The Liu Idea Lab for Innovation and Entrepreneurship at Rice University has named its 2025 Rice Innovation Fellows cohort. Photo via Rice University

7 top Houston researchers join Rice innovation cohort for 2025

top of class

The Liu Idea Lab for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (Lilie) has announced its 2025 Rice Innovation Fellows cohort, which includes students developing cutting-edge thermal management solutions for artificial intelligence, biomaterial cell therapy for treating lymphedema, and other innovative projects.

The program aims to support Rice Ph.D. students and postdocs in turning their research into real-world solutions and startups.

“Our fourth cohort of fellows spans multiple industries addressing the most pressing challenges of humanity,” Kyle Judah, Lilie’s executive director, said in a news release. “We see seven Innovation Fellows and their professors with the passion and a path to change the world.”

The seven 2025 Innovation Fellows are:

Chen-Yang Lin, Materials Science and Nanoengineering, Ph.D. 2025

Professor Jun Lou’s Laboratory

Lin is a co-founder of HEXAspec, a startup that focuses on creating thermal management solutions for artificial intelligence chips and high-performance semiconductor devices. The startup won the prestigious H. Albert Napier Rice Launch Challenge (NRLC) competition last year and also won this year's Energy Venture Day and Pitch Competition during CERAWeek in the TEX-E student track.

Sarah Jimenez, Bioengineering, Ph.D. 2027

Professor Camila Hochman-Mendez Laboratory

Jimenez is working to make transplantable hearts out of decellularized animal heart scaffolds in the lab and the creating an automated cell delivery system to “re-cellularize” hearts with patient-derived stem cells.

Alexander Lathem, Applied Physics and Chemistry, Ph.D. 2026

Professor James M. Tour Laboratory

Lathem’s research is focused on bringing laser-induced graphene technology from “academia into industry,” according to the university.

Dilrasbonu Vohidova is a Bioengineering, Ph.D. 2027

Professor Omid Veiseh Laboratory

Vohidova’s research focuses on engineering therapeutic cells to secrete immunomodulators, aiming to prevent the onset of autoimmunity in Type 1 diabetes.

Alexandria Carter, Bioengineering, Ph.D. 2027

Professor Michael King Laboratory

Carter is developing a device that offers personalized patient disease diagnostics by using 3D culturing and superhydrophobicity.

Alvaro Moreno Lozano, Bioengineering, Ph.D. 2027

Professor Omid Veiseh Lab

Lozano is using novel biomaterials and cell engineering to develop new technologies for patients with Type 1 Diabetes. The work aims to fabricate a bioartificial pancreas that can control blood glucose levels.

Lucas Eddy, Applied Physics and Chemistry, Ph.D. 2025

Professor James M. Tour Laboratory

Eddy specializes in building and using electrothermal reaction systems for nanomaterial synthesis, waste material upcycling and per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) destruction.

This year, the Liu Lab also introduced its first cohort of five commercialization fellows. See the full list here.

The Rice Innovation Fellows program assists doctoral students and postdoctoral researchers with training and support to turn their ideas into ventures. Alumni have raised over $20 million in funding and grants, according to Lilie. Last year's group included 10 doctoral and postdoctoral students working in fields such as computer science, mechanical engineering and materials science.

“The Innovation Fellows program helps scientist-led startups accelerate growth by leveraging campus resources — from One Small Step grants to the Summer Venture Studio accelerator — before launching into hubs like Greentown Labs, Helix Park and Rice’s new Nexus at The Ion,” Yael Hochberg, head of the Rice Entrepreneurship Initiative and the Ralph S. O’Connor Professor in Entrepreneurship, said in the release. “These ventures are shaping Houston’s next generation of pillar companies, keeping our city, state and country at the forefront of innovation in mission critical industries.”

The $2.5 million in NSF funding will allow Rice to increase the number of students in the Rice Emerging Scholars Program. Photo via rice.edu

Houston university lands $2.5M grant to expand STEM scholarship program for underserved communities

evolving inclusivity

Rice University will expand its Rice Emerging Scholars Program (RESP) over the next two years thanks to a recent grant from the National Science Foundation.

The $2.5 million in NSF funding will allow Rice to increase the number of scholars the RESP offers from 40 to 50 students this summer and to 60 students in 2025. The program works to address disparities among first-year students and to "assist students in adapting to the challenging pace, depth and rigor of the STEM curricula at Rice" through a six-week summer bridge program and ongoing mentorship, according to a statement from the university. Summer tuition scholarships, housing subsidies and research stipends are also provided.

Rice estimates that roughly 20 percent of its undergraduate population comes from families with limited financial resources, and 12 percent of students are the first in their families to attend college.

“Low-income students, especially those who are first-generation, face unique obstructions to pursuing college STEM degrees,” said Senior associate provost Matthew Taylor, a co-principal investigator on the grant. “RESP and Rice University are committed to eliminating these obstructions and ensuring that all students have the opportunity to thrive and achieve their academic and professional aspirations.”

Taylor created the program with Professor Emeritus of Mathematics Mike Wolf in 2012. It has since worked with more than 400 RESP scholars, according to the program's website. Most (about 79 percent) graduate with STEM degrees and an overwhelming 90 percent of RESP scholars graduate in four years, according to recent data.

“Rice recognizes the challenges faced by students from low-income backgrounds,” Angel Martí, chair and professor of chemistry, faculty director of RESP and principal investigator of the grant, said in a statement. “RESP aims to empower these students to achieve their academic and professional aspirations as future scientists and engineers.”

Earlier this year, the NSF also awarded Rice assistant professor Amanda Marciel $670,406 through its highly competitive CAREER Awards to continue her research in designing branch elastomers.

Marciel was also named to the 2024 cohort of Rice Innovation Fellows through the university's Office of Innovation and The Liu Idea Lab for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (or Lilie). The group includes 10 Ph.D. and postdoctoral students who aim to translate research into real-world startups.
In addition to supporting Amanda Marciel's research, the funds will also go toward creating opportunities in soft matter research for undergraduates and underrepresented scientists at Rice University. Photo by Gustavo Raskosky/Rice University

Houston professor earns competitive NSF award, nearly $700,000 grant

science supported

An assistant professor at Rice University has won one of the highly competitive National Science Foundation's CAREER Awards.

The award grants $670,406 over five years to Amanda Marciel, the William Marsh Rice Trustee Chair of chemical and biomolecular engineering, to continue her research in designing branch elastomers that return to their original shape after being stretched, according to a statement from Rice. The research has applications in stretchable electronics and biomimetic tissues.

“My goal is to create a new paradigm for designing elastomers,” Marciel said in a statement. “The research has four aims: to determine the role of comb polymer topology in forming elastomers, understanding the effects of that topology on elastomer mechanics, characterizing its effects on elastomer structure and increasing the intellectual diversity in soft matter research.”

Marciel, who joined the faculty at Rice in 2019, is one of about 500 researchers to receive the NSF's CAREER Award each year. The award recognizes early-career faculty members 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,” according to the NSF.

In addition to supporting Marciel's research, the funds will also go toward creating opportunities in soft matter research for undergraduates and underrepresented scientists. It will establish a new annual symposium called the Texas Soft Matter Meeting, where community college teachers can participate in a soft matter laboratory module and students in the Research Experiences for Undergrads program at Rice will present their summer research.

Recently, Rice also launched the new Rice Synthetic Biology Institute, which aims to strengthen the synthetic biology community across disciplines at the university. It is part of an $82 million investment the university put toward synthetic biology, neuroengineering and physical biology in 2018.

A fellow team or Rice researcher is also working on wearable haptic accessories. A member of the team was recently named to the 2024 cohort of Rice Innovation Fellows. Click here to learn more.

For the third year, Rice University has tapped 10 Rice Innovation Fellows working in engineering and materials science fields to support. Photo via rice.edu

10 Houston scientists named to fellowship for turning research into businesses

top of class

Rice University has announced its latest cohort of fellows who aim to translate research into real-world startups.

The 2024 cohort of Rice Innovation Fellows is the third of its kind since the university's Office of Innovation and The Liu Idea Lab for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (or Lilie) launched the program in 2022. The group includes 10 Ph.D. and postdoctoral students working in engineering and materials science fields.

The program provides personalized mentorship and up to $20,000 equity-free funding.

According to Lilie, the 10 members of the 2024 cohort are:

  • Barclay Jumet, a Ph.D. candidate in the department of mechanical engineering, working under Dan Preston and specializing in mechanics, thermal systems and wearable technologies. InnovationMap covered his recent technology here.
  • Tianshu Zhai, a Ph.D. student studying materials science specializing in hexagonal boron nitride-based thermal interface materials
  • Zachary Kingston, a postdoctoral research associate and lab manager for the Kavraki Lab in the Computer Science department at Rice, working under the direction of Dr. Lydia Kavraki, a pioneer in the field of robot motion planning. Kingston is developing a novel approach to high-performance, low-cost robot motion planning with Wil Thomason.
  • Soobin Cho, a Ph.D. student and co-founder of Duromem, which created the Dual-Role Electrically Conductive Membrane to improve existing water treatment systems
  • Sara Abouelniaj, a Ph.D. candidate in Material Science and Nanoengineering and founder of Graphene Grids LLC, which is exploring opportunities to diversify its range of grid types services offered
  • Alisha Menon, is founding a medical device startup that's developing wireless, AI-enabled patient monitoring devices for babies in the NICU. Her work is being done in collaboration with the Texas Medical Center and Rice, with support from NSF and the Southwest Pediatric Device Consortium.
  • Wil Thomason, a CRA Computing Innovation postdoctoral fellow in the Kavraki Lab at Rice University who is developing low-cost robot motion planning with Kingston
  • Jeremy Daum, a Ph.D. candidate at Rice in the Materials Science department working on a a novel production method to create photocatalysts
  • Jonathan Montes, a Ph.D. candidate in Bioengineering focused on combating neurodegenerative diseases with highly selective neuromodulation
  • Andrew (AJ) Walters, a Ph.D. student in Bioengineering working in the labs of Dr. Caleb Bashor (Rice) and Dr. Scott Olson (UTHealth Houston McGovern Medical School) who's building an accessible allogeneic cell therapy to treat inflammation disorders and potentially cancer. He was awarded a three-year NSF Graduate Research Fellowship in 2022.

Over the last three years, Innovation Fellows have brought in more than $6 million in funding for their ventures, according to Rice.

Last year, the cohort of 10 included doctoral and postdoctoral students working in fields from bioengineering and chemistry to civil and environmental engineering.

Late last year, Lilie also announced its new entrepreneurship council known as Lilie’s Leadership Council. The group is made up of 11 successful business leaders with ties to Houston from the likes of co-founder Frank Liu to former Houston Mayor Annise Parker and several other CEOs and board members of successful companies. The council members agreed to donate time and money to the university’s entrepreneurship programs.

Ad Placement 300x100
Ad Placement 300x600

CultureMap Emails are Awesome

Houston healthtech leader launches clinical trial for innovative anxiety-treating device

making waves

Houston-based Nexalin Technology’s proprietary neurostimulation device will move forward with a new clinical trial evaluating its treatment of anxiety disorders and chronic insomnia in Brazil.

The first of Nexalin’s Gen-2 15-milliamp neurostimulation devices have been shipped to São Paulo, Brazil, and the study will be conducted at the Instituto de Psiquiatria university hospital (IPq-HCFMUSP). The shipments aim to support the launch of a Phase II clinical trial in adult patients suffering from anxiety and insomnia, according to a news release.

“Brazil is an important emerging market for mental health innovation, and this collaboration marks our first IRB-approved study in the region,” Mike White, CEO of Nexalin, said in the release.

The study will be led by Dr. Andre Russowsky Brunoni, who specializes in neuromodulation and interventional psychiatry. He currently serves as director of the interventional psychiatry division at IPq-HCFMUSP and this summer will join UT Southwestern in Dallas and its Peter O’Donnell Jr. Brain Institute as a professor of psychiatry.

The Phase II study plans to enroll 30 adults in São Paulo and assess the efficacy of Nexalin’s non-invasive deep intracranial frequency stimulation (DIFS™) of the brain in reducing anxiety symptoms and improving sleep quality, according to the company. Using the Hamilton Anxiety Rating Scale (HAM-A), the trial’s goal is a reduction in anxiety symptoms, and assessments of sleep onset latency, total sleep time, overall sleep quality, depressive symptoms and clinical impression of improvement. The company plans to share results in a peer-reviewed scientific journal.

“Anxiety and insomnia are very common conditions that often occur together and cause significant distress,” Brunoni added in the news release. “In this study, we are testing a new, non-invasive brain stimulation technology that has shown promising results in recent research. Our goal is to offer a safe, painless, and accessible alternative to improve people’s well being and sleep quality.”

The Nexalin Gen-2 15-milliamp neurostimulation device has been approved in China, Brazil, and Oman.

The company also enrolled the first patients in its clinical trial at the University of California, San Diego, in collaboration with the VA San Diego Healthcare System for its Nexalin HALO, which looks to treat mild traumatic brain injury and post-traumatic stress disorder in military personnel and the civilian population. It also recently raised $5 million through a public stock offering. Read more here.

Texas university to lead new FAA tech center focused on drones

taking flight

The Texas A&M University System will run the Federal Aviation Administration’s new Center for Advanced Aviation Technologies, which will focus on innovations like commercial drones.

“Texas is the perfect place for our new Center for Advanced Aviation Technologies,” U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said in a release. “From drones delivering your packages to powered lift technologies like air taxis, we are at the cusp of an aviation revolution. The [center] will ensure we make that dream a reality and unleash American innovation safely.”

U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, a Texas Republican, included creation of the center in the FAA Reauthorization Act of 2024. The center will consist of an airspace laboratory, flight demonstration zones, and testing corridors.

Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi will lead the initiative, testing unstaffed aircraft systems and other advanced technologies. The Corpus Christi campus houses the Autonomy Research Institute, an FAA-designated test site. The new center will be at Texas A&M University-Fort Worth.

The College Station-based Texas A&M system says the center will “bring together” its 19 institutions, along with partners such as the University of North Texas in Denton and Southern Methodist University in University Park.

According to a Department of Transportation news release, the center will play “a pivotal role” in ensuring the safe operation of advanced aviation technologies in public airspace.

The Department of Transportation says it chose the Texas A&M system to manage the new center because of its:

  • Proximity to major international airports and the FAA’s regional headquarters in Fort Worth
  • Existing infrastructure for testing of advanced aviation technologies
  • Strong academic programs and industry partnerships

“I’m confident this new research and testing center will help the private sector create thousands of high-paying jobs and grow the Texas economy through billions in new investments,” Cruz said.

“This is a significant win for Texas that will impact communities across our state,” the senator added, “and I will continue to pursue policies that create new jobs, and ensure the Lone Star State continues to lead the way in innovation and the manufacturing of emerging aviation technologies.”

Texas Republicans are pushing to move NASA headquarters to Houston

space city

Two federal lawmakers from Texas are spearheading a campaign to relocate NASA’s headquarters from Washington, D.C., to the Johnson Space Center in Houston’s Clear Lake area. Houston faces competition on this front, though, as lawmakers from two other states are also vying for this NASA prize.

With NASA’s headquarters lease in D.C. set to end in 2028, U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, a Texas Republican, and U.S. Rep. Brian Babin, a Republican whose congressional district includes the Johnson Space Center, recently wrote a letter to President Trump touting the Houston area as a prime location for NASA’s headquarters.

“A central location among NASA’s centers and the geographical center of the United States, Houston offers the ideal location for NASA to return to its core mission of space exploration and to do so at a substantially lower operating cost than in Washington, D.C.,” the letter states.

Cruz is chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation; and Babin is chairman of the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology. Both committees deal with NASA matters. Twenty-five other federal lawmakers from Texas, all Republicans, signed the letter.

In the letter, legislators maintain that shifting NASA’s headquarters to the Houston area makes sense because “a seismic disconnect between NASA’s headquarters and its missions has opened the door to bureaucratic micromanagement and an erosion of [NASA] centers’ interdependence.”

Founded in 1961, the $1.5 billion, 1,620-acre Johnson Space Center hosts NASA’s mission control and astronaut training operations. More than 12,000 employees work at the 100-building complex.

According to the state comptroller, the center generates an annual economic impact of $4.7 billion for Texas, and directly and indirectly supports more than 52,000 public and private jobs.

In pitching the Johnson Space Center for NASA’s HQ, the letter points out that Texas is home to more than 2,000 aerospace, aviation, and defense-related companies. Among them are Elon Musk’s SpaceX, based in the newly established South Texas town of Starbase; Axiom Space and Intuitive Machines, both based in Houston; and Firefly Aerospace, based in the Austin suburb of Cedar Park.

The letter also notes the recent creation of the Texas Space Commission, which promotes innovation in the space and commercial aerospace sectors.

Furthermore, the letter cites Houston-area assets for NASA such as:

  • A strong business environment.
  • A low level of state government regulation.
  • A cost of living that’s half of what it is in the D.C. area.

“Moving the NASA headquarters to Texas will create more jobs, save taxpayer dollars, and reinvigorate America’s space agency,” the letter says.

Last November, NASA said it was hunting for about 375,000 to 525,000 square feet of office space in the D.C. area to house the agency’s headquarters workforce. About 2,500 people work at the agency’s main offices. NASA’s announcement set off a scramble among three states to lure the agency’s headquarters.

Aside from officials in Texas, politicians in Florida and Ohio are pressing NASA to move its headquarters to their states. Florida and Ohio both host major NASA facilities.

NASA might take a different approach, however. “NASA is weighing closing its headquarters and scattering responsibilities among the states, a move that has the potential to dilute its coordination and influence in Washington,” Politico reported in March.

Meanwhile, Congressional Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, a Democrat who represents D.C., introduced legislation in March that would prohibit relocating a federal agency’s headquarters (including NASA’s) away from the D.C. area without permission from Congress.

“Moving federal agencies is not about saving taxpayer money and will degrade the vital services provided to all Americans across the country,” Norton said in a news release. “In the 1990s, the Bureau of Land Management moved its wildfire staff out West, only to move them back when Congress demanded briefings on new wildfires.”