Highlights

This award recognized Prof. Shu Yang’s exceptional ability to combine materials synthesis, experimental creativity, and deep mechanical understanding to address fundamental scientific questions while enabling real-world applications to control adhesion, friction, and contact behavior. Specifically, Prof. Yang has made pioneering contributions to the understanding and application of surface and interfacial phenomena in soft materials. Read … Read more

When a knot lets go, it doesn’t just fall apart. It snaps. The Yang lab shows that a millimeter-sized, knotted soft robot can leap meters into the air, flipping mid-flight, spinning like a propeller. Adding a wing extends that control into the air. The robot can curves back toward its starting point, like a boomerang … Read more

Tackling large socio-environmental issues like climate change and global freshwater scarcity, Shu Yang’s team eyes for natural solutions. Imitating two unlikely products of nature: raspberries and sunflowers, they introduces a scalable, solar-driven water harvesting device that collects moisture from the air. Read more

Penn engineers, materials scientists, and designers have developed a 3D-printed concrete solution based on diatomaceous earth that has enhanced carbon capture, is stronger, and uses fewer materials like cement. Read more

A multidisciplinary team of researchers have successfully developed a cutting-edge method to 3D print cholesteric liquid crystal elastomers (CLCEs), opening the door to dynamic, color-changing materials that can respond to mechanical stress. Read more

Shu Yang is named as one of National Geographic’s 33 Extraordinary Changemakers who are creating a better future for the planet. Yang is recognized for her pioneering work in biomimicry, a field dedicated to finding innovative solutions to global problems by studying and emulating patterns in the natural world. Read more

As UPenn Engineering Postdoctoral Researcher Kun-Hao Yu transitions from his role to an Assistant Professor in the Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Syracuse, he reflects on his journey and shares insights into his preparation for this new chapter.  Read more

Sophia Jackson, the 1st year PhD student in the Yang group, has been awarded the 2024 ForEverglades Research Enhancement Grant to to fund her innovative project titled “Coral Restoration of Sustainable and 3D Printed Artificial Coral Reefs.” .  Read more

Shu Yang looks at her research through the lens of biomimicry: life forms and natural shapes have inspired her unique engineering solutions that span agriculture, building cooling and heating and reversible adhesives. For Yang, each of her innovations starts with changes on a fundamental level that can then grow into scalable and impactful products. Her … Read more

How seeds implant themselves in soil can seem magical. During rain or high humidity, the corkscrew-like stalk of Erodium unwinds and twists the seed into the soil, where it can take root and is safe from hungry birds and harsh environmental conditions. Inspired by Erodium’s magic, researchers at Carnegie Mellon University collaborated with Syracuse University, … Read more