News & EventsDepartment Events
Events
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Apr29
EVENT DETAILS
lessAbstract: Detection of small earthquakes in urban intraplate regions is highly challenging due to its dynamic noise levels, sparse seismicity, and poor instrument coverage. Traditional methods like the STA/LTA ratio and template matching are poorly suited for such environments, often misclassifying earthquakes with low signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs). To investigate a potential case of human-induced seismicity in the Chicago area, we applied an existing deep learning model and a newly developed Random Forest model to detect small earthquakes in an industrial corridor of the Chicago area. We also developed an unsupervised learning workflow to detect and cluster non-earthquake seismic events, producing a labeled dataset of 1000+ events that can be used to train future detection algorithms. We discuss the development of these two machine learning workflows, their performance in the Chicago area, and future directions for seismic monitoring in noisy, built environments.
Bio: Ann is a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Earth, Environmental, and Planetary Sciences at Northwestern University. She recently defended her PhD dissertation at Northwestern on urban intraplate seismology and geoscience education in the Chicago area. Her research focuses on developing data-driven methods to detect and characterize seismic events in noisy, data-sparse environments. She is passionate about community engagement in STEM, having over four years of experience in organizing workshops, conferences, and internship programs that provide hands-on STEM experiences for the larger community.
TIME Wednesday, April 29, 2026 at 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM
LOCATION A230, Technological Institute map it
CONTACT Andrew Liguori andrew.liguori@northwestern.edu EMAIL
CALENDAR McCormick - Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE)
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May6
EVENT DETAILS
lessAbstract- The fracture and fatigue of soft materials are tightly coupled to the topology of polymer networks. Achieving control over this topology and identifying the relation between topology and fracture/fatigue resistance are central to advancing the design of soft materials. In this talk, I will first review the importance of entanglement in the design of the elastic and fracture properties of polymer networks. Next, I will introduce two approaches that can engineer entanglements by mechanically and kinetically intervening in radical polymerization. Finally, I will discuss the molecular understanding of fracture-resistance dynamics in polymer networks. Specifically, I will show that UV light intensity influences entanglement formation in photopolymerized polymer networks. I will also discuss how applying mechanical stimuli via focused ultrasound during polymerization can control topology beyond thermodynamic equilibrium. These approaches are demonstrated using highly entangled hydrogels, which show significant differences in elastic and fracture properties due to the engineered polymer network topology. When a polymer topology is given, the toughness of polymer networks can be understood in terms of molecular structure. Through controlled material synthesis and the quantification of fracture resistance, we advance understanding of the time dependence of toughness in organogel and the fatigue threshold of LDPE thermosets. Our work expands the accessible design space for polymer network topology and offers new routes to tune mechanical response and fracture behavior in soft materials with molecular understanding.
Bio- Junsoo Kim is an assistant professor of Mechanical Engineering at Northwestern University. He earned his Ph.D. in the Material Science and Mechanical Engineering department at Harvard University in 2022, followed by postdoctoral training at Harvard University. Before joining Harvard in 2017, he was a researcher at Electronics Telecommunications Research Institute. He earned his M.S. in 2013 and B.S. in 2011 at Seoul National University. He has co-authored about 40 papers in peer-reviewed journals such as Science, Nature, Advanced Materials, etc, and has contributed to the field of mechanics of soft materials. He is selected as a Kavli Frontiers of Science Fellow by the National Academy of Sciences and Scialog Fellow by the Research Corporation for Science Advancement, and received the 9th Hanwha Non-Tenure Faculty Award from Hanwha Group and Haythornthwaite Foundation Research Initiation Grant.
TIME Wednesday, May 6, 2026 at 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM
LOCATION A230, Technological Institute map it
CONTACT Andrew Liguori andrew.liguori@northwestern.edu EMAIL
CALENDAR McCormick - Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE)
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May8
EVENT DETAILS
lessTBA
TIME Friday, May 8, 2026 at 2:00 PM - 3:00 PM
LOCATION A230, Technological Institute map it
CONTACT Andrew Liguori andrew.liguori@northwestern.edu EMAIL
CALENDAR McCormick - Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE)
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May15
EVENT DETAILS
lessTBA
TIME Friday, May 15, 2026 at 2:00 PM - 3:00 PM
LOCATION A230, Technological Institute map it
CONTACT Andrew Liguori andrew.liguori@northwestern.edu EMAIL
CALENDAR McCormick - Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE)
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May21
EVENT DETAILS
lessTBA
TIME Thursday, May 21, 2026 at 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM
LOCATION A230, Technological Institute map it
CONTACT Andrew Liguori andrew.liguori@northwestern.edu EMAIL
CALENDAR McCormick - Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE)
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May27
EVENT DETAILS
lessTBA
TIME Wednesday, May 27, 2026 at 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM
LOCATION A230, Technological Institute map it
CONTACT Andrew Liguori andrew.liguori@northwestern.edu EMAIL
CALENDAR McCormick - Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE)
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May29
EVENT DETAILS
lessTBA
TIME Friday, May 29, 2026 at 2:00 PM - 3:00 PM
LOCATION A230, Technological Institute map it
CONTACT Andrew Liguori andrew.liguori@northwestern.edu EMAIL
CALENDAR McCormick - Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE)