Lauren Beckingham, assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering, was named the inaugural recipient of the Emerging Investigator Award from Applied Geochemistry, the Journal of the International Association of Geochemistry. She and Karen McNeal, the Molette Endowed Professor of geosciences, also received a $139,375 National Science Foundation grant for research with Tuskegee University titled “Developing a Diverse, Future-oriented Workforce for Renewable Energy Industries.
Majid Beidaghi, associate professor of materials engineering, received a $969,547 grant from the National Science Foundation for a project titled “Improving Academic Success and Graduation of Transfer Students in Undergrad ME Programs.” Co-investigators are Rob Jackson, Jeffrey Fergus and Edward Davis.
David Bevly, the Bill and Lana McNair Professor of mechanical engineering, was awarded a $100,000 grant from IS4S to support his work in the GPS and Vehicle Dynamics Laboratory.
Saad Biaz, professor of computer science and software engineering, was awarded the 2021 Undergraduate Research Faculty Mentoring Award by the Computing Research Association.
Fa Foster Dai, the Godbold Chair of electrical and computer engineering, and his former Ph.D. student Hechen Wang were issued a U.S. patent for “Radio Frequency (RF) to Digital Polar Data Converter and Time-to-Digital Converter Based Time Domain Signal Processing Receiver.”
Siyuan Dai, assistant professor of materials engineering, received a $228,110 grant from the National Science Foundation for a project titled “Van Der Waals Polaritonics For Mid-Infrared Light Emitters.”
Virginia Davis, the Dr. Daniel F. and Josephine Breeden Professor of chemical engineering, and Robert Ashurst, the Uthlaut Family Associate Professor of chemical engineering, received a $477,650 from the U.S. Department of Agriculture for a project titled “Cellulose Nanocrystals: A Versatile Platform for The Detection of Allergens and Emerging Contaminants.”
Mario Eden, the Joe T. and Billie Carole McMillan Professor and chemical engineering department chair, was recognized as the author of one of the top 1% most cited articles by Industrial & Engineering Chemistry Research, a prominent chemical engineering journal.
Xiaowen Gong, assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering, was named an associate editor of the journal IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications.
Brendan Higgins, assistant professor of biosystems engineering, and Sushil Adhikari, the Alumni Professor of biosystems engineering, received a $391,099 National Science Foundation grant to create a Research Experiences for Undergraduates site in bioprocessing for conversion of waste into products of value.
Rob Jackson, the Albert J. Smith Jr. Professor of mechanical engineering, recent graduate Kefei Xu and doctoral student Nolan Chu won a Best Presentation Award at the International Tribology Research Symposium for “An Investigation of the Elastic Cylindrical Line Contact Equations for Plane Strain and Stress Considering Friction.”
Wei-Shinn (Jeff) Ku, professor of computer science and software engineering, was named an associate editor of the journal IEEE Transactions on Knowledge and Data Engineering.
Pradeep Lall, the John and Anne MacFarlane Professor of mechanical engineering, was appointed program vice-chair for the 2021 InterPACK Conference sponsored by the American Society of Mechanical Engineers.
Fabricio Leiva, assistant research professor at the National Center for Asphalt Technology, received a $228,028 grant from the Minnesota Department of Transportation for a project titled “Continuous Asphalt Mixture Compaction Assessment Using Density Profiling System.”
Bo Liu, assistant professor of computer science and software engineering, was named an associate editor of the journal IEEE Transactions on Neural Networks and Learning Systems.
Joseph Majdalani, the Francis Chair of Excellence of aerospace engineering, and postdoctoral scholar Li-Jun Xuan published a feature cover article in the Physics of Fluids journal explaining the so-called Pohlhausen paradox.
Shiwen Mao, the Earle C. Williams Eminent Scholar Chair of electrical and computer engineering, was named a distinguished lecturer of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Communications Society for 2021-2022. The society has only 40 distinguished lecturers around the world.
Scott Martin, assistant research professor of mechanical engineering, was awarded two grants totaling $125,000 from Radiance to support his work in the GPS and Vehicle Dynamics Laboratory.
Michael Perez, assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering, was appointed to a three-year term as the chair of the Transportation Research Board’s AKD50 Committee on Hydrology, Hydraulics and Stormwater.
Vrishank Raghav, assistant professor of aerospace engineering, was awarded $242,618 from the National Science Foundation for his research study “Effect of Pulsatility On Expiratory Droplet-Laden Flows” in collaboration with University of Michigan researchers.
Meredith Reid, assistant research professor of electrical and computer engineering, was named a handling editor for Aperture, the journal of the Organization for Human Brain Mapping.
Chad Rose, assistant professor of mechanical engineering, was awarded a $183,500 grant from Intelligent Automation Inc. for a project titled “Rodeo: Roll-Over Detection For Equipment-Transporter Operation.”
Anton Schindler, the Mountain Spirit Professor of structural engineering and Highway Research Center director, was awarded the 2021 Delmar L. Bloem Distinguished Service Award from the American Concrete Institute for outstanding leadership of ACI’s Technical Committee 237.
Alice Smith, the Joe W. Forehand/Accenture Professor of industrial and systems engineering, was named a Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Ambassador for the Institute for Operations Research and Management Science for her project “Stimulating Participation of Underrepresented Groups in INFORMS Editorial Boards.” She also delivered an IEEE CIS Distinguished Lecture to the Kolkata, India chapter of the IEEE Computational Intelligence Society and a keynote address to the Latin American Summer School of Computational Intelligence, an annual IEEE event held in Chile.
Jakita Thomas, the Philpott-WestPoint Stevens Associate Professor of computer science and software engineering, was named to Cell Mentor’s list of 1,000 inspiring Black scientists in America.
Adriana Vargas, assistant research professor at the National Center for Asphalt Technology, received a $132,000 grant from Pacific Geosource for training, practical research and technical support.
Fan Yin, assistant research professor at the National Center for Asphalt Technology, received a $100,000 grant from the Minnesota Department of Transportation for a project titled “Impact of Polymer Modification of Ideal-Ct and I-Fit for Balanced Mix Design.”
Promotions and Tenure
Majid Beidaghi was promoted to associate professor of materials engineering and awarded tenure.
Pengyu Chen was promoted to associate professor of materials engineering and awarded tenure.
Lorenzo Cremaschi was promoted to professor of mechanical engineering.
Edward Davis was promoted to associate professor of materials engineering and awarded tenure.
Sa’d Hamasha was promoted to associate professor of industrial and systems engineering and awarded tenure.
Gregory Harris, associate professor of industrial and systems engineering, was awarded tenure.
Jasmeet Lamba was promoted to associate professor of biosystems engineering and awarded tenure.
Nima Shamsaei was promoted to the Philpott-WestPoint Stevens Distinguished Professor of mechanical engineering.
Aleksandr Vinel was promoted to associate professor of industrial and systems engineering and awarded tenure.
Xinyu Zhang was promoted to professor of chemical engineering.
