The Big Idea Challenge is a new program that will provide resources to interdisciplinary teams of Purdue faculty and students pursuing bold proposals that address global challenges. Professor David Ebert led the team for "Harnessing Technology and Information Fusion to Enable Resilient and Sustainable Food-Water Balance under Evolving Environmental Conditions" while Professor Yong Chen led the team for "Photonics Science and Technologies for Security, Energy, and Healthcare Applications."

A team led by Jeffrey Mark Siskind, associate professor in Purdue’s School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, has developed three algorithms that allow a wheeled robot to learn the meanings of words from example sentences that describe example paths taken by the robot, to use the words to generate a sentence to describe a path of movement, and to comprehend the sentence in order to produce a new path of movement.

The discipline rankings are based entirely on peer evaluations, whereas the college rankings are a combination of peer and recruiter assessments, along with a variety of performance-based factors.

The work was in collaboration with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. The research involves self-cooling photovoltaic modules which can provide a 0.5% absolute efficiency boost and extend the lifetime by 85%.

Professor Sundaram won for his proposal "Towards Secure Large-Scale Networked Systems: Resilient Distributed Algorithms for Coordination in Networks under Cyber Attacks". The Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Program offers the National Science Foundation's most prestigious awards in support of early-career faculty who have the potential to serve as academic role models in research and education and to lead advances in the mission of their department or organization.

Two of the research teams include ECE Professors Peter Bermel and Peide "Peter" Ye.

Professor Ed Delp's improved automatic recognition and interpretation of gang graffiti and tattoos as well as Professor Byunghoo Jung's diaper-embedded transponder for monitoring urinary tract infections were presented.

Professor Sen received the Google FRA in the category of Physical Interfaces and Immersive Experiences. Among other topics, his research focuses on Human Body Communication (HBC), which focuses on using the human body as a conducting medium to securely, safely, and energy-efficiently connect wearable and implantable devices and sensors.

Internships within Purdue departments help students develop needed skills and work experience, while also helping them tap into their creativity and problem-solving skills.

UPrint was developed in 2015 by co-founders Rick Li and Joseph Watkins, graduates of the College of Health and Human Sciences and ECE. It is an app that allows users to print documents from smartphones to select printers on university campuses. The app is now accessible at seven universities and has grown the graduates' company by five people.