June 29, 2026
Ģý photo / J. Adam Fenster
Dear members of the Hajim School community,
has been a fixture on the campus since 1980 and gives students the opportunity to design, build, test, and race small, one-seater off-road vehicles, competing against teams from universities around the world in competitions run by the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) International. Ģý’s team currently has more than two dozen undergraduates and welcomes students of any major, whether they are interested in hands-on engineering work or positions in operations or marketing.
After working tirelessly on their car for the past year, Yellowjacket Racing put their skills and hard work to the test earlier this month at , facing off against 100 other teams from across North and South America in a four-day event that featured competitions in design, maneuverability, suspension and traction, hill climb, and a four-hour endurance race. I’m proud to share the team was a formidable competitor in every aspect of the event, finishing 29th overall, in a tie for 29th in the design presentation, 39th in acceleration, and 34th in the four-hour endurance race.
Several of the students reflected on how the skills and relationships they built through Baja have enriched their education. Learn what drives these students to be ever better at the News Center.
PHOTON CUP
While the World Cup is captivating people across the globe, the University recently spotlighted a fun soccer tradition close to home: the Photon Cup. Each year, the students and faculty from the and the have a friendly soccer match in the spring.
I’m happy to report that the optics team preserved their winning streak and have taken home the Photon Cup every year since 2018. .
WENJIE ZHANG NAMED FURTH FUND WINNER
Congratulations to , who is one of three faculty from across the University to win a Furth Fund award. The Valerie and Frank Furth Fund provides awards to help foster the development of promising scientists in the natural and biological sciences. It provides early career scientists with up to $14,500 in research funds to promote their research activities, which may include the purchase of new equipment or support for graduate students or postdocs.
NEWLY FUNDED RESEARCH
Congratulations to the following faculty who secured new sponsored research projects:
- , a research assistant professor at the Institute of Optics, received $681,537 from the Air Force Research Lab for a project titled “Mapping how curved sensors will transform the solution space of freeform unobscured reflective imagers and spectrometers.”
- Professor and Associate Professor from the received $500,000 from Longview Philanthropy for a project titled “On-chip Voltage Regulators as Analog Sensors for AI Workload Verification.”
- , the Marie C. Wilson and Joseph C. Wilson Professor of Optical Physics, received $58,484 from Army Research Laboratory for a project titled “Toward gravimetry enabled by nonlinear quantum phononics.”
INDEPENDENCE DAY
The University will be closed this Friday in observance of Independence Day and there will be no edition of Hajim Highlights on July 6. The next edition will be in your inbox on July 13. I hope you have a wonderful 4th of July.
Your dean,
Wendi Heinzelman
