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Edward Hensel

Spectrum News speaks with Ed Hensel, associate dean for graduate programs in RIT's Kate Gleason College of Engineering, about a $4.8 million FDA-funded study using new technology to monitor real-world vaping behaviors and better understand how e-cigarette users consume nicotine.

RIT researchers are studying real-world e-cigarette use to better understand nicotine exposure and inform future testing standards.

As the final phase of the new research building is completed, faculty-researchers from three of RIT’s colleges are preparing to be its first residents. They expect to move into the 39,000-square-foot building in the spring semester.

Work by Risa Robinson and members of the Respiratory Technologies Laboratory completely shifted how e-cigarette analysis is done and became an industry model. Through this new viewpoint, the team recorded harmful emissions that were not otherwise seen in a lab setting, and this data contributed to FDA policies and regulations about e-cigarette usage today.

U.S. News and World Report talks to Doreen Edwards, dean of the Kate Gleason College of Engineering, and Ed Hensel, associate dean for research and graduate studies, about the benefits of graduate degrees in engineering.

Three new engineering doctoral degree programs at RIT were approved by the New York State Department of Education and are focused on using multidisciplinary approaches to solving today’s global challenges.

Intersections: The RIT Podcast, Ep. 21: Are electronic cigarettes really a healthier alternative to tobacco products? Risa Robinson, head of RIT’s Department of Mechanical Engineering, talks with Edward Hensel, associate dean, about their unique research methods into how these devices are used and how they affect users’ health.

Emma Sarles ’17 (industrial design) has taken the road less traveled to become an engineer. Without ever earning a bachelor’s degree in engineering, Sarles has spent the last two years working toward a customized professional studies master’s degree that specializes in medical device engineering and applied biomaterials.

Risa Robinson has taken a different approach to assessing e-cigarette usage, and it’s turned up some attention-getting results. Robinson studies users in their own environments, puffing on their own e-cigarettes, rather than on test machines in lab settings. And what she’s found is that they are puffing as much, if not more, than traditional cigarette users, resulting in potentially higher exposure to harmful substances.