Purdue Polytechnic faculty are collaborating to explore the intersection between learning and work within the context of technology, developing and applying new approaches to education and workforce training and development. Their research cluster has been titled “Future Work and Learning,” one of the college’s five new research impact areas.

A knowledge gap in the development of alternative aviation fuels led to the creation of the Fuel Laboratory of Renewable Energy (FLORE), a new interdisciplinary research lab in Purdue’s Potter Engineering Center directed by Gozdem Kilaz, assistant professor of engineering technology.

Greg Strimel, assistant professor of engineering/technology teacher education (ETTE), and William Walls, ETTE undergraduate, launched the Improving Regional Manufacturing Ecosystems (IRME) project to serve as a Purdue undergraduate research/engagement initiative specifically for pre-service teachers.

Purdue Polytechnic faculty with expertise in advanced materials, data visualization and analytics, design, health applications, manufacturing and processes, robotics and mechatronics, systems and networks, and sensors are engaged in research which has been titled “Realizing the Digital Enterprise,” one of the college’s five new research impact areas.

Victor Chen, assistant professor of computer graphics technology, specializes in information visualization. He converts abstract data into images which are complex yet understandable. Each graphic Chen creates is as individual as its underlying data, with the resulting images resembling elegant, mechanical snowflakes.

Sangjun Lee, a graduate research assistant in Purdue Polytechnic’s Department of Computer and Information Technology, wants to keep hackers from interfering with your self-driving car. The National Institute of Justice is supporting his research.

Daniel Leon-Salas, associate professor in Purdue Polytechnic’s School of Engineering Technology, became an unlikely member of a study on fruit fly blindness when he designed and built an automated programmable containment system with a 3-D printer and laser-cut acrylic pieces.

With grants from the National Science Foundation’s Advanced Technological Education project, Mark French, along with two dozen other college professors and high school teachers, integrated the building of guitars with lessons in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM).

Teaching computers to understand jokes and humor is a funny business, according to Julia Rayz, associate professor of computer and information technology. Rayz is trying to help computers understand and interact with people as naturally as people interact with each other.

Jorge León, a graduate research assistant working with José Garcia-Bravo in the School of Engineering Technology, hopes to use hydraulic devices and fuzzy logic theory to maximize the energy efficiency in electric busses.