Christmas Day
Holidays
No classes. Most University offices and buildings are closed. Check with specific offices to confirm.
Event interval: Single day event. Year: 2026. Quarter: Winter. Event Types: Academics.
Thursday, December 25, 2025.
For more info visit www.washington.edu. New Year's Day
Holidays
No classes. Most University offices and buildings are closed. Check with specific offices to confirm.
Event interval: Single day event. Year: 2026. Quarter: Winter. Event Types: Academics.
Thursday, January 1, 2026.
For more info visit www.washington.edu. ChemE Graduate Seminar Series: Caleb Bashor
Engineering synthetic post-translational sense-and-response programs in human cells
Caleb Bashor
Assistant Professor of Bioengineering, Rice University
BioSciences Member, Ken Kennedy Institute
Abstract
Recent advances in mammalian synthetic biology have opened the door to programmable human cell therapies that can be tailored to specific diseases contexts. Yet a major bottleneck remains: we still lack flexible, modular circuit frameworks that can sense extracellular signals and respond on fast (minutes-scale) timescales, with predictable tuning across cell types and indications. In this talk, I will highlight recent work from my group addressing this gap by engineering synthetic phosphorylation-based circuits. Our strategy is to assemble reversible enzymatic cycles using modular protein-domain “building blocks” and couple them to synthetic receptors, enabling cells to convert ligand detection into rapid, controllable intracellular state changes. Our phosphorylation circuits can then be wired to diverse…
Event interval: Single day event. Campus location: Physics / Astronomy Auditorium (PAA). Campus room: PAA A102. Accessibility Contact: dso@uw.edu. Event Types: Lectures/Seminars. Target Audience: Graduate Students, Undergraduate students, Postdocs, Faculty.
Tuesday, January 13, 2026, 4:00 PM – 5:00 PM.
Martin Luther King Jr. Day
Holidays
No classes. Most University offices and buildings are closed. Check with specific offices to confirm.
Event interval: Single day event. Year: 2026. Quarter: Winter. Event Types: Academics.
Monday, January 19, 2026.
For more info visit www.washington.edu. ChemE Graduate Seminar Series: Lisa Biswal
Creating order far from equilibrium: Emergent phases and colloidal chain dynamics
Lisa Biswal
William M. McCardell Professor in Chemical Engineering, Rice University
Professor, Materials Science and NanoEngineering, Rice University, Abstract
Colloidal suspensions driven out of equilibrium exhibit rich and unexpected behaviors, from dynamic clustering to self-organized phase coexistence. These nonequilibrium systems challenge conventional thermodynamic intuition, yet their dynamics often resemble equilibrium phase transitions such as crystallization, condensation, and phase separation. By leveraging time-varying magnetic fields, we explore new avenues for controlling soft matter systems and uncover emergent material properties.
I will first introduce the collective behavior of superparamagnetic colloids under rotating magnetic fields. These driven particles self-organize into a steady-state vapor-liquid coexistence, reminiscent of equilibrium phase transitions. Using Kelvin’s equation, we extract an…
Event interval: Single day event. Campus location: Physics / Astronomy Auditorium (PAA). Campus room: PAA A102. Accessibility Contact: dso@uw.edu. Event Types: Lectures/Seminars. Target Audience: Graduate Students, Undergraduate students, Postdocs, Faculty.
Tuesday, January 20, 2026, 4:00 PM – 5:00 PM.
ChemE Graduate Seminar Series: Yadong Yin
Magnetic assembly approaches to creating smart materials
Yadong Yin
Professor, Department of Chemistry
University of California, Riverside
Abstract
Smart materials hold great promise for many intriguing applications as they exhibit chemical and physical responses to the applied external stimuli. This presentation summarizes our effort in developing magnetic assembly approaches to creating smart optical materials that can find applications in printing, sensing, signage, security documents, and displays. We will first review our early success in the chemical synthesis of magnetic nanostructures and their assembly into periodic structures with dynamic responses to external magnetic fields. By controlling the interaction between light and the nanostructured assemblies, we then show that many novel optical materials could be developed by manipulating diffraction, refraction, birefringence, electronic resonances, and chiroptical properties.
In particular, we will discuss our recent progress in creating…
Event interval: Single day event. Campus location: Physics / Astronomy Auditorium (PAA). Campus room: PAA A102. Accessibility Contact: dso@uw.edu. Event Types: Lectures/Seminars. Target Audience: Graduate Students, Undergraduate students, Postdocs, Faculty.
Tuesday, January 27, 2026, 4:00 PM – 5:00 PM.
ChemE Graduate Seminar Series: Allison Godwin
Defining meaningful failure as a key ingredient in student success
Allison Godwin
Associate Director of Cornell NanoScale Science and Technology Facility
Dr. G. Stephen Irwin ’67, ’68 Professor of Engineering Education Research, Cornell University
Abstract
Failure is one of the most impactful ways in which humans learn and is part of the human experience, and yet, it is often stigmatized in education systems that rely on one-attempt, high- stakes assessments. This talk focuses on three examples that frame failure as an essential intermediary step in the learning process, with success as the ultimate goal. This work is grounded in a novel framework for engineering learning—meaningful failure, which rewards and supports students in taking academic risks, embracing uncertainty, and learning from setbacks, ultimately achieving success that is connected to who they are.
The first example focuses on the use of alternative assessment in a first-year chemical engineering course to support student engagement with…
Event interval: Single day event. Campus location: Physics / Astronomy Auditorium (PAA). Campus room: PAA A102. Accessibility Contact: dso@uw.edu. Event Types: Lectures/Seminars. Target Audience: Graduate Students, Undergraduate students, Postdocs, Faculty.
Tuesday, February 3, 2026, 4:00 PM – 5:00 PM.
ChemE Graduate Seminar Series: Denis Wirtz
3D single-cell mapping of solid tumors and new CAR T therapy to resolve them
Denis Wirtz
Vice Provost for Research
Theophilus Halley Smoot Professor in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering,
Johns Hopkins University
Abstract
Our group has recently developed CODA, an AI-based platform to map whole diseased and healthy organs and organisms in 3D and at single-cell resolution. CODA solves the challenge of imaging large volume samples, while preserving high spatial resolution. Through integration with other multi-omic approaches – such as spatial transcriptomics and proteomics - CODA allows for unprecedented cellular and molecular profiling of tissues. I will discuss the new biological insights into tumor onset and progression gained from the use of CODA, including ovarian and pancreatic cancers, and associated biomedical implications for early detection of cancer. I will also introduce our new CAR T therapies that exploit synthetic velocity receptors that dramatically increase the ability of…
Event interval: Single day event. Campus location: Physics / Astronomy Auditorium (PAA). Campus room: PAA A102. Accessibility Contact: dso@uw.edu. Event Types: Lectures/Seminars. Target Audience: Graduate Students, Undergraduate students, Postdocs, Faculty.
Tuesday, February 10, 2026, 4:00 PM – 5:00 PM.
Presidents' Day
Holidays
No classes. Most University offices and buildings are closed. Check with specific offices to confirm.
Event interval: Single day event. Year: 2026. Quarter: Winter. Event Types: Academics.
Monday, February 16, 2026.
For more info visit www.washington.edu. Early Career Impact Award Seminar: Katie Weigandt (ChemE Ph.D. '12)
(Event details coming soon.).
Event interval: Single day event. Accessibility Contact: dso.@u.washington.edu. Event Types: Lectures/Seminars. Target Audience: Graduate Students, Undergraduate students, Postdocs, Faculty.
Tuesday, March 3, 2026.