Faculty Spotlight

Elisa Riedo, a professor in the Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering Department, is particularly well known for her pioneering work in thermochemical scanning probe lithography (SPL), a technique used to create nanoscale chemical patterns with applications in biomedicine, nanoelectronics, and magnetic materials. She has also made fundamental contributions in nano-mechanics, 2D materials, and nano-confined water, relevant in all living systems. 

Riedo’s recent research includes developing a technique to create cheap and effective synthetic bones in order to study stem cells, creating super-hard 3-D diamond structures out of boron nitride at room temperature, and material for medical devices with high conductivity and excellent electromagnetic interference shielding. In her PicoForce Lab, researchers are developing novel scanning methods for fabricating the next generation of electronic and biomedical devices.

Juliana Friere is a Professor of Computer Science and Engineering and also holds an appointment in the Courant Institute for Mathematical Science and is a faculty member at the NYU Center of Data Science. Friere is developing data management techniques and infrastructure to address problems introduced by emerging applications. 

Her recent work focuses on urban environments, using data from photography, the web and other sources to understand the ways we move and interact with the cities we live in. Her research covers everything from fake news on social media, to analyses of NYC taxi services, to visualizing distribution patterns of bird species. She has received several awards, including an NSF CAREER, an IBM Faculty award, and a Google Faculty Research award.

Industry Assistant Professor Regine Gilbert strongly believes in making the world a more accessible place — one that starts and ends with the user. She has helped such major companies as Ralph Lauren, Colgate, and Vitamin Shoppe ensure that their websites and mobile platforms can be used by all, and she brings that professional sensibility to bear within her Integrated Design & Media (IDM) classes.

Gilbert, an in-demand presenter at such events as the International User Experience Professional Association conference and the Design and Diversity conference, has taught in semesters past as a visiting professor at Tandon. 

In 2019 she published Inclusive Design for a Digital World: Designing with Accessibility in Mind, a comprehensive volume that explores the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, best practices for web development, and more.

Andrea Silverman is an Assistant Professor, with joint appointments in NYU Tandon's Department of Civil and Urban Engineering and at the NYU College of Global Public Health. Her research focuses on sustainable and appropriate wastewater treatment systems, in an effort to protect public health and environmental quality. Within the broad topics of water quality and wastewater treatment, she focuses on the detection and control of waterborne pathogens, the design of natural wastewater treatment systems like treatment ponds constructed wetlands, and the safe reuse of human waste.

During the COVID-19 Pandemic, Silverman has published research about how long the coronavirus can live in wastewater and runoff. Her research has produced insights into how effective water disinfection is in its current state, and how the virus lives and acts outside of the human body. She also works with the City of New York to study flooding in urban environments, collecting data about how flooding happens and developing mitigation strategies.

Julia Stoyanovich, an assistant professor both in NYU Tandon’s Department of Computer Science and Engineering and at the NYU Center for Data Science, is deeply engaged in studying the ethical and responsible use of data. Her work focuses on operationalizing fairness, diversity, transparency, and data protection in all stages of the data acquisition and processing lifecycle.

She established the Data, Responsibly consortium, serves on the New York City Automated Decision Systems Task Force (by appointment by Mayor de Blasio), and is a co-director of the Center for Responsible AI, a comprehensive laboratory for accelerating responsible AI practices.