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GROWING NANODIAMONDS
UNT chemistry researchers discovered a novel way to grow nanodiamonds. Te new growth method researched by Hao Yan, assistant professor of chemistry, and his team yields nanodiamonds that are extremely small and uniformly sized.
Previously, they were created using explosives and required further modifcation for consistent sizes. Te novel method to produce these tiny diamonds — only a few nanometers wide and used in drug delivery, sensors and quantum computer processors — will allow them to be more easily modifed for various uses.
“Many of the applications of nanodiamonds, particularly for drug delivery, depend sensitively on their sizes,” Yan says. “Making them smaller has two benefts. First, a smaller diameter means a larger specifc surface area, thus higher capacity as a drug vehicle. Second, the smaller size eases the removal and excretion of these diamond particles and reduces their toxicity.”
Guggenheim Fellows
College of Music faculty members Panayiotis Kokoras (left) and Sungji Hong (right) earned the coveted John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation fellowship.
Hong and Kokoras, who both teach in the Division of Composition Studies, were two of 180 recipients of the prestigious fellowship in 2022. Te award honors mid-career individuals in the U.S. and Canada for their “exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the arts.”
Hong’s compositions include works for solo instruments, orchestra, chorus, ballet and electroacoustic media with special interest on timbre and pre-determined pitch structures. Her musical language is colorful, with a wealth of imagery and exquisite delicacy.
She previously earned commissions from the Fromm Music Foundation at Harvard University, Tongyoung International Music Festival, Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra, and National Flute Association, among many others. In 2022, she also earned a Charles Ives Fellowship from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, as well as an election as an associate by the Royal Academy of Music upon its 200th anniversary.
Kokoras, who serves as director of UNT’s Center for Experimental Music and Intermedia, is an international award-winning composer and computer music innovator. His compositions have been selected by juries in more than 300 international calls for music and have received 84 distinctions and prizes in international composition competitions.
In both instrumental and electroacoustic writing, his music calls upon a “virtuosity of sound,” a hyper-idiomatic writing which emphasizes the precise production of variable sound possibilities and the correct distinction between one timbre and another to convey the musical ideas and structure of the piece.
New Bird Species In Chile
Ricardo Rozzi, director of the UNT Sub-Antarctic Biocultural Conservation Program in Chile, made a substantial aviary discovery along with international collaborators including UNT biology alumnus Ramiro Crego (’17 Ph.D.).
Te interdisciplinary research team identifed a new terrestrial bird species, Subantarctic Rayadito (Aphrastura subantarctica), in the Diego Ramírez Archipelago — the southernmost location in Chile and the Americas.
“Tis discovery is a great expression of what international collaboration can bring,” Rozzi says.
Previously, scientists only have identifed two bird species in the genus Aphrastura (rayadito), one native to the Juan Fernandez Archipelago in the Pacifc Ocean of Chile and the other native to the forests of Patagonia, the geographical region in the southernmost tip of South America that is governed by both Argentina and Chile.
Subantarctic Rayadito difers from other Aphrastura species in its genetics; morphology (larger beaks, longer tarsi, shorter tails and larger body mass); and behavioral preferences to move at shorter distances from ground level and nest in ground cavities, mainly at the basis of albatrosses’ nests, in a non-forested habitat.
“Tis is a signifcant fnding for the bird species itself and for the conservation of its habitat, which is protected by the Diego Ramirez Islands – Drake Passage Marine Park, the largest marine protected area in southern South America that UNT helped create with the Chilean government in 2018,” Rozzi says.
Rozzi and his team of international collaborators wrote an article about the new bird species that was published in Scientifc Reports.
