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Associate Professor Hua Wang has been awarded a 2026 Early Career Investigator Award from METAvivor for his pioneering research into next-generation exosome vaccines targeting metastatic breast cancer. Wang's innovative approach uses chemically modified tumor-secreted extracellular vesicles combined with click chemistry to trigger specific immune responses against cancer cells, offering new hope for patients living with the disease. 

Illinois researchers led by Assistant Professor Jean-Charles Stinville have discovered a breakthrough strategy for designing fatigue-resistant metal alloys by controlling how plastic deformation spreads at the atomic scale, potentially transforming materials used in transportation, aerospace and energy applications. By engineering alloys where deformation remains uniformly distributed rather than localized — a mechanism confirmed through advanced imaging and computational modeling — the team has opened new pathways to create metals that resist fatigue failure while maintaining strength under repeated loading cycles.

Assistant Professor Yuecheng "Peter" Zhou has been named a Scialog Fellow for Neurobiology and Changing Ecosystems and received a Biophysical Society early career travel award. The Scialog Fellowship will support his research on how neural systems adapt to environmental changes, while the travel award will enable him to present his group's work on novel biophysical tools at an annual BPS meeting.

Assistant Professor Marie Charpagne earned a DOE Early Career Research Program award for pioneering work that harnesses radiation itself to strengthen nuclear reactor materials, rather than fighting its damaging effects. Her approach uses radiation to create protective nanostructures in specially designed alloys that continuously repair damage during operation, potentially enabling self-healing materials for next-generation nuclear systems.

Professor Dallas Trinkle and colleagues have provided the first quantitative explanation for how magnetic fields slow carbon atom movement through iron, a phenomenon first observed in the 1970s but never fully understood. Published in Physical Review Letters, their computer simulations reveal that magnetic field alignment changes the energy barriers between atomic "cages," offering potential pathways to reduce the energy costs and CO2 emissions associated with steel processing.

Professor Qian Chen has been elected vice chair of the American Chemical Society's Division of Colloid and Surface Chemistry (COLL) Awards Committee, beginning January 1, 2026. Chen joins fellow MatSE faculty member Professor Rosa Espinosa Marzal, who began her term as COLL division chair at the start of 2026.