Health & Science
A centimeter-sized robot could be the future of medicine, manufacturing and environmental cleanup. The tiny robot can walk at human speed, pick up and transport cargo to a new location, climb up and down hills and then perform a spinning break dance to release the cargo.
Thanks to a new multimillion-dollar, multiyear grant from The Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research, Northwestern Medicine will continue to participate in the MJFF-sponsored Parkinson’s Progression Markers Initiative, which aims to identify biomarkers for the progression of the disease.
A recent gift from the John R. Flanagan Charitable Foundation seeks to prevent the spread of infectious diseases, like COVID-19, around the world.
Materials scientist and engineer Sossina Haile couldn’t have predicted that the cost of solar and wind energy would plummet in recent years, or that places like California would start paying customers to take electricity because their supply outstripped demand. But once those things happened, she had a solution.
Since the COVID-19 pandemic began in spring 2020, the University’s philanthropic community has responded by funding high-impact research and providing resources to help students learn remotely and return to campus. Donor support has been crucial to the continuation of Northwestern’s research and teaching missions.
In the wake of the pandemic, Olivia Pura found space for creativity, launching the podcast Science in Society. A first-generation student and first-generation Polish American, Pura also began a molecular biophysics program, with the goal of becoming a professor.
John Rogers doesn’t just lead the field of stretchable bioelectronics — he founded it. He has invented a mind-boggling number of devices, pushing boundaries to extreme limits and creating electronics that are impossibly thin, flexible, stretchy and smart — blurring the distinction between body and device.
I’m a person of faith, and the Bible gives me a glimpse into what is beyond my science, introducing me to a God who is intensely proud of the reality he wills into being. I believe that there is delight in heaven as my students and I peel back the layers of God’s “onion.” This motivates me and frees me to do curiosity-driven science well before I perceive how the insights to be gained will profit a modern society.
Northwestern Medicine surgeons perform double-lung transplants, giving new life to eight COVID-19 survivors.
Seeing her own family members treated unfairly in health care settings gave Melissa Simon ’06 the resolve to become a doctor and change health care from the inside. Today, she combines research and community outreach to reduce gaps in health care services for medically underserved communities.
