Spring 2025: Particulate-ly a Good Semester

UIUC AAAR
May 9
6 min read

AAAR@UIUC members kept busy this spring. Our organization hosted a mix of social and professional events, and supported our members as they prepared publications, applications, and presentations. Our 2024-2025 president, Erin Emme, provided the following message:

“Thank you to all the AAAR@UIUC 2024-2025 board and student chapter members who have made this a great year for us! From journal clubs, social events, weekly writing times at the Literary, panel discussions, and an award-winning Engineering Open House exhibit, our student chapter was able to grow academically and professionally while fostering community among us students researching similar topics. I'm so thankful that I was given the opportunity to be our chapter's president for the last year and am so looking forward to seeing what Tahsina has in store for us next year! Congratulations to all the new members of the board, and to all members for another fantastic year!”

Check out more about this semester’s activities below:

Weekly writing group

We held weekly writing sessions in a local cafe, The Literary. This delightful cafe combines some of our favorites as grad students–coffee, tea, snacks and books! It was a great environment to focus each week, and by the end of the semester the baristas even knew our orders by heart! We did not only drink coffee, however, we also were pretty studious about our writing. We supported one another in fellowship applications and grant proposals, giving feedback on each other’s work. We also worked on writing manuscripts, and a special shoutout to AAAR@UIUC President Erin Emme for successfully publishing her paper this semester, “Impacts of sea ice leads on sea salt aerosols and atmospheric chemistry in the Arctic” (Emme & Horowitz, 2025). Several other members likewise plan to submit manuscripts this summer!

Conference Awards

Erin Emme received an Outstanding Student Presentation Award for her poster presentation at the American Geophysical Union Fall 2024 annual meeting, for her poster “Impacts of Sea Ice Leads on Sea Salt Aerosols and Atmospheric Chemistry in the Arctic”. Congrats Erin!

Mashiat Hossain received two presentation awards at the American Meteorological Society 2025 Annual Meeting. She won 2nd place for her oral presentation in Atmospheric Chemistry conference for her presentation "Assessing Compliance with Updated NAAQS PM2.5 Annual Standard: The Role of Regional and Transboundary Emissions," and 1st place student oral presentation in the 17th Symposium on Aerosol Cloud Climate Interactions for her presentation on "Assessing the Impact of Marine Aerosols on Cloud Dynamics in the Southeast Atlantic: Insights from a Chemical Transport Model." Great work Mashiat!

EES/ CLiMAS Seminar presentations

Due to the interdisciplinary nature of our research, our group has members pursuing degrees in Environmental Engineering & Science (EES) and Climate, Meteorology and Atmospheric Sciences (CliMAS). This semester, several members presented their work in departmental seminars.

On January 31, Manho Park shared a proposed project in the EES seminar, developed as part of a fellowship application. It was valuable to learn how he approached the research proposal process, and we were glad to provide feedback to strengthen his application. We all are rooting for him and hope he is awarded the fellowship! Tessa Clarizio and P.S. Ganesh Subramanian both presented in EES Seminar on February 28. Tessa presented “Advocating to Congress in support of Science,” based on a workshop she led for AAAR@UIUC (more details in the “Policy Workshop” section). Ganesh presented “Chemical and Oxidative Properties of Indoor PM: Discerning the Influence of Residential Characteristics,” where he shared results from chamber experiments testing emissions from common household sources of air pollution, including cigarettes, toasters, candles and incense. Kyuhaeng Lee presented in the CliMAS seminar on March 11. His presentation, “Single Particle Instrument Simulator: Bridging Experiments and Models” discussed preliminary results from his work on simulating aerosol mixing state.

Candle making Social

We kicked off the semester with a Candle Making social on February 4, 2025 at Firedoll Artisan Chandlery. We selected different essential oils to make our own unique blend of scents, and got to name the candle ourselves! I personally chose some relaxing lavender and chamomile tea scents to help remind me to relax after a stressful day in graduate school. It was so fun to see everyone’s creations! And those studying indoor sources of aerosols had their fears assuaged–Firedoll only uses natural soy and beeswax bases for their candles, and we learned from Ganesh’s EES presentation that candles have minimal indoor emissions in any case (unless there is a draft/wind present)!

Firedoll Candle-Making Social Event

Policy Workshop

Tessa Clarizio led a workshop on February 19, 2025 on how to successfully engage with policymakers to promote funding of scientific research. She helped attendees understand the institutional structure of Congress and how it influences scientific research, identified Illinois Congressional Representatives and their policy priorities, and provided tools to compose advocacy letters to members of Congress that align with their priorities to support science and research funding. She also discussed university and federal regulations on researchers engaging in advocacy work. Many attendees went on to contact their representatives in support of federal science funding. Tessa later led this workshop again at the EES weekly seminar, and you can read more about this presentation on her blog.

Journal Club

On March 24, 2025, Manho Park led a thought-provoking journal club discussion on, “Manufacturing Gender in Commercial and Military Cockpit Design” by Weber (1997). This paper discussed how cockpit designs, originally tailored for the male-dominated military, have been adopted by commercial aviation, unintentionally excluding many women due to physical incompatibility. It argues that meaningful change will likely require government intervention rather than market-driven solutions.

Our group reflected on parallels in STEM fields today. Several members shared personal experiences with lab equipment, PPE and infrastructure that failed to account for diverse body types–creating inefficiencies and unnecessary barriers for both women and men. The conversation also touched on how academic career timelines often conflict with family planning, particularly for women, due to systemic gaps in parental leave and financial support during graduate and postdoctoral stages.

We concluded by emphasizing the value of diversity, including the global perspectives brought by our international peers. These conversations reminded us that inclusive design and equitable systems aren’t just ethical—they strengthen science and help everyone succeed.

Engineering Open House Exhibit

Our exhibit, “Care for the Air” won 3rd place in Sustainability at Engineering Open House, which took place on April 4th and 5th. The exhibit featured interactive displays, including “smog in a jar,” real-time air quality as detected by low-cost sensors, and the impact of C-R boxes (a DIY air filter) on improving indoor air quality. We also discussed common indoor air pollutants, showing filter samples collected from chamber experiments. Thank you to all who planned the event and volunteered.

EES Symposium & 30th Anniversary Event + Happy Hour

The EES program hosted its 30th Annual Research Symposium, and a special Anniversary Event on April 10th and 11th. Several AAAR@UIUC board members played key roles in planning the symposium and presenting their research.

The Anniversary Event featured two panel discussions, “CEE for Emergencies” and “Community Emergency Planning.” The first panel entailed a series of faculty presentations on how their research supports community preparedness and resilience. Topics included modeling emergency transportation and evacuation, developing tools in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, and addressing housing crises. The second panel brought together community leaders from the university and across various levels of government. We learned about UIUC’s emergency response protocols, and how the Champaign-Urbana Public Health District collaborated with UIUC to keep community COVID-19 levels low via the use of rapid, frequent, and accessible saliva-based testing. The panel also highlighted the Champaign County Champaign County Emergency Management Agency’s response to disasters like tornadoes, how the State of Illinois Department of Public Health works to improve outreach and accessibility, and how the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers supports rapid deployment efforts in disaster-impacted communities. Tessa Clarizio and P.S. Ganesh Subramanian served as panel moderators, helping facilitate thoughtful questions and conversation.

During the symposium itself, several of our members presented their research through oral and poster presentations, including:

Session: “Artificial Intelligence, Data Science in Environmental Engineering”.
- Manho Park - “Fast machine-learned advection solver powered by SimpleChains.jl”. (Oral).
Session: “Air Quality, Indoor Air Quality, Climate Change”.
- Erin Emme - “Impact of Seasonality for Mid-Latitude Marine Cloud Brightening in Combating Global Warming.” (Oral).
- Qurat ul ain Fatima - “Hyperlocal air pollution prediction via traffic surveillance and computer vision: A Multi-City Comparative Study.” (Poster).
- Mashiat Hossain - “Impacts of Marine Aerosols on Aerosol-Cloud Interactions Over the Southeast Atlantic: Insights from a Chemical Transport Model.” (Poster).
- Oluchi Nweke - “Chemical, Oxidative, and Toxicological Profiles of Fine Ambient Particulate Matter in Alaska.” (Poster).

We celebrated our award from EOH and a successful EES Symposium at a Happy Hour at the Literary in downtown Champaign!

Photos from Engineering Open House and EES Symposium events

AAAR election

We elected a new board for the 2025 - 2026 academic year. We are looking forward to another great year!

President: Tahsina Alam
Vice-President: Kyuhaeng Lee
Secretary: Qurat ul Ain Fatima
Treasurer: Mashiat Hossain
Membership Director/Social Media Coordinator: Erin Emme
Social event coordinator: Manho Park

Ice cream social

We celebrated the end of a successful semester with ice cream at the Main Scoop in Urbana. We chilled (pun-intended) together over cones and cups, reflected on the semester, and shared plans for the summer.

End of semester ice cream social

Conclusion

As we wrap up Spring 2025, we're proud of the progress we’ve made, the friendships we’ve strengthened, and the research we’ve pushed forward. Thanks to everyone for sticking with us through the highs and the PM2.5s–stay tuned to see what is on the forecast for next year!