That’s the question driving the summer research of Jackson Saunders, a rising senior at Fordham College at Rose Hill. In a Fordham lab, he’s building chambers to split and direct the flow of sound, pursuing research that could impact not only acoustics but also bulletproofing, rocket design, and more.

Innovative Acoustics

Saunders, a physics and philosophy double major, is working under the guidance of Camelia Prodan, Ph.D., the Kim B. and Stephen E. Bepler Professor of Physics at Fordham. Supported by a summer fellowship from Fordham’s Campion Institute, Saunders is building on Prodan’s research into acoustic techniques inspired by topological materials.

First discovered around 1980, these materials intrigue scientists because of their internal configurations, or topology, that guide electricity into precise streams separated by gaps that block current. A topological insulator, for instance, can channel electricity along its surface but keep it from passing through to the other side.

Since then, scientists have found that such segmented flows can be seen beyond electricity.

Prodan published research in January showing that acoustic materials can be designed to guide the flow of sound in a similar way.

Building Sound Chambers in the Lab

Based on that research, Saunders is building a series of sound chambers that mimic the internal symmetries of topological materials, perfecting a design that will split sound in the same way that topological materials direct electricity into discrete streams.

It’s a project that showcases physics that dates back to Isaac Newton, Saunders said, with the behavior of atoms and electrons being recreated in larger objects like the sound chambers he’s making with a 3D printer.

“We’re taking a very well-studied quantum mechanical effect and realizing it” with classical physics, he said. “What’s novel about what we’re doing is we’re showing that we can create specific applications … using this classical mechanical approach.”

Through the project, he’s helping to build knowledge that could have many uses, from making better soundproofing materials to reducing urban noise pollution to designing rooms that contain all the sound generated within them—even if one side is open.

From Better Bulletproofing to Quantum Computing

Studies of topology-based sound flows could have implications for other innovative materials as well, he said. These could include bulletproof vests that dissipate a bullet’s impact along their surface or a rocket built to channel vibrations along its surface during takeoff without rattling the electronics within.

Topological materials could also be applied in the development of quantum computers that have vastly greater processing power. “Any field that has computation, quantum computing will benefit,” so it’s exciting to be working on questions related to that, no matter how tangentially, Saunders said.

In his research, he has an eye on the past as well as the future. “I’m doing work that is at the leading edge of a 400-year legacy of scientists, and that’s motivating,” he said. “You want to be part of that.”

“We are so proud of all of the students who worked with us this year, especially the graduates of 2018,” said John Kezel, Ph.D., director of the Campion Institute, which helps Fordham students apply for prestigious scholarships and fellowships. “We are also delighted that so many alumni decided to come back and work with us to achieve their dreams.”

Kayla Matteucci is the first Fordham student to be selected as a James C. Gaither Junior Fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, a global think tank with centers around the world. She was one of 12 students chosen out of hundreds of applicants. The yearlong fellowship in Washington, D.C., which will focus on nuclear policy, will allow Matteucci to advance the research interests she developed as an intern at Fordham Law’s Center on National Security.

“I was doing research related to counterterrorism and cybersecurity, and there’s a lot of overlap with nuclear policy,” said the international relations and Spanish major, who is graduating from Fordham College at Lincoln Center. Matteucci is currently interning with two nongovernmental organizations at the United Nations, where she focuses on disarmament. In April, she traveled on a Fordham-funded trip to Geneva for the U.N. Preparatory Committee meeting for the 2020 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, attending as part of a youth delegation.

“It was clear that states are preparing for the eventuality of cooperation on  disarmament,” she said. “With dialogue lacking in most political spaces—even the nuclear field is quite partisan—it is exciting to see people searching for common ground.”

Sean McKay is graduating from Fordham College at Rose Hill, but he will be celebrating in Rio de Janeiro, where he is studying Portuguese on a Boren Scholarship. And McKay has even more reason to celebrate: This year he won a Fulbright, which he expects will have him returning to Brazil to teach English. He’ll also be required to design a community engagement project, and has proposed starting a creative writing workshop where students will offer constructive criticism and share Brazilian and American media for inspiration.

“The idea comes directly from the creative workshop classes taken at Fordham as part of my creative writing minor,” said McKay.

Upon completing the Boren, McKay should be well prepared for his Fulbright teaching position; this past year he has been studying Brazil’s language and literature.

“I had learned Spanish and there was linguistic crossover with Portuguese, but I had never heard of, or engaged with, plays, short stories, and fiction of Brazil,” he said. He has also noticed similarities in Brazilian and American identities, which he would not have been aware of had he not immersed himself in Brazil’s “vibrant and rich culture.”

“In its core, the Fulbright means growing your sense of empathy to build deeper relationships with communities that Americans don’t often directly engage with,” he said.

Olivia Korth graduates today from the Gabelli School of Business with a concentration in entrepreneurship and a double minor in sustainable business and environmental studies. After winning a Newman’s Own Fellowship, she will have the opportunity to combine all of her interests while helping underserved communities. Korth will be getting in on the ground floor of a new nonprofit called Wholesome Wave, a food equity company that seeks to salvage and sell fruits and vegetables that are deemed unattractive by consumers and supermarkets but are perfectly fine nutritionally. Newman’s Own will pay her salary.

“I’ll be working with a team of four for one year. We hope to grow the number of grocery chains that carry the food from five to 15,” she said. “The stores are near farms in the Appalachian region of Virginia, an area that has high rates of poverty, obesity, and diabetes.

She added that she had just been talking about the “ugly food” movement in one of her classes a day before she interviewed for the position, so she felt well versed in the subject.

“I had already worked in the realm of sustainability, all my classes touch on it, so I felt like everything just came together,” she said.

As of May 10, other prestigious awards won this year include:

• In addition to Sean McKay, six Fulbright awards: Shay Chang, FCLC ’18, to South Korea; Margaret Fahey, FCRH ’18, to France; Elodie Huston, FCLC ’18, to Germany; Israel Muñoz, FCLC ’17, to Mexico; Melani Shahin, FCRH ’18, to Germany; and Luca Vettori, FCLC ’18, to Jordan
• One Luce Scholarship: Nikolas Oktaba, FCLC ’15
• One Rangel Graduate Fellowship: Erik Angamarca, FCRH ’14
• One Coro Fellowship: Taina Quiles, FCLC ’18
• One National Science Foundation Research Experience for Undergraduates award: Sunand Raghupathi, FCRH ’20
• One New York City Teaching Fellowship: Mayarita Castillo, FCLC ’16
• Three Gates Millennium Scholarships: Amarachi Korie, FCLC ’18; Yota Oue, FCRH ’18; and Anisha Pednekar, GABELLI ’19
• One White House Internship: Victoria Pascullo, FCRH ’19
• Three Boren Fellowships: Michael Johnson, GSAS ’19; Robyn J. Murray, GSAS ’19; and Jessica Way, GSAS ’19

As of May 15, Fordham students earned 76 awards, including Fulbright scholarships, German Academic Exchange Service grants (aka the DAAD), and Boren scholarships.

“Fordham students have won international and national recognition, including a number of firsts: from a Newman’s Own Fellowship to a Schwarzman Scholarship in Beijing, China,” said John Kezel, Ph.D., director of the Campion Institute. “Those who have worked with the institute have a lot to celebrate.”

Psychology major and Fordham soccer player Turner Block’s interest in athletes and physical impairment has earned her a Fulbright fellowship at the University of Queensland in Australia.

Under the direction of Sean Tweedy, a senior lecturer of physical activity at the university and principal investigator of its International Paralympic Committee Classification Research Partnership, an accredited classifier in Paralympics Athletics, Block will explore mental barriers and facilitators that influence athletic identity in Paralympic swimmers who have moderate to severe cerebral palsy. The research will have “ramifications for rehab,” she said.

“I’ve seen how being injured can really impact your mentality. This research will give athletic identity the weight that it deserves.”

Gabelli School of Business alumna Ran Niu is one in a select group of students who were awarded a Schwarzman Scholarship, which trains future leaders about China’s expanding role in global trends. Niu, who graduated last year with a master’s degree in global finance, said working in international affairs has long been her goal, having interned in United Nations’ Regional Commissions New York Office. She is Fordham’s first Schwarzman scholar.

“I was attracted by its vision of ‘global leadership for the 21st century.’ As an international student who has studied and worked in New York City, I feel connected to this global vision,” she said.

In August, she will enroll at Schwarzman College, a new institution that is part of Beijing’s prestigious Tsinghua University, with the goal of earning a master’s degree in global affairs.

As China’s foreign policy evolves, Critical Language Scholarship winner Robyn Emory said acquiring an understanding of both the language and culture could have real-world applications, especially in government. As an undergraduate at the University of Arkansas, Emory visited China while studying abroad. She has been studying Mandarin Chinese for about eight years. Through an eight-week intensive program in Xi’an, China at Shaanxi Normal University, the International Political Economy and Development (IPED) graduate student hopes to develop proficiency in the language.

“I’m trying to use my economic and political knowledge to see where conflict can come in and where it can be avoided,” said the former Peace Corps volunteer. “It’s going to take studying Chinese to understand the full side of things.”

As Critical Language scholars are paired with Chinese roommates, she is excited to engage with native speakers on a personal level.

“Having done Peace Corps and lived overseas before, I know that the cultural aspect is just as important as the language,” she said.

This summer, Aaron Kristopik, an international political economy major in Fordham’s School of Professional and Continuing Studies, will be working in the economics department of the U.S. Embassy in Ukraine as part of a distinguished internship with the U.S. Department of State.

Prior to coming to Fordham, Kristopik served in the Marine Corps for close to eight years. During that time, he worked as a guard for multiple U.S. embassies, including the U.S. Embassy in Nouakchott, Mauritania. While in Africa, the New Britain, Connecticut native provided security during the 2010 Palestinian-Israeli peace talks in Egypt, he said.

As “fake news” and right-wing populism rises in Europe, Kristopik said he is hoping to learn how these changes will impact U.S. relations with Eastern European countries like the Czech Republic and Ukraine.

“There’s a lot going on in Central and Eastern Europe and it sparked my interest,” he said. “If you can understand their mindset, culture, language, and the norms of their country, it makes it more beneficial for building relationships.”

In addition to earning a Department of State internship, Kristopik has also been offered a Boren Scholarship in Czech Republic.

Kezel said the institute is investigating new fellowship opportunities all the time, and that he’d like to “see more alumni take advantage of all that our office has to offer.”

As of May 15, other prestigious scholarships won this year include:

Six additional Fulbright Fellowships: James von Albade, FCRH ’17, to France; Nina Heyden, FCRH ’17, to the United Kingdom; Gabrielle McGovern, FCRH ’17, to Costa Rica; William Stern, GSE ’20, to India; Priscilla Cintron, FCLC ’15, to the Dominican Republic; and Michael Perrin, GSAS ’14, to Spain.

Five Gates Millennium Scholarships: Kevin Berlanga, FCLC ’19; Dylan Hollingsworth, FCRH ’17; Amarachi Korie, FCLC ’18; Yota Oue, FCRH ’18; and Anisha Pednekar, GABELLI ’19.

Nine Clare Boothe Luce Scholarships: GSAS students Elle Barnes and Elizabeth Carlen; Lauren Beglin, FCRH ’19; Elizabeth Chesnut, PCS ’19; Victoria Cirrillo, FCRH ’19; Amy Feng, FCRH ’19 (2); Carolyn Ogden, FCLC ’19; and Marissa Vaccarelli, FCRH ’18.

Two Additional Critical Language Scholarships: Cody Harder, FCRH ’18 (Swahili); and Halina Shatravka, FCLC ’17 (Russian).

Three DAAD Fellowships: Sara Hurley, FCRH ’18, to the RISE Germany Program; FCRH graduate student Matthew J. Kasper; and GSAS doctoral student Michael Begun.

Four National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowships:
Yoliem Miranda Alarcon, FCRH ’15; Samantha Walker, FCRH ’16; William Beatrez, FCRH ’19; and Nadine Moukdad, FCLC ’17.

One additional Boren Scholarship: Sean McKay, FCRH ’17, to Brazil.

One Newman’s Own Fellowship:
Shannon Kelsh, FCRH ’17, to work with the Women’s Business Development Center in Chicago.

Ask anyone about their work in a forthcoming production of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, and chances are very good that they’ll explain that they’re working on “The Scottish Play” instead.

On Thursday, Nov. 10 at noon, Clare Asquith, the Countess of Oxford and Asquith, will explore the origins of the widely-held superstition that misfortune will befall anyone who speaks the name of the play aloud, at a lecture at the Rose Hill campus.

Asquith, the author of Shadowplay: The Hidden Beliefs and Coded Politics of William Shakespeare (Public Affairs, 2006) and an expert on Catholic elements in Shakespeare’s plays, will discuss the idea that the causes behind the “curse” are rooted in Catholicism, and that the Bard and his compatriots were uneasy about performing the play from the very beginning.

Her appearance, part of the St. Edmund Campion Institute’s Hobart-Ives lecture series, will take place in Walsh Library’s Flom Auditorum, on the Rose Hill campus. Asquith is no stranger to Fordham, having delivered the inaugural Hobart-Ives lecture in 2013.

For more information, visit the institute’s website.

Antonio Joseph DelGrande’s passion for language landed him one of Fordham’s five Critical Language Scholarships. The award offers intensive summer language instruction in 13 foreign languages deemed critical for building relationships between the United States and the international community.

DelGrande, who is graduating from the Gabelli School of Business‘s global business honors program, was originally destined for Bursa, Turkey to study Turkish, but his assignment has been relocated to Baku, Azerbaijan due to security concerns.

“It was a surprise to hear, and a bit of a bummer at first, but I’m excited to go,” said DelGrande, who is also proficient in Spanish and Italian, and has studied Mandarin and Swahili.

The two-month study will not be DelGrande’s first foray with Turkish. He has been studying the language since high school and also studied abroad in Istanbul. He plans to use his experience this summer to prepare him to begin a career in translation. He said he’s noticed many small businesses using websites and Facebook pages in both Turkish and English in order to reach a wider audience. Often, however, the translations are not good.

“I’d like to help these smaller business reach the English-speaking world by providing translations,” he said.

School of Law graduate Olivia Gonzalez will travel to Oxford University. Gonzalez won a Fulbright fellowship for graduate study in the United Kingdom, where she will work toward a master’s in social science with a specialty in cybersecurity law and policy.

“There is no existing international law on cyberwarfare,” said Gonzalez, who was also a 2014 White House fellow. “I’m interested in how the current laws of war are going to apply in the case of a cyberattack, and I’d like to help create new laws and policies around this.”

Boren scholarship winner Peter Terrafranca sets out in June to Amman, Jordan for a summer of intensive Arabic language study followed by a year researching the refugee crisis in the Middle East.

“I’m interested in how refugees integrate into the countries they end up in, as well as how U.S. foreign policy has affected refugee issues in the region,” said Terrafranca, a School of Professional and Continuing Studies student who is majoring in international studies and minoring in Arabic.

Terrafranca’s Boren win comes after a long journey of his own. After dropping out of a community college business program, Terrafranca enlisted in the military and made several tours to Afghanistan and Romania. While abroad, he witnessed firsthand the chaos that refugee families endure when they are forced to uproot and start anew in a foreign country.

“It’s a complex subject, and a sensitive one, because most refugees just want to go back home,” Terrafranca said. “I want to find out what hasn’t been talked about yet.”

As of July 5, other prestigious scholarships won this year include:

• Nine Fulbright Fellowships: Erik Angamarca, FCRH ’14, to Taiwan; Mostafa Elmadboly, FCRH ’16, to Turkey; GSAS student Kathleen (Ellie) Frazier, to Sierra Leone; Olivia Gonzalez, LAW ’16, to United Kingdom; James Lassen, FCRH ’16, to Taiwan; Pilar Mendez-Cruz, FCRH ’16, to Germany; David Rowley, FCRH ’13, to Turkey; Suzy Sikorski, FCRH ’16, to the United Arab Emirates; and GSE student LeAnn Tadros to Jordan.
• Eleven Clare Boothe Luce scholarships: FCRH junior Carolyn Allain; GSAS student Chelsea Butcher; FCLC sophomore Sammi Chung; GSAS student Nicole Fusco; GSAS student Carol Henger; FCRH sophomore Anna Jane Hudson; FCLC sophomore Juliet Mengaziol; FCRH sophomore Abby O’Neill; GSAS student Sarah Seepaulsingh; and FCRH sophomore Marissa Vaccarelli.
• Five Critical Language Scholarships: Antonio Joseph DelGrande, GABELLI ’16 (Turkish); FCRH sophomore Nicholas Guthammar (Arabic); FCRH junior Rich Himed (Arabic); Miranda Morton, FCRH ’15 (Urdu); and Suzy Sikorski, FCLC ’16 (Arabic).
• Six Gates Millennium scholarships: FCLC freshman Kevin Berlanga; FCRH junior Dylan Hollingsworth; Gabriel Hyman, FCLC ’16; FCLC sophomore Amarachi Korle; FCRH junior Yota Oue; and GABELLI freshman Anisha Pednekar.
• Four FBI Honors internships: FCRH junior Carolyn Allain; FCRH junior John Oddo; FCRH sophomore Cailee Tallon; and Luke Zaro, FCRH ’16.

Two additional Fordham alumni won Fulbright fellowships through other educational institutions. Michael Perrin, FCRH ’13, GSAS ’14, received an English teaching fellowship to Spain. A recent graduate from Yale University’s epidemiology and global health program, Perrin also plans to shadow at children’s hospitals and the Ministry of Health while in Madrid. Victoria Chatfield, GSE ’10, received a Fulbright Distinguished Award in Teaching, which she will complete at the University of Glasgow in the United Kingdom.

John Kezel, PhD, director of the Campion Institute, said his office’s initiative to reach more students from all of Fordham’s schools paid off this year.

“We are seeing greater diversity in the students who are applying for fellowships and they are bringing increasingly more creative projects and richer cultural and social backgrounds into their applications,” he said.