Awards
New Research Projects
Self-Powered In Vivo Joint Load and Angle Sensing in Total Knee Replacement
Principal Investigator: Steve Anton, PhD, Mechanical Engineering
Funding Agency: National Institutes of Health
Award Total: $2.5 million over 5 years
The Self-Powered In Vivo Joint Load and Angle Sensing in Total Knee Replacement project, a prestigious R01 research grant, was awarded to Dr. Steve Anton by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Total knee arthroplasty (TKA) is one of the most common surgical procedures and despite technical advances, 10-20% of patients remain dissatisfied with their outcomes and 9% require revision. To address this problem, this research proposes the development of an innovative self-powered smart piezoelectric TKA implant platform that will enable continuous in vivo measurement of joint kinematics and compartmental joint kinetics, and allow expandability for future sensors.
This interdisciplinary research project includes team members from Tennessee Tech’s Departments of Mechanical and Nuclear Engineering (Dr. Steve Anton, Dr. Steve Canfield, and Dr. Andy Pardue), Electrical and Computer Engineering (Dr. Charles Van Neste), and Computer Science (Dr. Doug Talbert), as well as external collaborators in Orthopedic Surgery and Mechanical and Materials Engineering at Western University in London, Ontario, Canada. The work includes the development of a piezoelectric joint force sensing and energy harvesting system, a magnetic joint angle sensing system, and miniaturized embedded circuitry, all of which will be integrated into a commercial knee replacement implant system without gross modification to the overall implant design. The ultimate goal of this project is to fill the technological gap in postoperative monitoring of TKA to provide the community with valuable data to advance orthopedic surgical techniques and implant designs to ultimately improve patient satisfaction and human health.
Cyber Threat Mitigation for Off-Road Autonomous Ground Vehicles
Principal Investigators: Syed Rafay Hasan, PhD, Electrical and Computer Engineering; Nan “Terry” Guo, PhD,
Center for Manufacturing Research; Doug Talbert, PhD, Computer Science
Funding Agency: Neya Systems, a division of Applied Research Associates, Inc.
Award Total: $991,667
This project is a continuation of funding to tackle security in autonomous vehicle infrastructure and investigates the overall navigational control system, AI, and communication of connected vehicles. The photo shows a testbed with miniature autonomous ground vehicles, used to implement and demonstrate attacks and countermeasures.
During FY25-26, four PhD students, seven MS students, and 10 undergraduate students were engaged in this research to address critical issues related to potential sensor attacks to enhance infrastructure safety for autonomous vehicles. Four journal papers and 18 conference papers were published on the results of this research.
Collaborative Research: Mixed-Pole Multi-phase Synchronous Reluctance Motor Drives
Principal Investigators: Olorunfemi Ojo, PhD, Electrical and Computer Engineering; Syed Rizvi, PhD, Electrical
and Computer Engineering
Funding Agency: National Science Foundation
Award Total: $290,477
This research explores a new class of electric high-performance machines that do not depend a rare-earth magnets which are expensive, challenging to extract, and vulnerable to global supply chain disruptions. When multiple winding sets with different pole configurations are successfully combined to interact with each other and with the rotor of a different pole number, their associated magnetic fields can be manipulated to great advantage, resulting in improved energy conversion, high torque density, and fault tolerance – all without using magnets. This research has the potential to transform the future of electric motor systems across many sectors, particularly electrified transportation and aviation, shipboard systems, and wind energy, by reducing dependence on critical materials in the next generation of motor-drive systems. The outcome of this research will support a broader transition to sustainable, resilient and competitive electrified transportation, industrial high-power drives and wind energy infrastructure.
Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) Site: Cyber AI: Cybersecurity Solutions Leveraging Artificial Intelligence for Smart Systems
Principal Investigators: Mohamed Mahmoud, Ph.D. and Syed Hasan Ph.D., Electrical and Computer Engineering
Funding Agency: National Science Foundation
Award Total: $459,033
Motivated by the recent advances in artificial intelligence (AI), telecommunications, sensing, and computation, the concept of smart systems (such as smart power grid and smart healthcare) has emerged aiming to improve the quality of life by revolutionizing the services we use in our daily life. However, security breaches can disrupt critical infrastructures and privacy breaches can reveal citizens' locations and activities.
The proposed REU site offers research and development activities to undergraduate students in the area of cybersecurity solutions leveraging AI for smart systems. The students will learn diverse topics such as cryptography, deep-learning, federated- and reinforcement learning, graph-based anomaly detection, Blockchain, hardware attacks countermeasures, etc. The students will learn from an expert group of faculty mentors how to formulate research problems, and develop, implement, and assess solutions.
Along with improving the research experience for undergraduates, the site aims to 1) contribute to the development of the cybersecurity workforce; 2) increase the percentage of female and minority students in cybersecurity; 3) encourage undergraduates to pursue graduate studies, 4) support TTU's focus on cybersecurity research, and 5) increase enrollment in STEM.
CarbonLess Electric AviatioN (CLEAN)
Principal Investigators: Rory Roberts, Ph.D., Bruce Jo, Ph.D., and Ahmad Vaselbehagh, Ph.D., Mechanical Engineering
Funding Agency: NASA
Award Total: $8,670,014
Team members include Tennessee State University, The Ohio State University, University of Dayton, University of Washington - Bothell, Boeing Research & Technology, Raytheon Technologies Research Center, and Special Power Sources. This project seeks to help solve one of aviation's key challenges for the future of commercial air travel: zero-emission aircraft by 2050. The team of researchers, led by Dr. Rory Roberts, will explore a preliminary design for an electrified, 150-passenger aircraft that uses an ammonia-based integrated propulsion, power, and thermal management system. The research focuses on investigating, designing, and testing several components and subsystems that are required for a zero-emissions commercial passenger aircraft.
The research team has unique one-of-a-kind testing capabilities for Solid Oxide Fuel Cell Combustor (SOFCC) with a turbogenerator (TB) power generation technologies under flight conditions including pressurized operation with rapid changes in load for emulated in-flight operation. SOFC-TG technology is a unique and transformative concept addressing many of the challenges faced in all-electric propulsion-based aviation. The power generation system has high part-load efficiency during cruise, high specific power density, load following capability, high-power capacity at high altitudes adapting to low temperatures and pressures, rapid startup time, and efficient thermal management. The SOFCC-TG concept achieves the performance targets necessary for electrifying zero emissions 150-passenger aircraft by reducing the complexity of traditional fuel cell-gas turbine hybrid systems.
Spray Deposition of Coal-Derived Graphene-Copper Nanocomposites for Advanced Conductors
Principal Investigators: Jiahong Zhu, Ph.D., Mechanical Engineering and Ying Zhang, Ph.D., Center for Manufacturing Research
Funding Agency: U.S. Department of Energy
Award Total: $1,250,000
This project focuses on the optimization of the spray deposition parameters for the synthesis of high-performance copper-matrix nanocomposite with uniformly distributed graphene particulates. The team will conduct a techno-economic analysis to demonstrate the viability and cost-effectiveness of the proposed nanocomposite manufacturing process. The spray-deposited nanocomposites are expected to offer enhanced electrical/thermal conductivities, strength, and temperature capability over copper wires and cables currently used in clean energy applications. This project will also provide workforce training and opportunities for underrepresented students to participate in clean energy research. In addition, this project will enhance the research capability of a minority-serving university and help disadvantaged rural communities through technology innovation to promote economic inclusion.
Second-life Battery in Mobile EV Charging Application for Rural Transportation (SMART)
Principal Investigator: Pingen Chen, Ph.D., Mechanical Engineering
Funding Agency: U.S. Department of Energy
Three-Year Award Total: $4,531,642
This project aims to address the urgent need to develop affordable mobile charging stations (MCSs) that can be deployed in rural America on a large scale by utilizing second-life batteries retired from electric vehicles (EVs). Project objectives are: 1) design, develop, demonstrate, and validate four types of cost-effective MCSs to reduce upfront investment costs; 2) create and demonstrate first-of-the-kind affordable, resilient, and sustainable rural EV infrastructure in a multi-state region by seamlessly integrating affordable MCSs into the existing charging network to support electrification in underserved rural communities; 3) collect and analyze the first-hand data of second-life-battery-integrated MCSs to assess the potential market and benefits; 4) create outreach, training, and education opportunities to help a broad range of EV stakeholders make informed decisions in adopting second-life-battery-powered MCSs and develop economically viable charging stations.
Rural Reimagined: Building an EV Ecosystem and Green Economy for Transforming Lives in Economically Distressed Appalachia
Principal Investigator: Pingen Chen, Ph.D., Mechanical Engineering
Funding Agency: U.S. Department of Energy
Three-Year Award Total: $4,000,000
The "Rural Reimagined" project is Tennessee Tech's Grand Challenge initiative to harness science, technology and innovation to transform rural communities.
"Today is a great day," said Pingen Chen, principal investigator and assistant professor of mechanical engineering. "With the rise of the clean energy economy around electric vehicles, rural and low-income communities in Appalachia have struggled in the transition, due in part to a lack of infrastructure, low awareness and limited-to-no access to electric vehicles and clean energy jobs."
The total cost of the project is $8 million. Tennessee Tech is the leading organization among more than 50 partners from Tennessee, Ohio, Kentucky, West Virginia, and Virginia sharing the balance of the funding.
"This project aims to provide clean and affordable mobility options to the underserved communities by developing needed charging infrastructure and adopting and demonstrating various cost-effective electric vehicles in diverse applications," said Chen. "In addition, the project aims to create outreach, training and education opportunities to the residents of rural and low-income communities."
Five major components make up the project: charging infrastructure development, electric vehicle acquisition and demonstration, data collection and analysis, outreach and education and workforce training and economic development. Long term impacts on rural areas include transition from a fossil-fuel-based economy to clean energy, improved environmental quality and public health as well as creating new job opportunities.