Sara M. Hashmi

Sara M. Hashmi is an Assistant Professor of Chemical Engineering at Northeastern University, with affiliations in Mechanical and Industrial Engineering and Chemistry and Chemical Biology. She holds a PhD and MS from Yale University (2008 and 2004). Her research focuses on complex fluids, biomaterials, and soft materials, specifically manipulating nanoscale properties to control macroscale transport and assembly. Applications span biomedical, pharmaceutical, and energy fields. Her lab, the Complex Fluids Lab, investigates microfluidics and polymer gel dynamics, addressing clogging mechanisms in confined flows.

Key awards include the 2023 NSF CAREER Award for studying in situ gelation in microchannel flows. She has secured grants like the Northeastern Spark Fund (2022, 2024) for high-throughput particle measurement technologies. Notable research includes understanding discontinuous clogging in tapered microchannels and developing machine learning tools for droplet optimization.

• Education:
  • PhD, Engineering & Applied Science, Yale University (2008)
  • MS, Engineering & Applied Science, Yale University (2004)
• Labs/Teams: Complex Fluids Lab, Institute for Mechanobiology
• Grants:
  • NSF CAREER Award ($550,000)
  • Spark Fund Awards (2022, 2024)

Her work bridges fundamental fluid mechanics with practical applications, mentoring students like Saeed Alborzi (Oral Exam 2021) and Sabrina Maroto (Proposal Defense 2021). Current projects include in situ polymer gelation studies and novel particle elasticity measurement devices.