Five of this year’s Governor’s STEM Scholars are from New Jersey Institute of Technology — the most from any college in the state and the university’s highest total in a single year.

The Highlanders are among a select cohort of 16 college-level scholars and a larger pool of 111 that includes high school students interested in STEM.

Each college scholar plays a leadership role, sharing expertise and offering guidance to a group of about a half-dozen high schoolers as they tackle global problems at a local level.

A quadriplegic for the past 11 years, Julissa Santiago is the master of her own comfort. With the precision of a polite drill sergeant, she delivers instructions at bedtime for a series of minute body shifts and covers placed just so. And yet she still struggles to sleep.

The human body can heal itself, but only up to a point. If an injury removes 20% or more of a muscle — as can happen in car accidents, certain surgeries or explosions in combat zones — natural processes can’t, on their own, replace it. Instead, the wound seals up, covered by scar tissue.  

“The body sees this extensive loss of tissue as an insurmountable void,” says Jonathan Grasman, an assistant professor of biomedical engineering. 

New Jersey Institute of Technology’s standing in national rankings continues to rise with U.S. News & World Report placing NJIT No. 84 among U.S. universities — improving two places from last year — in the 2025 edition of its Best Colleges list.

The latest ranking extends NJIT’s upward trajectory — climbing 19 spots since 2022 — and supports the findings of other publications that rank U.S. universities, which emphasize value and return on investment.

New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT) is launching a new, $10+ million initiative that will significantly advance the university’s strength in the field of artificial intelligence (AI) and position NJIT to become a leader in both AI research and application in higher education. This augments already significant existing academic and research activity in AI and related programs. In 2023 alone, NJIT research related to AI totaled nearly $60 million.

Five professors and administrators from New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT) have been recognized as "Enterprising Women in Commerce" by Commerce Magazine, an honor that highlights outstanding achievements across a range of industries.

The honorees are among the select group chosen by the Commerce and Industry Association of New Jersey, celebrating excellence in fields including accounting, architecture, environmental services, financial services, health care, higher education, human resources, law, marketing, non-profit work and real estate.

Materium Technologies, a startup company with deep NJIT roots, is bringing data science innovations into the slowly evolving field of solar energy panels.

Startups are always a gamble, but the Materium team has a good hand, with two pair of Highlanders — recent alumni Sheldon Fereira (M.S. ‘23) and Scott Daniel (M.S. ‘24), advised by Professor Nuggehalli Ravindra and Adjunct Instructor Michael Jaffe. Their collective scientific expertise spans the worlds of artificial intelligence, applied physics, biomedical engineering, and semiconductors.