Dr. Melik Demirel, Associate Professor in Engineering Science and Mechanics, was highlighted on the cover of August 15 Applied Physics Letters publication. Demirel, along with three other collaborators demonstrated a biosensing approach which, for the first time, combines the high sensitivity of whispering gallery modes (WGMs) with a metallic nanoparticle-based assay. They provided a computational model based on generalized Mie theory to explain the higher sensitivity of protein detection. Furthermore, they quantitatively analyzed the binding of a model protein (i.e., Bovine Serum Albumin) to gold nanoparticles from high-Q WGM resonance frequency shifts, and fit the results to an adsorption isotherm, which agrees with the theoretical predictions of a two-component adsorption model.

Dr. Akhlesh Lakhtakia, Charles Godfrey Binder Professor in Engineering Science and Mechanics, will travel this month to San Diego, California to attend the Board of Editors meeting of SPIE. During his stay he will be presenting an invited paper on “Surface multiplasmonics.” To learn more about the meeting, please visit their web site.

About 40 per cent of the world's population is at risk for malaria. An estimated 300 million to 500 million people worldwide contract the disease each year, and as many as 1 million of them die each year, a large majority of them are children under five.

Recent reports from Cambodia suggest that currently effective anti-malarial drugs are beginning to lose their effectiveness as the most virulent malaria strain develops resistance.

Pennsylvania State University materials scientists Dinesh Agrawal and Jiping Cheng are working to develop a process which uses low-power microwaves to destroy malaria parasites in the blood minus any medication. Their research has been further boosted by a donation from The Gates Foundation.

The treatment of hydrocephalus in African children and the effects of climate on newborn infections will be the focus of testimony when Steven Schiff, director of the Penn State Center for Neural Engineering and Brush chair professor of engineering, testifies before the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Foreign Affairs, Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health and Human Rights, at 2 p.m. on Tuesday (Aug. 2)

Hydrocephalus -- water on the brain -- is one of the most common treatable neurological conditions in childhood. Recently, Schiff and other researchers have shown that the majority of childhood hydrocephalus in East Africa, and perhaps much of the developing world, occurs after infections. According to Schiff, the broad implication is that most of the world's hydrocephalus is preventable.

Recent analysis of the magnitude of the economic burden of postinfectious hydrocephalus on sub-Saharan African societies, where more than 100,000 cases arise each year, detailed the enormous impact.

The hearings will highlight novel surgical techniques that have shown to be effective alternatives to the implantation of fluid shunts in children with hydrocephalus in developing countries. Also highlighted will be ongoing efforts to identify the microbes responsible for causing these infections, the routes of infection during the neonatal period and the emerging recognition from satellite climate measurements that rainfall has an important role in influencing the infection incidence.

Schiff, who holds appointments in the Departments of Neurosurgery and Engineering Science and Mechanics, and Physics, will be joined by Benjamin Warf, director of the Neonatal and Congenital Anomalies Neurosurgery, Department of Neurosurgery, Children's Hospital Boston, and Jim Cohick, senior vice president of specialty programs, CURE International. The session, "Hydrocephalus Treatment in Uganda: Leading the Way to Help Children," can be viewed at this web site.