The College of Engineering has selected six research working groups for the 2025-26 academic year. These interdisciplinary teams will explore emerging research areas that show potential for growth.

This program aims to expand research networks and build capacity in emerging fields by bringing together faculty from various departments across campus. Each group will focus on developing innovative concepts, fostering collaboration and preparing competitive proposals for submission to federal agencies and other external funding sources.

"These research working groups represent a strategic investment in the future of engineering research at our institution," said Kartik Balachandran, interim associate dean for research in the College of Engineering. "By fostering collaboration across departments and targeting high-impact emerging areas, we're empowering our faculty to compete successfully for major research funding."

The six awarded groups span diverse areas of engineering innovation:

Biotechnology Working Group: Developing Strategies Aligned With Industry, State and Federal Initiatives
Led by Bob Beitle Jr. and Ranil Wickramasinghe from chemical engineering, along with Christopher Nelson and Xianghong Qian from biomedical engineering, this working group plans to support the long-term goal of national and international recognition of the U of A in the broad area of biotechnology. This core team plans to develop a five-year plan to advance biologics process discovery, development and manufacturing through the efforts of faculty and industrial partners.

Smart Agriculture: Engaging Faculty to Vision and Modernize Agro-Food Systems With Artificial Intelligence and Robotics
Led by Dongyi Wang from biological and agricultural engineering and Cengiz Koparan from the Department of Agricultural Education, Communications and Technology within the Dale Bumpers College of Agricultural, Food and Life Sciences, this group looks to improve agricultural efficiency and modernize the traditional agro-food system from farm to fork.

Cybersecurity
Led by Chris Farnell and Qinghua Li from electrical engineering and computer science, this working group will foster a collaborative environment that advances understanding, research and education in cybersecurity. The group aims to promote cutting-edge research, collaborate with industry and government, foster a community of expertise and develop cybersecurity resources.

Arkansas MATTERs: Materials & Transportation Technology for Economic Resilience
Led by Lei Guo from civil engineering, along with Andrew Braham, civil engineering; Chandra Vaddy, civil engineering; Keisha Walters, chemical engineering; Paul Millet, mechanical engineering; and Shengfan Zhang, industrial engineering, this interdisciplinary group will focus on advanced materials engineering and manufacturing to solve challenges in next-generation transportation and logistics. By integrating AI-driven design with experimental research, the team will generate seed data, develop novel material formulations and optimize scalable manufacturing processes.

Next-Gen Transportation: A Working Group for Next-Generation Passenger, Freight and Air Transportation System Research
Led by Suman Mitra from civil engineering, along with Sarah Hernandez, civil engineering, and Neelakshi Majumdar, mechanical engineering, this group will address emerging transportation challenges by integrating smart mobility, resilient infrastructure, logistics innovation, automation and human-centered systems.

Engineering Education Research Working Group
Led by Jenn Campbell from mechanical engineering, along with Heather Walker, chemical engineering, and Richard Cassady, industrial engineering, this group will expand the community of faculty conducting rigorous engineering education research, increase awareness of funding opportunities, support proposal development and foster cross-campus and industry collaborations to enhance student and faculty experiences.

Building on Success and Breaking New Ground

Some working groups are expanding established programs, while others are launching ambitious new initiatives. The Cybersecurity Working Group, for instance, is looking to build on positive momentum over the past two years with new partnerships and opportunities for collaboration.

"Our Cybersecurity Working Group is advancing interdisciplinary research to secure intelligent and connected systems," said Chris Farnell, an assistant professor in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Department. "This year, we're prioritizing partnerships, industry engagement and collaborative funding opportunities to strengthen the University of Arkansas' leadership in cybersecurity innovation."

"The Cybersecurity Working Group has been a success in pulling together a group of people to stay focused on cybersecurity and collaboratively securing external funding to advance our leadership in this domain," said Qinghua Li, a professor in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Department. "In the past two years, we have been able to bring on board multiple professors who did not mainly work on cybersecurity before."

Other groups are just beginning to build their networks. The monetary award serves as seed funding to start each group or initiative. The Biotechnology Working Group, newly formed this year, aims to connect the university's scattered expertise in biomanufacturing and modeling.

"The Biotechnology Working Group is long overdue. Our campus has significant expertise in biomanufacturing and modeling that is housed in different departments," said Beitle, the Jim L. Turpin Professor of Chemical and Biochemical Separations. "Creating the working group will help promote new connections among existing faculty in cell and molecular biology, the Center for Protein Structure and Function, and the Membrane Applications Science and Technology Center to address upstream (make), downstream (purify) and modeling (understand) challenges."

Beyond advancing research capabilities, all of these working groups will help develop strategies to train and retain a robust STEM workforce while spurring investment in research and development infrastructure in critical technologies and priority growth sectors for Arkansas. Through these collaborations, the College of Engineering aims to strengthen the state's technological competitiveness and its future capacity to attract and develop top scientific talent.