2025 Morse-Alumni Awards

The University of Minnesota annually recognizes faculty members for their outstanding contributions to teaching and learning. Three MSI PIs have received the Horace T. Morse – University of Minnesota Alumni Association Award for Outstanding Contributions to Undergraduate Education for 2025.

• Associate Professor Juliana M. Abel (Mechanical Engineering)
  • Professor Abel uses MSI resources for multi-scale modeling that supports investigations of functional fabrics, which are a novel approach to create pliable, lightweight structures with intrinsic active functionalities, enhancing diverse engineering applications by providing actuation, sensing, energy harvesting, and communication.
• Associate Professor Amira Azarin (Chemical Engineering and Materials Science)
  • Professor Azarin uses MSI resources to perform bioinformatics analysis of the transcriptome and proteome in order to investigate mechanisms of tumor progression and metastasis, cellular quiescence and reawakening, growth kinetics and metabolism, and barrier function and disregulation in the brain and the intestine
• Associate Professor Victor K. Lai (Chemical Engineering, UMD)
  • Professor Lai uses software available through MSI for projects concerning biomechanics and biotransport through biological soft tissues and the study of Lyme disease and the interactions between the bacteria with the immune cells.

See all the Horace T. Morse-Alumni Award recipients.