Stevens: Innovation Rooted in Purpose
Quantum, AI, national defense, health, extreme-weather resilience and critical minerals are all strengths of Stevens’ robust — and growing — research enterprise
Founded during the Industrial Revolution by visionary innovators, Stevens Institute of Technology has consistently aligned its research and education with the nation’s most pressing needs. From mechanical engineering breakthroughs in the 1870s to today’s advances in quantum computing and artificial intelligence, the university has always addressed challenges that mattered most to society and national security.
That alignment is intentional. Stevens has always drawn and maintained a focus on solving real-world problems through applied research and technological innovation.
This tradition of purposeful innovation continues today, as the university’s researchers advance exciting new solutions in multiple critical areas:
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
The Stevens Institute for Artificial Intelligence (SIAI) serves as the hub for Stevens’ AI research, which is substantial, taking in nearly 100 university faculty in project work and collaboration as the university works to harness AI technologies that help make our lives safer, healthier and more enjoyable.
Wide-ranging AI applications have been developed at Stevens, including to monitor bridge health and safety, predict traffic surges and slowdowns during emergency evacuations, inform autonomous-vehicle navigation and analyze the energy use of individual homes, neighborhoods and communities — among many others.
CRITICAL MINERALS
Computing, sensing, defense, imaging, space, quantum and other key technologies require specialized components — often made from rare earths and other minerals that aren’t easily mined, refined or otherwise obtained in the U.S.
To address this growing challenge, Stevens environmental chemists Dibs Sarkar and Christos Christodoulatos have been leading an effort to ramp up the phytomining of critical minerals — in essence, using plants to do the chemical and mechanical work of extracting key minerals and compounds more affordably (and while consuming less energy) than when using conventional mining methods.
The Stevens team is currently testing combinations of specialized plants, bacteria and nontoxic acids to extract nickel — utilized in battery production, medical devices and transportation technologies — from soil. The work is supported by a $1.9 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA-E).
HEALTH
Stevens works in a wide range of health initiatives via its Semcer Center for Healthcare Innovation (CHI), including pathbreaking work in brain science, neurodegenerative disease, concussion, vision loss, cancer therapy, drug design and neuromuscular disorders.
University researchers have been the recipients of numerous National Science Foundation (NSF) and National Institutes of Health (NIH) awards, often collaborating with the nation’s leading medical centers and research institutions of higher learning.
Stevens also maintains rigorous health AI and bioinformatics research programs, investigating topics such as epilepsy detection, skin cancer detection, infection detection, cardiovascular imaging, glycemic load prediction and patient decision-making, among many other areas.
NATIONAL DEFENSE & SECURITY
The Stevens-led Systems Engineering Research Center (SERC), a 20-plus institution consortium, has long worked with the Department of Defense to build national defense support including training for systems engineers, lower-impact military facilities, high-speed vehicle research and creation and training of a civilian defense corps.
The university’s Center for Environmental Systems (CES) maintains a longstanding relationship with the DoD, innovating technologies that sustainably cleanse wastewater streams from military facilities and produce biofuels from manufacturing by-products.
Stevens also maintains a longtime relationship with industry partner L3Harris, one of the world’s largest defense contractors.
Other researchers — including recent White House PECASE honoree Nick Parziale and former Air Force and Jet Propulsion Lab fellow Jason Rabinovitch — perform research in high-speed physics, computation and mechanical engineering with defense applications, while professor Hamid Jafarnejad Sani’s teams develop systems that enhance drone communication and security.
Cybersecurity, as well, is a longtime priority of the university. Stevens is home to multiple National Centers of Excellence in Cybersecurity and the Center for the Advancement of Secure Systems and Information Assurance (CASSIA), a frequent partner of the National Science Foundation's in cybersecurity research, education and workforce training.
QUANTUM SCIENCE
Quantum is indisputably the future of computing, and Stevens frequently produces key research in quantum communications, optics and sensing. The university recently partnered with the U.S. Army in a $15 million contract to bridge the gap between quantum theory and laboratory advances and field applications.
Under the leadership of director and chief quantum scientist Yuping Huang, Stevens’ Center for Quantum Science and Engineering has generated tens of millions of dollars in research support and developed prize-winning intellectual property protected by U.S. and international patents.
Research continues in key quantum areas such as room-temperature physics toward personal quantum computers, quantum metrology and ultra-secure quantum security for sensitive data.
URBAN & COASTAL EVENT RESILIENCE
Stevens has long been a leading voice in conversations around extreme weather, natural disasters and the protection of lives, property and enterprises.
The university’s historic Davidson Lab has built and maintains some of the nation’s leading flood-forecast tools, including the Stevens Flood Advisory System (SFAS). Stevens also develops systems and tools to monitor ocean currents and forecast devastating storm-surge effects up to three days in advance, with further enhancements and technical upgrades and broader geographical scope coming on the near horizon.
“Most days, SFAS is the first piece of information I check in the morning,” notes Caleb Stratton, chief resilience officer for the city of Hoboken, New Jersey.
The U.S. Coast Guard is one of the agencies accessing Stevens’ data products, notably when planning and conducting life-saving rescue and recovery missions in the New York Harbor region — helping save hundreds of lives to date. Stevens’ modeling “remains our only consistently reliable model for one of the busiest maritime environments in the nation,” says Commander Matthew Mitchell, policy chief for the Coast Guard’s Office of Search and Rescue.
Stevens researchers and graduate-student teams also work directly with agencies such as NOAA and NASA to understand river dynamics, coastal erosion, spring ice thaw, heavy-rainfall storms and other factors that can predict and feed extreme flooding and property-damage scenarios.
In recognition of this expertise, the federal government and state of New Jersey each recently re-committed additional appropriations to support extreme-event prediction, planning and public information tools and add additional support in the form of enhanced supercomputing resources, autonomous sea and air vehicles with LiDAR capabilities, portable weather stations and a sophisticated X-band weather radar system.
“Our research is making impacts in some of the nation’s most pressing challenges, including in health, security, prosperity and resilience,” summarizes Stevens Vice Provost for Research and Innovation Ed Synakowski. “But we are committed to doing even more."
"By expanding and deepening partnerships and levering the attributes of this extraordinary region, our faculty and students will continue to propel Stevens toward a position as an unquestioned national and global research and innovation leader through solutions to these complex challenges and through research-infused academic programming.”