Area high school students got to learn about the latest and greatest innovations in robotics from Purdue Polytechnic's very own SMART Lab. As part of the week-long program, they got to pick the brains of faculty and research staff, even learning how Purdue's familiar delivery robots manage to stay on target and not get lost around campus.

Talented data analysts went head-to-head last fall during Purdue’s IronHacks competition to predict unemployment claims across Indiana. Competitors used data provided by Purdue Polytechnic’s Department of Technology Leadership and Innovation alongside state government data. The winners’ predictive models displayed stunning accuracy.

Purdue Polytechnic and the College of Engineering celebrated the dedication of Dudley and Lambertus Halls, the Engineering & Polytechnic Gateway Complex. The state-of-the-art $140 million complex, built during the last three years, opened in January 2023. It is now home to new laboratories for the Polytechnic’s School of Construction Management Technology, School of Engineering Technology, Department of Computer and Information Technology and Department of Computer Graphics Technology, plus faculty offices and numerous labs and offices for the College of Engineering.

Purdue Polytechnic’s Abdul Salam is developing a network of underground devices to help farmers respond to climate change and environmental concerns. The new technology tracks conditions in the fields, allowing the agricultural industry to conserve water.

Purdue Polytechnic graduate research assistants Rey (Alex) Gonzalez, Yifei Hu and Damin Zhang are members of a student research team competing in Amazon’s international Alexa Prize TaskBot Challenge, developing multimodal (voice and vision) conversational agents that assist customers in completing tasks requiring multiple steps and decisions. Julia Rayz, professor of computer and information technology, is their advisor.

An interdisciplinary team of Purdue Polytechnic researchers received National Science Foundation (NSF) funding to study how teams of humans and robots will work together at construction sites. The team hopes the NSF grant will serve as the foundation for years of collaborative research to improve the efficiency and scalability of human-robot teams in constrained and complex construction workplaces.

Purdue Polytechnic’s Kathryn Seigfried-Spellar has been named a recipient of Purdue’s 2023 Jefferson Award.

Purdue Polytechnic’s Tatiana Ringenberg earned the title of “Boilermaker” four times — as an alumna with bachelor’s, master’s and PhD degrees, all from Purdue, and now as a faculty member in the Department of Computer and Information Technology.

Purdue Polytechnic’s Chad Laux was one of four authors to receive two prestigious awards in recognition of their book, “The Ten Commandments of Six Sigma: A Guide for Practitioners.”

Purdue Polytechnic’s Umit Karabiyik is researching how ordinary citizens willingly share data with law enforcement, including photos, videos, text messages, and other data from cell phones — and how to collect this data in a way that maintains personal privacy and security.