Suicide Vulnerability Index Identifies Counties Most at Risk.
HealthNews, October 19, 2022.
A novel Suicide Vulnerability Index identifies the US counties most prone to suicide. Researchers hope that the index could help authorities to effectively channel limited resources to the small areas that need immediate attention. The research work led by Vishnu Kumar Industrial Engineering doctoral student along with Dr. Soundar Kumara and Dr. Kristin Sznajder of Penn State, has been published in npj Mental Health Research.
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Smart Vaccine Manufacturing Technologies Look Set to Stay
“The rapid spread of COVID-19 across the globe created an urgent need to save people’s lives and livelihoods. As a result of the pandemic, biopharma firms quickly adopted novel biotechnology platform-based techniques for vaccine manufacturing such as mRNA and viral vector platform-based vaccines. And technologies adopted as a result of COVID-19, particularly those used make m-RNA vaccines, are here to stay, points out Vishnu Kumar, Industrial Engineering doctoral student at Penn State, who examined the impact of the pandemic vaccine manufacturing along with researchers Dr. Soundar Kumara of Penn State and Dr. Vijay Srinivasan of NIST.” April 27, 2022.
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Industrial engineering professor named outstanding alumnus by alma mater
“Soundar Kumara, Allen E. Pearce and Allen M. Pearce Professor of Industrial Engineering at Penn State, received a 2021 Outstanding Industrial Engineering Alumni Award from his alma mater, Purdue University’s School of Industrial Engineering. This award is given to Purdue University industrial engineering alumni that have demonstrated exemplary achievement and leadership throughout their career, according to Purdue University’s website. Kumara received his doctorate in industrial engineering from Purdue University in 1985.” April 21, 2022
Three engineering students receive awards at the 2022 Graduate Exhibition
“Vishnu Kumar, Industrial Engineering doctoral student at Penn State advised by Dr. Soundar Kumara, received First place in the research poster option, engineering subcategory, in the 37th annual Penn State Graduate Exhibition for “Machine Learning based Suicide Prediction and Development of Suicide Vulnerability Index for US Counties. The complete list of award winners can be viewed in the Graduate School website” April 20, 2022
Industrial engineer named ‘influential academic’ by international society
“Soundar Kumara, Allen E. Pearce and Allen M. Pearce Professor of Industrial Engineering at Penn State, was named one of the 20 Most Influential Academics in Smart Manufacturing by SME, formerly known as the Society of Manufacturing Engineers.
SME, a nonprofit association of professionals, educators and students committed to promoting and supporting the manufacturing industry, selected 20 recipients who are educating the next generation of engineers and smart manufacturing technologists for the honor, according to SME’s website.” June 8, 2021
Industrial engineer receives career research award from international society
“Soundar Kumara, Allen E. Pearce and Allen M. Pearce Professor of Industrial Engineering at Penn State, received the David F. Baker Distinguished Research Award from the Institute of Industrial and Systems Engineers (IISE). He was honored at the IISE annual conference, held virtually May 22-25.
The award is given once annually to one IISE member in recognition of outstanding research throughout a career of accomplishments that broadly benefited practitioners, organizations or other researchers, according to the IISE website.” June 1, 2021
Penn State researchers to help revive manufacturing enterprises
“A team of Penn State researchers, in collaboration with Texas A&M University and The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley (UTRGV), has received funding from the Clean Energy Smart Manufacturing Innovation Institute (CESMII) to help small- and medium-sized American manufacturers be at the forefront of new smart technologies to improve their processes.
Housed at the University of California, Los Angeles and funded by the Department of Energy, CESMII provided funding to Soundar Kumara, Allen E. Pearce and Allen M. Pearce Professor of Industrial Engineering and his team of researchers. ” Nov 19, 2020.
Industrial engineering department pivots to address COVID-19
“In an effort to lessen COVID-19 spread, Soundar Kumara, Allen E. Pearce and Allen M. Pearce Professor of Industrial Engineering, brought together a team to design an advanced artificial intelligence and machine learning model to assess vulnerability counties in the United States.” May 28, 2020.
New method analyzes images to improve health care and manufacturing
“Patterns appear in both natural and human made systems, but they can be difficult for humans to recognize and analyze, especially in dynamic systems like the human heart or factory machines. To address this issue, researchers in the Penn State College of Engineering have developed a novel algorithm, which has implications for health care and manufacturing.” May 20, 2020
Penn State industrial engineering professor addresses U.S. Congressional Caucus
“On July 11, Soundar Kumara, Allen E. Pearce and Allen M. Pearce Professor of Industrial Engineering at Penn State, spoke at a briefing in Washington, D.C., hosted by the House Manufacturing Caucus, co-chaired by U.S. Reps. Tim Ryan (D-Ohio) and Tom Reed (R-N.Y.).
The briefing, “Artificial Intelligence and Manufacturing: The Power to Make Anything Anywhere Quickly,” focused on applying artificial intelligence and manufacturing to revolutionize, strengthen and expand the manufacturing capacity of the United States.”
Algorithm aims to alert consumers before they use illicit online pharmacies
“In a study, a team of Penn State researchers report that an algorithm they developed may be able to spot illicit online pharmacies that could be providing customers with substandard medications without their knowledge, among other potential problems.” August 28, 2020
Researcher to discuss how AI can help people avoid adverse drug interactions
Because machine learning can accurately monitor massive amounts of data, experts in artificial intelligence are investigating how the technology can help improve the safety of medical care and interventions. Penn State’s Institute for CyberScience seminar series will feature a speaker who is working on using AI and machine learning to spot possible negative side effects that people might encounter when they are using multiple drugs.
AI could offer warnings about serious side effects of drug-drug interactions
“The more medications a patient takes, the greater the likelihood that interactions between those drugs could trigger negative side effects, including long-term organ damage and even death. Now, researchers at Penn State have developed a machine learning system that may be able to warn doctors and patients about possible negative side effects that might occur when drugs are mixed.” August 2, 2019
Researchers’ paper on complex networks honored as milestone contribution
“A research paper authored by three Penn State researchers has been honored by the prestigious peer-reviewed scientific journal Physical Review E (PRE) as part of the publication’s ongoing 25th anniversary celebration.
Usha Nandini Raghavan, a Penn State alumna, Réka Albert, distinguished professor of physics and biology, and Soundar Kumara, Allen E. Pearce and Allen M. Pierce Professor of Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering, co-authored the paper, titled ‘Near linear time algorithm to detect community structures in large-scale networks.’ ” August 10, 2018
Researchers develop new method to identify patients at risk for readmission, emergency room visits or death
Historically, hospital patients have been at a high risk for adverse effects after they are discharged, according to the Institute of Medicine. These effects can be defined as unplanned bad circumstances that are directly related to the patient’s diagnosis, clinical conditions or the care they received while in the hospital. Many times these events lead to the patient being readmitted, going to the emergency room or, even worse, dying.
Researchers from Penn State and Geisinger Health System teamed up to find a way to predict a patient’s risk for needing further medical care three days after being discharged from the hospital. The model they developed is known as REDD, which stands for readmission, emergency department (ED) or death.” June 4, 2018
Kumara to teach health care data analytics course in India
“Soundar Kumara is one of three instructors that will be teaching a course on “Data Analytics with Applications to Health Care” at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Madras (India) in early 2017.
Kumara, Allen E. Pearce and Allen M. Pearce Professor of Industrial Engineering, along with R. P. Sundarraj and C. Rajendran, professors at IIT Madras, submitted their course proposal to the government of India under the Global Initiative Academic Networks (GIAN) program.”