In mid-October, Professor Jonathan Rothstein of the Mechanical and Industrial Engineering Department ran his annual STEM Outreach event at the Houston Children's Museum. “This is the fifth time we have run this event ahead of the Society of Rheology meeting,” said Rothstein. “It is a program that I developed for the Society of Rheology. We have averaged over 300 kids and 30 volunteers over the last five years.”
News
Jonathan Rothstein
Shannon Roberts, director of the College of Engineering Human Performance Laboratory, investigates the way people react to automation, with the goal of reducing traffic accidents.
See the video here.
Ian Grosse (c)
In late August Professor Ian Grosse of the Mechanical and Industrial Engineering Department received the Distinguished Service Award from the Computers and Information in Engineering (CIE) Division of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME). Grosse earned the award “in recognition and appreciation of leadership and outstanding service to the ASME Computers and Information in Engineering Division.” Grosse was elected an ASME Fellow in 2012.
Professor Wen Chen of the UMass Mechanical and Industrial Engineering Department is on a team of scientists from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), UMass Amherst, and Harvard University working on a process for hierarchical 3-D printing of gold that could revolutionize the manufacture of electrochemical reactors, sensors, and actuators. Chen, a former postdoctoral research scientist at LLNL, helped develop an alloying and de-alloying process that was the key to the findings.
See media coverage: Phys.org, Science & Technology Research News, Nanowerk.
Ashwin Ramasubramaniam
An international grant will support pioneering research into a new class of catalysts that will enable the efficient conversion of carbon dioxide to higher-value chemicals and fuels. The National Science Foundation and the US-Israel Binational Science Foundation have awarded a three-year, $340,884 grant to support a groundbreaking research project led by Professor Ashwin Ramasubramaniam of the Mechanical and Industrial Engineering Department at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.
Matthew Eden
Undergraduate student Matthew Eden of the Mechanical and Industrial Engineering (MIE) Department has been selected as one of six finalists for the 2018 Undergraduate O.R. Prize Competition at the annual meeting of the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS) in Phoenix, Arizona, from November 4 to 7. Eden’s research paper is titled "Evolving contact network algorithm: a new simulation method for modeling HIV, a disease with low prevalence but a critical public health issue in the US."
Krish Thiagarajan Sharman
On July 19, Professor Krish Thiagarajan Sharman, the newly appointed Endowed Chair in Renewable Energy within the Mechanical and Industrial Engineering Department, made an official visit to the Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources (DOER) and the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center along with College of Engineering Dean Tim Anderson. This meeting was set up with the aim of introducing the endowed chair to the DOER. Dr. Sharman is an expert on marine renewable energy and energy producing offshore structures.
Once again the UMass Amherst College of Engineering ranks among the nation’s top engineering programs, climbing this year to No. 33 public in the U.S. News & World Report Best Colleges 2019.
Sierra Magazine, the national magazine of the Sierra Club, has placed the University of Massachusetts Amherst at No. 7 in its 12th annual “Cool Schools” ranking of North America’s greenest colleges and universities (See UMass News Office Story). The College of Engineering certainly must be considered in the forefront of this UMass surge toward the top of greenest schools in North America. A list of just a few recent projects will confirm this fact.
Erin Baker
Erin Baker, the Armstrong Professional Development Professor in the Mechanical and Industrial Engineering Department and the director of the UMass IGERT Offshore Wind Energy Program, has been appointed the new associate dean in the College of Engineering, a key position that includes more than a dozen significant job responsibilities.
