Groundbreaking for the 60,000-square-foot addition to the Jeong H. Kim Engineering Building took place in fall 2018. Its unique spaces and labs will enable students, faculty, and staff to address 21st century challenges while also serving as venues to translate basic research into invention and invention into product.
Support the E. A. Fernandez IDEA Factory
Because we recognize that creativity is organic, we are designing a building that is unconventional in every way. In fact, the IDEA Factory will be drastically different from any other building on campus. The building design will spark innovation, encouraging a collision of ideas across engineering as well as the arts, business and science. Its movable walls and shared spaces will promote dialogue between students, entrepreneurs and faculty who are working in diverse fields such as multimedia, robotics, transportation, rotorcraft, and quantum engineering.
Since 1982, the Alfred Gessow Rotorcraft Center at the University of Maryland has been one of the three Rotorcraft Centers of Excellence, supported for most of the years by the Army Research Office (1982–95) and later by the Army/NASA National Rotorcraft Technology Center (1996–2006). The center carries out interdisciplinary research on various aeromechanics disciplines of rotorcraft systems.
Learn moreThe Maryland Transportation Institute is a catalyst for high-caliber transportation research, innovation, and technology transfer. With internationally leading experts in engineering, planning, data science, human-computer interaction, logistics, social sciences, public policy, public health, and sustainability, the institute is uniquely positioned to unearth solutions to society's greatest transportation challenges and fuel community and economic development.
Learn moreThe Robotics Realization Laboratory focuses on designing, building, and testing novel robot designs. It is a student-centered space that also supports the NSF REU Site program at the University of Maryland focused on Bioinspired Robotics. This lab has been used to test several bio-inspired robotics platforms, including walking and swimming quadrupeds. This lab has also been used to test small custom made unmanned ground vehicles.
Learn moreStartup Shell is a student-run coworking space and incubator that provides a pipeline and network for student-run startups to scale out of the college campus. Startup Shell was founded out of a storage closet in 2012 with the mission of creating an entrepreneurship community for students at the University of Maryland.
Learn moreThe Quantum Technology Center (QTC) is a new joint center between the A. James Clark School of Engineering and the Department of Physics, and will focus on translating quantum physics into innovative technologies. UMD has initially committed 4 new faculty lines to this Center, which aims to become a nexus for a National Quantum Initiative.