University of Texas Arlington

Ashfaq Adnan, associate professor in the UTA Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, chaired the inaugural symposium.

At a symposium held earlier this month, faculty and leadership at The University of Texas at Arlington discussed their multidisciplinary research and education efforts in the area of health and the human condition—one of the University’s four strategic themes. Video Link: https://vimeo.com/331322010

Ashfaq Adnan, associate professor of mechanical engineering, and his postdoctoral associate Yuan Ting Wu published research on traumatic brain injury in Nature's Scientific Reports. Their work revealed that battlefield blasts may cause cavitation (tiny bubbles) in the brain's perineuronal nets, which may collapse and cause neuronal damage.

Spring 2018 issue of UTA's inquiry magazine highlighted our work on brain injury.

Ashfaq Adnan, an associate professor of mechanical engineering at The University of Texas at Arlington (UTA), and his postdoctoral associate Yuan Ting Wu published research findings in Nature Scientific Reports in July 2017 revealing how battlefield blasts may cause bubbles in the brain's perineuronal nets which, in turn, may collapse and damage neurons.

Researchers at the University of Texas at Arlington used supercomputers at the Texas Advanced Computing Center to simulate how bubbles caused by explosions may damage neurons in the brain. Using similar methods, the team reported in the Journal of the American Ceramic Society how nanoparticles affect the fragility of ceramic materials used in space shuttles. They found that the conventional wisdom that nanoparticles improve material strength is not necessarily guarantee

The Office of Naval Research gave a UTA professor a grant to research the connection between blast-like trauma and neurological disorders. Ashfaq Adnan, mechanical and aerospace engineering associate professor, has been given this $613,079 grant, and it will cover three years worth of research.

Ashfaq Adnan, an associate professor in UTA’s Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Department, recently was awarded a three-year, $613,079 grant from the Office of Naval Research to show the potential link between blast-like trauma and neurological disorders such as post-traumatic stress disorder, Alzheimer’s disease and Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy, or CTE.

Ashfaq Adnan, an associate professor of mechanical engineering at The University of Texas at Arlington, and his postdoctoral associate Yuan Ting Wu recently published research findings in Nature’s Scientific Reports revealing that if battlefield blasts may cause cavitation in the brain’s perineuronal nets, which, in turn, may collapse and cause neuronal damage.

he Office of Undergraduate Research will host a guest faculty talk by Ashfaq Adnan, associate professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at the University of Texas-Arlington, at 3:30 p.m., March 9, in Landes Auditorium in the Galloway Business Building. Admission is free.

A mechanical and aerospace engineering professor has received a grant to work on a computer simulation system to study how neurons in the brains of soldiers are affected after a battlefield blast. Ashfaq Adnan and his research team are working to create a computer model with an atomistic stimulation system, Adnan said. Adnan received a three-year, $380,586 grant through the Office of Naval Research’s Warfighter Performance Department and UTA.

A University of Texas at Arlington engineering researcher supported by the Office of Naval Research is developing a computational model to measure how and when battlefield blasts can cause devastating damage to neurons in the brain.

MAKING CERAMICS STRONGER Attractive properties such as strength, hardness, durability, and resistance to corrosion have made ceramics a popular choice for a wide variety of applications, from kitchen knives and car brake pads to hip replacements and microprocessors. But it’s their high heat tolerance—some ceramics have a melting point of over 3,000 degrees Celsius—that makes them truly unique.

At UTA, a school comprised of 85 percent commuter students, according to UTA’s website, some researchers are saying highway safety and efficiency is no less than vital. “When you make the road above the surface, there are two sides that are sloping down,” said Ashfaq Adnan, aerospace and mechanical engineering assistant professor, who also worked on the project. “These pins just lock the slippery soil into place. They act as a resisting force against the clay soil.”

Anyone who has seen a Life Alert commercial knows the frigidity human bones take on as they age. Ashfaq Adnan, assistant mechanical and aerospace engineering professor, is working on ways to understand the science behind this phenomenon.