A student and their service dog stand next to President Leshin to accept their diploma.

The Month in Photos: May 2021

June 11, 2021

While Commencement was the (well-deserved) star of last month, May was filled with plenty of other events and activities—outdoor labs, several new research projects, and even a quick run through the fountain for good measure. Take a look at what the WPI community was up to through the lenses of our talented staff photographers.

Topics

Offices and Departments

Andrew Teixeira
Andrew Teixeira
Associate Professor, Chemical Engineering
Andrew is a classically trained chemical engineer with with specialties in the fields of chemical reaction engineering and materials science. He received his B.S. from Worcester Polytechnic Institute in 2009, and continued to pursue his Ph.D. with Professor Dauenhauer at the Univ [...]
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Danielle Cote
Danielle Cote
Associate Professor, Mechanical & Materials Engineering
  After graduating from UNH with a chemical engineering degree in 2005, Danielle Cote worked as a researcher at Saint-Gobain in the Northboro Research and Development Center in polymer science and data automation. Cote continued working while she pursued a master’s degree at WPI [...]
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Harold Walker
Harold Walker
Schwaber Professor, Civil, Environmental, & Architectural Engineering
Harold Walker is the Schwaber Professor of Environmental Engineering in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at WPI. Prior to his appointment at WPI, Professor Walker was the Founding Chair of the Department of Civil Engineering at Stony Brook University. Profess [...]
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Michael Timko
Michael Timko
William B. Smith Professor and Department Head of Chemical Engineering, Chemical Engineering
Sharing that “ah hah” moment with a student struggling and suddenly mastering a difficult concept; helping expand the intellectual horizons of an aspiring engineer; tackling and solving problems that challenge the energy, economic, and environmental security with passionate stude [...]
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Nikolaos Kazantzis
Nikolaos Kazantzis
Professor, Chemical Engineering
I believe strongly in the primacy of the quality of the student-teacher relationship, its mutually precious intellectual and emotional rewards, and its key role in the attainment of educational objectives such as the development of the student’s critical thinking, the capacity fo [...]
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Pamela Weathers
Pamela Weathers
Professor, Biology & Biotechnology
Prof. Weathers is an internationally recognized expert on Artemisia annua and artemisinin, having worked with the plant and its phytochemicals including the antimalarial drug, artemisinin, for >25 years. She is a Fellow of AAAS and SIVB, won many awards, given many national an [...]
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Face coverings didn’t hide the fact that our graduating seniors were all smiles, all day.

 

Graduate students celebrated in style, sharing an elbow bump with President Leshin in front of the 3D-printed Gompei statue created through a collaborative effort between the Makerspace and Prototyping Lab team in The Innovation Studio, assistant vice president and dean of students Greg Snoddy, and Adam Murrison ‘23.

 

22 Army ROTC and Air Force cadets from WPI, Assumption, Becker, Holy Cross, Fitchburg State, and UMass Lowell were sworn in as second lieutenants in the Army and Air Force during a joint commissioning ceremony on the Quad.

 

While faculty and staff took a few minutes to reflect on the resilience and perseverance of the Class of 2021 as they worked through a year like no other, class members themselves looked back on their time at WPI and shared their plans for what’s next.

 

Nothing beats a refreshing leap through the fountain between classes.

 

The Women’s Rowing team concluded its regular season by sweeping Holy Cross during the May regatta, with the varsity eight posting the fastest Division III time in the nation on Saturday, May 18.

 

Danielle Cote, assistant professor of mechanical engineering, took advantage of the perfect New England weather throughout D-Term to hold outdoor materials labs with her classes on Higgins House Lawn.

 

A team of researchers that includes biology professor Pamela Weathers has found that extracts from the leaves of the Artemisia annua plant inhibit the replication of the SARS-CoV-2 virus and two recent variants.

 

After the pandemic cancelled his ROTC stint at Fort Knox last summer, cadet Spencer Tess ’21 switched things up with an internship with the Department of Defense, leading to his involvement in collaborative teamwork that recently earned a Technology Transfer Innovation Award.

 

Skylar Barthelmes ’22 reset two of her own records in the hammer throw as the men’s and women’s track and field teams closed out the 2021 regular season with the Tufts Final Qualifier before moving on to the NCAA DIII championships.

 

Helping chocolatiers build a better bar, assuring the safety of cosmetics, exploring the Glacier National Park Project Center, researching how to help communities adapt to climate change, catching up with the Dean of Arts & Sciences—it’s all in the latest issue of the WPI Journal.

 

WPI PhD candidate Heather LeClerc (foreground) and WPI PhD student David Kenney work together to seal and prepare the reactor used to produce bio-oil from toxic sludge.

Can toxic sewage sludge be turned into renewable energy? A team of WPI researchers—including Michael Timko, associate professor of chemical engineering; Geoffrey Tompsett, assistant research professor in chemical engineering; Andrew Teixeira, assistant professor of chemical engineering; Nick Kazantzis, professor of chemical engineering; and Harold Walker, Alena and David M. Schwaber Professor of Environmental Engineering—received a nearly $2 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy to research exactly that.

 

We’re ending the academic year on a good note, especially if all four jazz groups on campus—who hosted a free Jazz on the Lawn event on Higgins House Lawn—have anything to say about it.

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