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Wildfire research at WPI
The devastating wildfires in the Los Angeles area exemplify the dangers of wind-driven fires in inhabited areas. WPI’s Department of Fire Protection Engineering is leading research designed to understand how fires spread with the goal of contributing to measures that can better protect communities and firefighters.
WPI’s experts in this field include those who are part of the National Science Foundation’s Wildfire Interdisciplinary Research Center, a collaboration with San Jose State University, to study new fire detection methods, first responder safety, and wildfire suppression systems.
WPI’s research, which involves faculty and ongoing experiments conducted by students in a state-of-the-art wind tunnel on campus, was featured by several media outlets including The Boston Globe, WCVB, NBC 10 Boston, NECN, and Spectrum News 1.
For its coverage of the L.A. fires, The New York Times interviewed Albert Simeoni, professor and head of the Department of Fire Protection Engineering, about how the wildland fires in Southern California transformed into urban fires, leading to extensive loss of life and destruction of property. Simeoni also provided analysis for the fact-checking website Full Fact for an article addressing online claims about the wildfires.
The Associated Press also interviewed James Urban, an assistant professor of fire protection engineering, for an article that helps explain how firebrands, or flying embers, contribute to the spread of wildfires. The AP also interviewed Urban and visited campus to observe fire laboratory experiments for its coverage explaining how fire whirls, or fire tornadoes, can develop in large fires like those occurring in the Los Angeles area. Their experiments were photographed and featured in an AP article, "Fire tornadoes pose a threat in California. A fire lab shows how they work" and in an AP video.
Professor Urban also spoke with WPTF, a news radio station in Raleigh, NC, about how wind and drought factored into the California fires, and about wildfire prevention.
Spectrum News 1, Phys.org, and News-Medical.net covered the publication of a new paper by Dmitry Korkin, Harold L. Jurist ’61 and Heather E. Jurist Dean’s Professor of Computer Science, that reveals new details about the outer shell of the SARS-COV-2 virus particle.
The science magazine Nautilus talked with Dmitry Korkin, Harold L. Jurist ’61 and Heather E. Jurist Dean’s Professor of computer science about his role in developing a “periodic table” of structural elements that make up the COVID-19 virus, and how it led a Scottish artist Angela Palmer to create a sculptural model of the virus first displayed at the Oxford Museum of Natural History.
Health It Analytics, Spectrum News 1, Worcester Business Journal, Science Beta, and Indian Practitioner all covered the collaborative research effort between WPI and McLean Hospital that used artificial intelligence to identify key warning signs of suicide in women.
GBH spoke with Computer Science Professor Dmitry Korkin about how he has opened his home to the family of a Ukrainian professor, Vitaly Yurkiv, amid the war with Russia. Korkin is also working to help Yurkiv find work in the U.S. when Yurkiv is able to leave Ukraine.
The National Interest talked to Dmitry Korkin, associate professor of computer science, about how and why diseases, like coronavirus spread quickly on ships.
The Boston Herald reported on the research that Dmitry Korkin, associate professor of computer science, is doing to project how viruses, including the coronavirus, might spread in confined spaces.
Dmitry Korkin, associate professor of computer science, and his eight-member graduate team, were featured in this article. The researchers developed an artificial intelligence-based computational model that predicts how an infectious disease spreads in a confined space.
Bioinformatics professor Dmitry Korkin was featured in an article highlighting a trend in researchers bypassing traditional journals in favor of publishing their findings more quickly online. Korkin and his team built a 3D roadmap of the coronavirus and posted it online to provide a tool for others to use in their own research. “We felt the urgency of this work,” Korkin said.
A stand-alone story about WPI’s role in developing and sharing a 3D roadmap of the novel coronavirus appears in Boston.com. The story includes quotes from WPI bioinformatics professor Dmitry Korkin and PhD students Senbao Lu and Oleksandr Narykov. The piece also includes several photos, a graphic of the novel coronavirus, and a 30-second video explainer.
Dmitry Korkin, associate professor of computer science at WPI and director of the university’s bioinformatics and computational biology program, appears on a three-minute segment on NBC10 discussing his role in developing and sharing the 3D roadmap of the novel coronavirus. The segment includes insightful comments from PhD students Ziyang Gao and Hongzhu Cui.
WPI professor Dmitry Korkin is interviewed in this story about his role in guiding a research team in developing and sharing the 3D roadmap of the novel coronavirus. The story includes comments from PhD student Ziyang Gao, who has friends in the region most impacted by coronavirus. The story also includes an explainer graphic.
Dmitry Korkin, associate professor of computer science, spoke with WBZ News Radio about the structural road map of the 2019 novel conoravirus he and his graduate students developed. The goal of the research is to reach new breakthroughs in treating the virus.
Dmitry Korkin, associate professor of computer science, was featured in the Telegram & Gazette for groundbreaking research he is doing to create a structural 3D roadmap of the new coronavirus. The story includes multiple photos and a 60-second video.
WPI scientists are using visualization tools and mixed reality to explore complex biological networks, a depiction of a system of linkages and connections so complex and dense it’s been dubbed the “hairy ball.” Dmitry Korkin, PhD, associate professor of computer science and director of the university’s bioinformatics and computational biology program, leads the research team.
