Professor Daniel Genkin collaborated with international researchers to define security threats in new computing technology.
"We appreciate ACM for recognizing our work," said Genkin. “Tools for early-stage testing of CPUs for emerging side-channel threats are crucial to ensuring the security of the next generation of computing devices.”
The third paper, Unmasking the Security and Usability of Password Masking, was authored by graduate students Yuqi Hu, Suood Al Roomi, Sena Sahin, and Frank Li, SCP and ECE assistant professor. This study investigated the effectiveness and provided recommendations for implementing password masking and the practice of hiding characters as they are typed and offered.
"Password masking is a widely deployed security mechanism that hasn't been extensively investigated in prior works," said Li.
The assistant professor credited the collaborative efforts of his students, particularly Yuqi Hu, for leading the project.
The ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS) is the flagship annual conference of the Special Interest Group on Security, Audit and Control (SIGSAC) of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM). The conference was held from Oct. 14-18 in Salt Lake City.
News Contact
John Popham
Communications Officer II
College of Computing | School of Cybersecurity and Privacy
J. Carson Meredith, Executive Director of the Renewable Bioproducts Institute and Professor in Georgia Tech's School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering.
J. Carson Meredith, a professor in Georgia Tech’s School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, is the 2024 recipient of the Andrew Chase Award from the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE) Forest and Plant Bioproducts Division.
Meredith will receive the award at the Annual AIChE Meeting in San Diego California, later this month.
The award recognizes Meredith’s research in nanocellulose chemical modification, composites, and cellulose-based renewable barrier coatings, which has resulted in seven patent applications, one commercial license, and ongoing research projects with six companies, reflecting the impact these advancements are making. His group recently reported the first successful recycling and reuse of nanocellulose gas barrier films and achieved one of the lowest water vapor barrier coatings derived from cellulose to date.
Meredith, ChBE’s James Preston Harris Faculty Fellow, is executive director of Georgia Tech’s Renewable Bioproducts Institute, which aims for future where plant biomass will enable a carbon neutral society and manufacturing infrastructure through traditional and emerging products.
News Contact
Brad Dixon || braddixon@gatech.edu
A pair of Smarticle robots from the lab of Prof. Dan Goldman. Earlier research from his group observed the arise of order in active matter from the physics of low rattling. (Photo Credit: Christa M. Ernst)
If you’ve ever watched a large flock of birds on the wing, moving across the sky like a cloud with various shapes and directional changes appearing from seeming chaos, or the maneuvers of an ant colony forming bridges and rafts to escape floods, you’ve been observing what scientists call self-organization. What may not be as obvious is that self-organization occurs throughout the natural world, including bacterial colonies, protein complexes, and hybrid materials. Understanding and predicting self-organization, especially in systems that are out of equilibrium, like living things, is an enduring goal of statistical physics.
This goal is the motivation behind a recently introduced principle of physics called rattling, which posits that systems with sufficiently “messy” dynamics organize into what researchers refer to as low rattling states. Although the principle has proved accurate for systems of robot swarms, it has been too vague to be more broadly tested, and it has been unclear exactly why it works and to what other systems it should apply.
Dana Randall, a professor in the School of Computer Science, and Jacob Calvert, a postdoctoral fellow at the Institute for Data Engineering and Science, have formulated a theory of rattling that answers these fundamental questions. Their paper, “A Local-Global Principle for Nonequilibrium Steady States,” published last week in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, characterizes how rattling is related to the amount of time that a system spends in a state. Their theory further identifies the classes of systems for which rattling explains self-organization.
When we first heard about rattling from physicists, it was very hard to believe it could be true. Our work grew out of a desire to understand it ourselves. We found that the idea at its core is surprisingly simple and holds even more broadly than the physicists guessed.
Dana Randall Professor, School of Computer Science & Adjunct Professor, School of Mathematics
Georgia Institute of Technology
Beyond its basic scientific importance, the work can be put to immediate use to analyze models of phenomena across scientific domains. Additionally, experimentalists seeking organization within a nonequilibrium system may be able to induce low rattling states to achieve their desired goal. The duo thinks the work will be valuable in designing microparticles, robotic swarms, and new materials. It may also provide new ways to analyze and predict collective behaviors in biological systems at the micro and nanoscale.
The preceding material is based on work supported by the Army Research Office under award ARO MURI Award W911NF-19-1-0233 and by the National Science Foundation under grant CCF-2106687. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the sponsoring agencies.
Jacob Calvert and Dana Randall. A local-global principle for nonequilibrium steady states. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 121(42):e2411731121, 2024.
Photo courtesy of Goodisman Research Group.
The most recognizable yellow jacket at Georgia Tech is made of fabric and foam, but Professor Mike Goodisman and a team of researchers revealed a far more complex cellular structure by successfully sequencing the genome of two local species of yellow jacket wasps — Vespula squamosa (the southern yellow jacket) and Vespula maculifrons (the eastern yellow jacket).
Having the genome sequences of yellow jacket wasps expands biologists' understanding of the behaviors and evolution of social insects, including the intricacies of the caste system made up of queens, males, and workers.
"The genome is fundamental for a lot of questions that we ask," Goodisman said.
The research, published in Annals of the Entomological Society of America, identifies rates of gene evolution among the different species, which Goodisman says could offer explanations for the various roles each wasp plays in their colonies as well as their ability to adapt and thrive in different environments. Variations in the genomes will also help scientists dissect the interactions between the two local species.
Southern and eastern yellow jacket queens produce all caste members in the colony, and while mated queens from both species hibernate in the winter following the decline of their colonies, V. squamosa will stay in hibernation slightly longer. Southern queens then actively seek out established eastern yellow jacket nests, kill the resident queen, and take over her colony. Goodisman and his research team hope the genome provides insight into the southern queens’ parasitic behavior.
The typical colony will survive six to eight months, but in certain climates, colonies can outlast the winter months to become "supercolonies." These larger colonies take on multiple queens as they grow to the size of a couch or a car. Goodisman's team will use the genome to look for clues as to how these supercolonies thrive for multiple years and how natural selection operates in the two species.
Throughout the study, Goodisman relied on the Georgia Tech community's shared interest in the social insect to gather the necessary samples. Through ads in The Whistle and other campus publications, he collected yellow jacket wasps’ nests from faculty, staff, and alumni, in addition to samples from around the region. DNA was extracted from individual wasp samples and then sent to the University of Georgia for DNA sequencing. The resulting genomes, which are about 200 million base pairs in length, were then jointly analyzed by scientists at Georgia Tech and the University of Georgia.
“When you get the data back, you get these long sequences of the building blocks of DNA. Part of the game is putting that together like a puzzle, and then we analyze the sequence to figure out what it means,” he said.
With the genome sequenced, the team can then compare the local species to each other and all species of yellow jacket wasps worldwide. Unlike honeybees, yellow jacket wasps are not considered significant pollinators, but because their diet consists of insects and carrion, Goodisman explains that understanding their place in the ecosystems they inhabit is equally important.
He is enthused to be on a campus that shares his interest in the group of social insects known as Hymenoptera. That interest led him to study insects like fruit flies at Cornell University and fire ants at the University of Georgia before beginning his postdoctoral research on other members of the Hymenoptera order.
Now, when discussing his research with members of the Georgia Tech community, he finds himself answering one question more than any other. His response is always the same. "Because of the stinger, Buzz is anatomically female."
And while he can't definitively say which species of yellow jacket the mascot would be, Goodisman said Buzz's feisty nature would lean toward the more aggressive and charismatic southern yellow jacket, V. squamosa.
News Contact
Steven Gagliano - Institute Communications
A new surgery planning tool powered by augmented reality (AR) is in development for doctors who need closer collaboration when planning heart operations. Promising results from a recent usability test have moved the platform one step closer to everyday use in hospitals worldwide.
Georgia Tech researchers partnered with medical experts from Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta (CHOA) to develop and test ARCollab. The iOS-based app leverages advanced AR technologies to let doctors collaborate together and interact with a patient’s 3D heart model when planning surgeries.
The usability evaluation demonstrates the app’s effectiveness, finding that ARCollab is easy to use and understand, fosters collaboration, and improves surgical planning.
“This tool is a step toward easier collaborative surgical planning. ARCollab could reduce the reliance on physical heart models, saving hours and even days of time while maintaining the collaborative nature of surgical planning,” said M.S. student Pratham Mehta, the app’s lead researcher.
“Not only can it benefit doctors when planning for surgery, it may also serve as a teaching tool to explain heart deformities and problems to patients.”
Two cardiologists and three cardiothoracic surgeons from CHOA tested ARCollab. The two-day study ended with the doctors taking a 14-question survey assessing the app’s usability. The survey also solicited general feedback and top features.
The Georgia Tech group determined from the open-ended feedback that:
- ARCollab enables new collaboration capabilities that are easy to use and facilitate surgical planning.
- Anchoring the model to a physical space is important for better interaction.
- Portability and real-time interaction are crucial for collaborative surgical planning.
Users rated each of the 14 questions on a 7-point Likert scale, with one being “strongly disagree” and seven being “strongly agree.” The 14 questions were organized into five categories: overall, multi-user, model viewing, model slicing, and saving and loading models.
The multi-user category attained the highest rating with an average of 6.65. This included a unanimous 7.0 rating that it was easy to identify who was controlling the heart model in ARCollab. The scores also showed it was easy for users to connect with devices, switch between viewing and slicing, and view other users’ interactions.
The model slicing category received the lowest, but formidable, average of 5.5. These questions assessed ease of use and understanding of finger gestures and usefulness to toggle slice direction.
Based on feedback, the researchers will explore adding support for remote collaboration. This would assist doctors in collaborating when not in a shared physical space. Another improvement is extending the save feature to support multiple states.
“The surgeons and cardiologists found it extremely beneficial for multiple people to be able to view the model and collaboratively interact with it in real-time,” Mehta said.
The user study took place in a CHOA classroom. CHOA also provided a 3D heart model for the test using anonymous medical imaging data. Georgia Tech’s Institutional Review Board (IRB) approved the study and the group collected data in accordance with Institute policies.
The five test participants regularly perform cardiovascular surgical procedures and are employed by CHOA.
The Georgia Tech group provided each participant with an iPad Pro with the latest iOS version and the ARCollab app installed. Using commercial devices and software meets the group’s intentions to make the tool universally available and deployable.
“We plan to continue iterating ARCollab based on the feedback from the users,” Mehta said.
“The participants suggested the addition of a ‘distance collaboration’ mode, enabling doctors to collaborate even if they are not in the same physical environment. This allows them to facilitate surgical planning sessions from home or otherwise.”
The Georgia Tech researchers are presenting ARCollab and the user study results at IEEE VIS 2024, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) visualization conference.
IEEE VIS is the world’s most prestigious conference for visualization research and the second-highest rated conference for computer graphics. It takes place virtually Oct. 13-18, moved from its venue in St. Pete Beach, Florida, due to Hurricane Milton.
The ARCollab research group's presentation at IEEE VIS comes months after they shared their work at the Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI 2024).
Undergraduate student Rahul Narayanan and alumni Harsha Karanth (M.S. CS 2024) and Haoyang (Alex) Yang (CS 2022, M.S. CS 2023) co-authored the paper with Mehta. They study under Polo Chau, a professor in the School of Computational Science and Engineering.
The Georgia Tech group partnered with Dr. Timothy Slesnick and Dr. Fawwaz Shaw from CHOA on ARCollab’s development and user testing.
"I'm grateful for these opportunities since I get to showcase the team's hard work," Mehta said.
“I can meet other like-minded researchers and students who share these interests in visualization and human-computer interaction. There is no better form of learning.”
News Contact
Bryant Wine, Communications Officer
bryant.wine@cc.gatech.edu
A rufous-tailed jacamar (Photo by Benjamin Freeman)
Benjamin Freeman
Benjamin Freeman has been named a 2024 Packard Fellow for groundbreaking research in climate change and bird ecology. Freeman, an assistant professor in the School of Biological Sciences, will receive $875,000 to fund his work.
“From all of us in Biological Sciences, we’re thrilled to see Ben Freeman named a Packard Fellow,” says School Chair Jeffrey (Todd) Streelman. “Ben’s research is important, compelling, and creative — a triple-threat combination that justifies this recognition.”
Awarded annually to only 20 individuals by the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, Packard Fellows are known for pursuing cutting-edge research, never-before-done projects, and ambitious goals.
“These scientists and engineers are the architects of tomorrow, leading innovation with bold ideas and unyielding determination,” shares Nancy Lindborg, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Packard Foundation. “Their work today will be the foundation for the breakthroughs of the future, inspiring the next wave of discovery and invention.”
“I'm flabbergasted to receive this prestigious award,” says Freeman. “Packard support will be transformative. It will give me the freedom to do the sorts of risky projects that I've dreamed about, and will support the intense fieldwork that I'm convinced is necessary to understand big questions in climate change ecology.”
The Packard funding will support Freemans most ambitious project to date: developing “Tech Mountain” in the tropics, a long-term field project focused on surveying thousands of individual birds. From mountain slope to summit, he will track their motions, their nests and predators, where they live, eat, move, and die — and how this changes as temperatures warm.
The pioneer study will shape a window into how birds and other organisms are responding to our changing climate, while developing technology and methodology that could revolutionize the fields of ecology and biology.
The escalator to extinction
Freeman’s previous research has shown that, in general, birds are moving to higher elevations as our climate changes.
“I found that as it's gotten warmer in the tropics, it's set in motion what I call an escalator to extinction,” he explains. “Birds are living at higher and higher elevations, and those that were common on a mountain top when I was a toddler in Peru are now gone from that mountain.”
While this previous research has shown that tropical birds are on this escalator, it hasn’t been possible to determine the specifics: which birds might be most vulnerable and what the key stressors are.
Freeman explains that “Tech Mountain” will be a first-of-its-kind field site, equipped with innovative sensors and trackers — think cameras placed on nets, recording equipment, climatic sensors, and small individual trackers on each bird.
“I want to figure out what drives their birth rates, where they're dying, and where they're moving during the course of their life,” he shares. “That will help us unravel how this escalator to extinction works.”
Building ‘Tech Mountain’
Several thousand meters tall, encompassing lowland rainforest, foothill rainforest, and cloud forest, Freeman’s field site will feature dense vegetation, steep grades, and encompass several different climatic zones — each with unique species.
Along its slopes, Freeman’s team will find, catch, mark, and follow the lives of thousands of individual birds across hundreds of species — for a minimum of five years, but potentially for decades. It’s never been done before.
Currently, most GPS trackers are too large for small birds, and smaller trackers capture limited information. Additionally, these smaller trackers cannot wirelessly transfer data — in order to download and access the data, each bird must be recaptured.
“The conditions are tough. It’s rugged. It’s humid. It’s cloudy and wet. We’ll need to put resources into developing technology that fits our needs, and experiment with different ways of tracking individuals in these difficult conditions,” Freeman says.
Freeman will also leverage eBird, an online hub where community scientists can upload their observations. “Millions upon millions of observations are uploaded by community scientists, citizen scientists, birders — people,” he adds. “And using this data, we can estimate the vulnerability of mountain bird species — which species seem to be shrinking their ranges and declining in abundance.”
This builds on Freeman’s current work creating the Mountain Bird Network, which supports community scientists in conducting bird surveys on their local mountains.
Georgia Tech and global connections
Freeman’s tools and methodologies could revolutionize fieldwork for ecologists and biologists, opening the door for rigorous new field studies.
It will also provide opportunities to deepen collaborations abroad. “I'm planning on working closely with Dr. Elisa Bonaccorso's lab at the University of San Francisco, Quito (USFQ Ecuador),” Freeman says, “and I’m looking forward to that collaboration. The Packard funding will also support work in Ecuador conducted by an Ecuadorian graduate student who is studying at Georgia Tech.”
Throughout the research, students will be at the heart of the projects. “I take mentoring scientists very seriously,” Freeman shares. “Undergraduates will have the opportunity to get involved on the biology side of this research, the computational side, and on the engineering side of the research. They’ll even help develop new tracking technologies.
The Packard Fellowship will not only support my research — but help me provide these opportunities in the coming years to Georgia Tech’s future scientists.”
News Contact
Written by Selena Langner
Contact: Jess Hunt-Ralston
Ant hill cast in molten aluminum to show intricate underground structure of tunnels and chambers, much like the branches of coral.
- Written by Benjamin Wright -
Nature doesn’t waste energy, and nature finds ways to adapt to a changing world. Understanding those two principles led David Frost to his interest in bio-inspired design. Frost, the Elizabeth and Bill Higginbotham Professor in Georgia Tech’s School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, has spent the last dozen years searching for ways to use nature’s efficiency and ingenuity to improve the civil engineering field. His efforts are paying off. In the last year alone, research from his lab has resulted in multiple patent filings, licensing agreements, and product launches — all of which take their inspiration from the biological world.
Many of those research projects have been the subjects of doctoral research by Frost’s students, with support and advisement from Michael Helms, co-director of Georgia Tech’s Center for Biologically Inspired Design (CBID) and the Brook Byers Institute for Sustainable Systems lead for biologically inspired design. The CBID mandate is to encourage researchers to find inspiration in the biological world, where design solutions have been in development for three-and-a-half billion years as life has on Earth has evolved. Building on the concept that nature isn’t wasteful, one of the goals of bio-inspired design is to develop products that are both energy and materially efficient, and therefore more sustainable.
As the subsurface exploration and excavation thrust leader for the National Science Foundation (NSF) Center for Bio-mediated and Bio-inspired Geotechnics (CBBG), Frost focuses on what’s going on below the planet’s surface. His inspiration comes from things like tree roots, earthworms, spider webs, and ant colonies. In fact, ants are what first got him interested in bio-inspired design.
“There are many organism systems that have not been thought of as necessarily the most intelligent systems. But in fact, they are following a set of rules, approaches, or guidelines and are producing things that, in the end, are both energy- and resource-efficient and adaptive,” said Frost. “One of these is ant colonies. We see the hills above ground, but what’s going on below the ground, with the tunnels and chambers, is fascinating.”
Early in his time with CBBG, Frost came across a Florida artist who made metal castings of ant colony structures. Frost acquired some, made more castings of his own, and then built digital models of ant colonies to understand how the structures maintain their strength. He also studied exactly how ants build such complex structures so efficiently.
“They take advantage of capillarity, arching effects, and the strength of spirals,” explained Frost.
Ants dig by carefully and quickly probing each grain of sand or dirt, in the same way a human might test a Jenga piece, before deciding whether it can be safely removed without damaging the tunnel. As a result, ants are extremely energy efficient as they dig, continually removing the least encumbered pieces of material. Based on this information, Frost and his team are exploring ways to improve the effectiveness and energy usage of tunnel-boring machines.
Other bio-inspired projects from Frost’s research that are further along in the development process include building anchors inspired by tree roots, a ground heat-exchange system based on spirals and plant xylem, a geogrid (or stabilization mesh) design based on spiderwebs, a worm-inspired soil probe, and another probe design influenced by a vortex and centipedes that would displace a minimum amount of soil.
“I'm convinced that just about any system in nature we look at will help us think about analogs for things that, as human engineers, we’d like to do — and do better,” said Frost. “The opportunities for inspiration and improvement are endless.”
Take the Root-Inspired Ground Anchor (RIGA), for example. Anchors are an essential element in construction, stabilizing retaining walls and other foundation structures. Traditionally, anchors are straight poles inserted into the ground. Looking at tree roots, Frost wondered if there was a better way. That thought led him to inventing an anchor that can be driven into the ground and then expanded under the surface, similar to the structure of tree roots. The expandable anchor improves load capacity by up to 75% and is about two-thirds as long as a conventional anchor. After years of refinement, the device has been patented, licensed, and is the basis of a startup founded by Ph.D. student John Huntoon.
Frost takes the most pride in the real-world impact of his bio-inspired designs. Since 2023, Georgia Tech has filed, or is in the process of filing, utility patents for five of them. Like the RIGA system, those patents will be available for licensing for commercial use. Companies have already contacted Frost about his heat-exchange and geogrid concepts.
“Civil engineering doesn’t traditionally have a culture of patent-producing research,” noted Frost. “It’s exciting to see these filings and how they can generate energy and enthusiasm for studying natural systems and using what we learn to improve the world. Practical application has always been very important to me.”
Frost is finding that practical application also appeals to the next generation of civil engineers — specifically K-12 students interested in the profession who tour the CBID affiliated labs on campus. The students study nature’s designs and figure out how to apply them, rather than learn traditional construction methods.
“Ants, spiders, and worms are immediately relatable for middle- and high-school students,” Frost said. “They think engineering is all math and science, and that doesn’t sound fun to them. Instead, we show them they can be inspired by anything and then use that to make it about conservation and adaptation and energy minimization. Those are things they are interested in.”
Frost is hopeful that the students of today and tomorrow will continue to take inspiration from nature, enabling humans to adapt to a changing world as effectively as nature has.
News Contact
Brent Verrill, Research Communications Program Manager, BBISS
Partners of the facility gathered for an official ribbon cutting ceremony. From left to right: Eric Vogel, Hightower Professor in MSE, and executive director for the Institute for Matter and Systems; Devesh Ranjan, Eugene C. Gwaltney, Jr. school chair and professor in the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering; Julia Kubanek, Vice President of Interdisciplinary Research; Tequila Harris, professor in the Woodruff School and facility leader; Christine Conwell, interim executive director for the Strategic Energy Institute; Tim Liewen, interim executive vice president for Research; Thomas Kurfess, Regent's Professor in the Woodruff School and executive director of the Georgia Tech Manufacturing Institute; J. Carson Meredith, professor and James Preston Harris Faculty Fellow in the School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, executive director of the Renewable Bioproducts Institute. Photo: Christopher McKenney.
Tequila Harris, professor in the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering, next to the modular R2R equipment. Photo: Christopher McKenney.
The Highly Advanced Roll-to-Roll iManufacturing Systems (HARRiS) research group in the new R2R facility. Photo: Christopher McKenney.
Whether it’s developing new products, reducing costs, or increasing accessibility, innovations in manufacturing stand to improve the lives of companies and consumers alike. Georgia Tech recently took another step toward ensuring those innovations make it from lab to market with the launch of a Modular Pilot Scale Roll-to-Roll Manufacturing Facility.
“As researchers develop new materials, one of the key aspects we’re missing is how to make them at scale. This is a major oversight because if we can’t make them at scale, we can’t transition from basic research to commercialization,” said Tequila Harris, a professor in the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering. “With this new facility, we can prove our discoveries beyond lab-scale studies — and can go from materials innovation to product development at scale.”
Led by Harris, the new facility is the result of a partnership between the Georgia Tech Manufacturing Institute(GTMI), the Strategic Energy Institute, and the Woodruff School. As a pilot facility, it will serve as a testbed for scaling up manufacturing research open for Georgia Tech researchers as well as academic, government, and industry partners around the world.
“The larger vision I see at Georgia Tech involves innovation in manufacturing for large-scale industries,” said Georgia Tech’s Interim Executive Vice President for Research Tim Lieuwen at the facility’s unveiling event on Sept. 19. “It’s crucial that we’re innovating in basic science and technology, but we also need to be innovating in large-scale manufacturing.”
Roll-to-roll (R2R) manufacturing transforms flexible rolls of substrate materials, such as paper, metal foils, and plastics, into more complex, transportable rolls upon coating the surface with one or more fluids, such as inks, suspensions, and solutions, which are subsequently dried or cured on the base substrate. Its high yield and efficiency make R2R an ideal method for the sustainable, large-scale production of components for solar cells, batteries, flexible electronics, and separations — all industries that have expanded in Georgia in recent years.
“As a state institution, we’re ultimately here to serve our state,” said Lieuwen, who is also Regents’ Professor and David S. Lewis Jr. Chair in the Daniel Guggenheim School of Aerospace Engineering. “We’re seeing Georgia emerge as the national leader in terms of recruiting corporate investments in this space and in industries that will be served by this facility.”
Roll-to-Roll Innovations
The R2R process is similar to the production of newspapers, where a large roll of blank paper goes through a series of rollers printing text and photos. “The roll-to-roll aspect is the process of using a specialized tool to force fluid onto a moving surface,” says Harris. It’s one of the fastest-growing methods for producing thin film materials — photovoltaics used in solar cells, transistors in flexible electronics, and micro-batteries, for example — at a large scale.
Harris’s group works to develop novel manufacturing tools, with a particular focus on understanding and improving the dynamics of thin film manufacturing to increase efficiency and minimize waste. Her group is particularly interested in slot die coating, an R2R technique where a liquid material is precisely deposited onto a substrate through a narrow slot. With the new pilot facility, researchers like Harris will be able to take their work to the next level.
“Slot die coating on a roll-to-roll can handle the broadest viscosity range of most coating methods. Therefore, you can process a lot of different materials very quickly and easily,” says Harris. “It’s one of the fastest-growing technologies in the U.S. — and currently, this is the most advanced modular pilot scale facility at an academic university in the United States.”
“Georgia Tech is way ahead of the curve in terms of our facilities,” says GTMI Executive Director and Regents’ Professor Thomas Kurfess. “This will grow our capability in the battery area, membranes, flexible electronics, and more to allow us to support the development of new technologies.”
“As technologies around cleantech continue to advance at an unprecedented pace, pilot manufacturing facilities provide a critical bridge between innovative benchtop research and commercial-scale production and manufacturing,” says Christine Conwell, interim executive director of the Strategic Energy Institute. “We are excited about the opportunities this R2R facility will provide to the Georgia Tech energy community and our industry partners.”
News Contact
Audra Davidson
Research Communications Program Manager
Georgia Tech Manufacturing Institute