 The Chinese Institute
of Engineers has selected Jeong Kim (Ph.D. '91, reliability engineering), president
of Alcatel-Lucent Bell Labs, as the recipient of its 2009 Distinguished Lifetime
Achievement Award. The award recognizes Asian-American engineering professionals with
a record of significant personal achievements and contributions to academia, public
service and industry. Previous honorees have included Nobel Prize winners, renowned
professors and corporate leaders. Kim also was included on Fast Company Magazine's
"12 Most Creative Minds of 2008" list.
 Clark School
alumni George Stimak (pictured; MS '76, electrical engineering [EE], and MBA '83),
Kevin A. Boulis (Ph.D. '96, EE), Richard Fischer (B.S. '84, M.S.
'86 and Ph.D. '93, EE) and Jonathan G. Neumann (B.S. '00, M.S. '02 and Ph.D.
'05, EE) have been named
"Top Navy Scientist and Engineer of the Year." They were some of 34 scientists and engineers
recognized at the third annual Dr. Delores M. Etter Top Scientists and Engineers of the
Year awards ceremony.
 Stephen
Kerber (B.S. '03 and M.S. '05, fire protection engineering) and Daniel Madrzykowski
(B.S. '88, mechanical engineering, and M.S. '93, fire protection engineering) of the National Institute
for Standards in Technology have received the U.S. Department of Commerce Medal for
Scientific/Engineering Achievement for their work on positive pressure ventilation and
wind-driven fires.
 Aerospace
engineering alumna Jeanette Epps (M.S. '94 and Ph.D. '00) has been selected as
an astronaut in the NASA 2009 candidate class. She will begin training for space flight at the
Johnson Space Center in Houston later this summer.
 The Rotary National
Award for Space Achievement Foundation's National Board of Advisors has selected former NASA
Administrator Michael D. Griffin (Ph.D. '77, aerospace engineering [AE]) to receive its highest
honor, the National Space Trophy. The award has been presented annually for the past 23 years
to an individual who has excelled in furthering national goals in the field of space. Griffin
is now an eminent scholar and tenured professor in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace
Engineering at the University of Alabama in Huntsville.
 Syed Hasan (B.S. '04, AE),
a graduate student in the Department of Aerospace Engineering, received the NASA Space Flight
Awareness Honoree Award, which is presented to NASA employees for their dedication to quality
work and flight safety. Hasan also received the Space Flight Awareness Team Award. This award
is used to recognize small groups of employees that have demonstrated exemplary teamwork while
accomplishing a particular task or goal in support of the human space program.
 Pinar Akcora
(Ph.D. '05, CHE), formerly advised by Professor Peter Kofinas (bioengineering),
has been appointed to a
tenure-track position as an assistant professor in the Department of Chemical Engineering at the
University of Missouri.
 Alumnus Pradeep
Sharma (Ph.D. ’00, mechanical engineering [ME]) was recently selected as the recipient of the American
Society of Mechanical Engineers 2009 Thomas J.R. Hughes Young Investigator Award. Sharma was
advised by ME professor Abhijit Dasgupta.
 Thomas D.
Murphy (B.S. '57, chemical engineering) has received the Frank W. Reinhart Award from the American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM)
International Committee on Standards. He was honored for his leadership and service in
terminology standardization. Murphy has served on several ASTM committees addressing topics
as diverse as statistical quality control, pesticides, and pharmaceutical products, and
has previously received an Award of Merit and election to fellowship for his work.
 Civil and environmental
engineering (CEE) alumni Emin Kutay (M.S. '02 and Ph.D. '05, civil engineering) and Nelson
Gibson (B.S. '99, M.S. '02 and Ph.D. '06, civil engineering), along with co-author
Jack Youtcheff,
received the Walter J. Emmons Award for the best paper presented at the 2008 Annual Meeting of the
Association of Asphalt Paving Technologists.
 H. Vicky Zhao (M.S. '03
and Ph.D., '04, EE) was selected to receive the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
(IEEE) Signal Processing Society's 2008 Young Author Best Paper Award. She received the award
for a paper she co-authored with her advisor, Prof. K.J. Ray Liu, titled "Behavior Forensics
for Scalable Multiuser Collusion: Fairness vs Effectiveness," which appeared in the September
2006 issue of IEEE Transactions on Information Forensics and Security.
 Dan Goodman
(B.S. ’87, EE), a Smith School of Business senior fellow for renewable energy, was confirmed
recently by the Maryland Senate as one of nine Board members of the Maryland Clean
Energy Center. He was appointed to the position by Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley.
 Paul Tran (B.S.
'95, electrical engineering), founder of Elucid Solutions, has been honored by the Washington
Business Journal with its Minority Business Leader Award.
Top of page
 Paul C.
Hershey (M.S. '84 and Ph.D. '94, EE) was promoted to the position of Engineering Fellow at Raytheon.
Hershey was one of only nine individuals to receive this honor, given to Raytheon professionals
who have distinguished themselves through technical achievements and expertise in the application
of advanced technologies.
 Fischell Department of Bioengineering benefactor and namesake Robert E.
Fischell (M.S. '53, physics) was named the recipient of the 2009 President's Distinguished
Alumnus Award, which was presented at the 10th Annual Alumni Association Awards Gala this
April. The award recognizes an alumnus or alumna "for achieving national recognition for
excellence, both personally and professionally."
 Chan Mo Park
(M.S. '64 and Ph.D. '69, chemical engineering) received the University of Maryland Alumni
Association's 2009 International Alumnus Award. The award is presented to "a University
of Maryland alumna/us who was born or lives outside of the United States, and has distinguished
himself/herself by providing significant leadership to another country's educational, cultural,
social, and/or economic development." Park is the Special Advisor to the President of Korea
for Science and Technology, professor emeritus and immediate past president of the Pohang
University of Science and Technology, co-chair of the Founding Committee of the Pyongyang
University of Science and Technology, and an elected Fellow of the Korean Academy of Sciences
and Technology.
 Anh N. Duong
(B.S. '82, CHE) received the Clark School's 2009 Distinguished Engineering
Alumnus Award. The award recognizes an "engineering alumnus who exemplifies the bold visions,
bright future and new directions that make them a proud reflection of the leadership that is
nurtured and grown at Maryland." Duong, director of the Borders and Maritime Security Division
in the Science and Technology Directorate of the Department of Homeland Security, is an
internationally recognized expert in explosives currently focusing her efforts on combating terrorism.
 Nikhil Koratkar
(M.S. '98 and Ph.D. '00, AE) has been promoted to full professor at Rensselaer Polytechnic
Institute in the Department of Mechanical, Aerospace and Nuclear Engineering.
 Heather (Haitao) Zheng (M.S. '98 and Ph.D. '99, EE) has been
promoted to the position of associate professor with tenure in the Department of Computer
Science at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
 Enlu Zhou
M.S. '08 and (Ph.D. '09, EE)
will join the Department of Industrial and Enterprise Systems Engineering at the University
of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, as an assistant professor in the coming fall.
 Yechun Wang
(M.S. '04 and Ph.D. '07, CHE) was appointed an assistant professor in the Department of Mechanical
Engineering and Applied Mechanics at North Dakota State University.
 Pedro Quintero
(Ph.D. ’08, ME) has joined the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of
Puerto Rico at Mayaguez as an assistant professor.
 William McGill
(M.S. '03 and Ph.D. ’08, reliability engineering) is an assistant professor of Information Sciences and Technology at the
College of Information Sciences and Technology at Penn State.
 Michael Black
(M.S. '03 and Ph.D. '07, EE) has joined the faculty of the Department of Computer Science at American
University in Washington, D.C., as an assistant professor.
 Bill Byrne
(Ph.D. '93, EE) has been promoted to a Readership in Information Engineering in the
Department of Engineering at the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom. He was
previously a Lecturer in Speech Processing. He is also a Fellow of Clare College, Cambridge.
 Clark School
alumni Adedayo Adeniran (pictured, B.S. '08, CHE), Time Aigbe (B.S. '08, ME) and Reuel Smith (B.S. '05 and M.S. '07, AE) received Bridge to the Doctorate fellowships to pursue graduate study at
the University of Maryland, College Park. The program, which helps under-represented minority
students earn doctoral degrees and choose careers in science and engineering, offers
stipends of $30,000 annually and a supplement for tuition and fees.
Top of page
|
