UConn Tech Park News

A Bright Idea: Connecting STEM Learning and Energy Efficiency

Posted on October 28, 2026October 29, 2026 by Melanie Noble

How much can a light bulb teach us about energy use? At UConn Engineering’s 2026 STEM Family Field Day, the Southern New England Industrial Training and Assessment Center (ITAC) brought energy efficiency into the spotlight with its “Light Bulb Face-Off.”

Held October 4 at the UConn Volleyball Center, STEM Family Field Day invited families to explore engineering through interactive exhibits and hands-on activities. The event offered an opportunity to introduce younger learners to the science and engineering concepts that shape everyday life.

The Light Bulb Face-Off also reflected a practical challenge with real-world implications: understanding how lighting choices affect energy consumption. For manufacturers and other businesses, improving lighting efficiency can be one way to reduce electricity use and operating costs.

Based at UConn Tech Park’s Innovation Partnership Building, the ITAC connects engineering education with industrial applications. Funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, the center provides eligible small and medium-sized manufacturers with no-cost energy assessments to identify opportunities to improve efficiency, reduce waste, and strengthen productivity. Its faculty-and-student teams gain hands-on experience evaluating energy use and developing recommendations for real facilities.

By bringing energy efficiency into a family STEM event, ITAC helped connect a familiar technology with a broader engineering challenge: finding practical ways to use resources more efficiently. Activities like these can encourage curiosity about how everyday systems work—and how engineering knowledge can help solve problems at home, in industry, and throughout the community.

CyberSEED 2026 Challenges 129 Teams to Put Cybersecurity Skills to the Test

Posted on October 28, 2026October 29, 2026 by Melanie Noble

Cybersecurity requires more than understanding the theory behind digital threats. It takes analytical thinking, technical skills, and the ability to solve problems under pressure. Those skills were on display October 3 as 129 teams competed in CyberSEED 2026, an online Capture the Flag (CTF) competition hosted by UConn’s Connecticut Advanced Computing Center (CACC).

The annual competition brought together students from 70 colleges and universities across the country for hands-on challenges in cybersecurity, including cryptography, open-source intelligence, password cracking, digital forensics, network traffic analysis, reverse engineering, and web application security.

Teams earned points by solving technical problems and analyzing potential security vulnerabilities. The competition also included an incident response briefing, giving participants an opportunity to practice communicating technical findings and risks to an audience of stakeholders.

Bits For Everyone from the United States Military Academy took first place, followed by cu_kaazmo from Cedarville University in second and CyberLions from Pennsylvania State University in third. Teams from Purdue University, the University of Central Florida, the SANS Technology Institute, and other institutions also finished among the top 10. View the complete list of winners.


Bits for Everyone First Place	cu_kaazmo Second Place	CyberLions Third Place

For participants, the experience offered more than a leaderboard finish. One team from the Rochester Institute of Technology described how the competition helped deepen its understanding of cybersecurity concepts through practical application. The team also highlighted the incident response briefing as an opportunity to strengthen its ability to communicate technical risks and recommendations.

Hosted by CACC and sponsored by Synchrony, with the competition platform provided by Cyber Skyline, CyberSEED connects students with challenging, practical exercises that complement their academic studies. By encouraging participants to apply their knowledge in a competitive setting, the event helps students develop skills relevant to the evolving cybersecurity field.

The 2026 competition continued UConn’s longstanding involvement in cybersecurity education and research, bringing students together to learn, collaborate, and test their abilities against a diverse set of technical challenges.

Separations Technology Workshop Connects Research with Real-World Challenges

Posted on October 28, 2026October 29, 2026 by Melanie Noble

From recovering critical materials to improving water treatment, separations technologies play an important role in addressing industrial and environmental challenges. At the 5th Industrial Workshop on Separations Technology, held October 1–2, 2026, at UConn Tech Park’s Innovation Partnership Building, researchers, industry leaders, startups, and investors came together to discuss emerging technologies and the challenges of bringing them to market.

Hosted by the University of Connecticut, the workshop drew 120 attendees from more than 70 companies and universities. The two-day program combined technical presentations with opportunities to exchange ideas, showcase research, and build connections across the separations technology community.

The event began with an early career workshop, followed by a networking reception featuring 20 student research posters and a startup pitch competition. Students from UConn, Yale University, MIT, Tufts University, and Clarkson University presented their work, while five startups pitched technologies addressing opportunities in water and critical materials. Hydron Desalination won the pitch competition, receiving a trophy and a cash award sponsored by Xylem.

Friday’s sessions explored applications across energy, industrial processing, critical materials recovery, desalination, water treatment, and water reuse. Presenters from organizations including PolyCera, SLB, Via Separations, ChemFinity Technologies, KMX Technologies, Xylem, Veolia, and NanoH2O shared developments ranging from advanced membranes to new approaches for recovering valuable resources.

The program also looked beyond the technologies to consider what it takes to move innovations forward. Panels on water technology, critical materials and energy, and sustainable technology financing brought together representatives from startups, established companies, and investment organizations. Additional briefings highlighted initiatives from XPRIZE, the Advanced Research Projects Agency–Energy (ARPA-E), and the MEMBRANE Center led by the National Laboratory of the Rockies.

Attendees also toured the Connecticut Center for Applied Separations Technologies (CCAST) at the Innovation Partnership Building, gaining a closer look at the facilities supporting the center’s applied separations research.

Throughout the workshop, discussions connected technical advances with the needs of the industries that could put them to use. Understanding those needs can help researchers and emerging companies identify opportunities for further development and more effective solutions.

By bringing together people working across research, industry, and investment, the annual workshop creates opportunities to share expertise, explore common challenges, and strengthen connections that can help move separations technologies toward practical application.

Interested in attending or participating in future workshops? Click here to join the mailing list.

UConn Researchers Win Inaugural DOE Genesis Mission Award

Posted on July 27, 2026 by Melanie Noble

Register by May 15 for EAS Pharmaceutical Analysis Symposium

Posted on May 11, 2026May 11, 2026 by Melanie Noble

UConn Tech Park Hosts 4th Annual Separations Workshop, Showcasing Innovation Across Industry and Academia

Posted on October 26, 2025February 9, 2026 by Maham Waqar

UConn Tech Park was a hub of scientific exchange and industry collaboration earlier this month as it hosted the 4th Industrial Workshop on Separations Technology, organized by the Connecticut Center for Applied Separations Technologies (CCAST). The two-day event held in early October drew more than 100 participants from over 70 companies and universities, highlighting cutting-edge research and commercialization in the separations field.

The workshop opened with an Early Career session featuring 14 talks, a keynote by renowned separations scientist Kamalesh Sirkar, and a career panel with experts from academia, national labs, and startups. The following evening, a lively poster session showcased 25 research projects from students and postdocs representing more than a dozen labs nationwide.

This year’s program expanded on its tradition of connecting science with application. Technical presentations and panels covered a range of topics, including new membrane materials, gas and water separations, and critical materials recovery. Speakers from both industry and academia—including Francesco Benedetti (Osmoses), Emily Rabe (Membrion), Eric Hoek (UCLA), and Tom Pankratz (Global Water Intelligence)—shared insights into emerging technologies and market trends.

Panels on venture capital, critical materials, and water technology brought together investors, entrepreneurs, and researchers to discuss commercialization challenges and sustainability opportunities. In the popular startup pitch competition, Recovered Potential, a Stanford spinout developing ammonia recovery technologies, won first place, followed by OsmoPure Technologies from the University of Colorado Boulder.

CCAST also showcased its state-of-the-art separations laboratory, located at Tech Park, where it advances both academic and industry research in water treatment, gas separation, and membrane development.

Sponsored by the Connecticut Department of Economic and Community Development, UConn College of Engineering, Verico Technology LLC, and others, the workshop continues to grow as a premier forum for innovation at the intersection of science, engineering, and sustainability.

Interested in attending or participating in future workshops? Click here to join the mailing list.