News

This past January, Lehigh's Institute for Functional Materials and Devices (I-FMD) formally launched the "Research Experience at Lehigh (RE@L) Scholars program in partnership with Lehigh Carbon Community College (LCCC). This program is designed to provide direct research experience for high-performing second year students from LCCC, offering them a unique opportunity to directly participate in scientific research and better prepare them for their futures upon graduating from LCCC. The program was designed based on the successful...

Lehigh's Institute for Functional Materials and Devices hosted a workshop on April 8, 2025 on X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) techniques. This event was organized by Dr. Ryan Thorpe, Surface Science Manager for I-FMD, and was generously sponsored by Thermo Fisher Scientific. The full day event kicked off with an overview of Lehigh's Materials Characterization facility, including I-FMD's near-ambient pressure XPS (NAP-XPS), which is a unique capability that is only available at a handful of institutions...

Faculty and staff from Lehigh's Institute Functional Materials and Devices were among the presenters at the first of its kind "Interdisciplinary Research in the Arts Symposium" held at Lehigh University on March 21, 2025. The symposium was jointly sponsored by the Lehigh University Art Galleries (LUAG) and the Vice Provost for Research (VPR) office. The event featured a total of 20 presentation, performances and discussions and was open to all members of the Lehigh and...

Elsa Reichmanis, Professor and Carl Robert Anderson Chair in Chemical Engineering in Lehigh University’s P.C. Rossin College of Engineering and Applied Science, has been named director of Lehigh’s Institute for Functional Materials and Devices (I-FMD), effective July 1, 2024. She succeeds I-FMD’s founding director, Himanshu Jain, Professor and T.L. Diamond Distinguished Chair in Engineering and Applied Science, who has led the institute since 2018. Jain will be taking on a new role with the National...

During Jain’s tenure, I-FMD has grown to include nearly 70 affiliated Lehigh faculty members, with interdisciplinary teams developing multi-PI proposals, working on numerous projects, and securing grant funding, including a $6 million grant from the NSF’s Accelerating Research Translation (ART) Program. I-FMD hosts annual workshops to spark collaborations with external academic, industry, and government partners and educate researchers on topics such as X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and electron microscopy. “I am thankful to the colleagues who...