Mechanical and Materials Engineering

Annual Report 2009-2010

Department Overview

The Department of Mechanical and Materials Engineering provides academic programs with a well-balanced curriculum in Mechanical Systems, Mechanics, Robotics and Mechatronics, Thermo/fluid Systems, Heating-Ventilation-and-Air-Conditioning (HVAC), Material Characterization, Manufacturing and Automation Systems, Materials Science and Engineering, Multidisciplinary Design Optimization and Inverse Design, Biomechanics, Computational Analysis and Distributed Parallel Computing, Laser and Plasma Materials Processing, Nanomaterials, Nanotechnology, Electronic Packaging, Optical Measurement and Diagnostics, Waste Management, and Renewable Energy. The department had an exciting year in 2009-10. Student enrollment passed the 500 mark for the first time, and increased for the fifth consecutive year. It also awarded an all-time high 72 degrees (6% increase over the previous year). Research funding was sustained at $2.2M (a modest 3% increase over the previous year).

Faculty and Research Highlights

The Department has 16 faculty members, 1 research professor, and 3 instructors. The faculty published 6 book chapters, 2 books, 51 conference proceedings, 86 journal papers, 1 monograph, and 21 technical reports.

Dr. Kinzy Jones was chosen as FIU’s Outstanding Professor, an award given by the FIU President’s Council. He also received a new research project on “High Density Biocompatible Feedthrough Development” in collaboration with his colleagues at MIT.

Dr. Arvind Agarwal was chosen as the first runner-up for the FIU’s Outstanding Professor.

Dr. Cesar Levy, Chair of MME, was elected to the grade of Fellow by the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME).

Student Activities and Achievements

The Advantage Student Society won the World Materials Day Award and the Chapter of Excellence award.

The national ASM Board of Trustees named FIU Materials Advantage student as a member on its board.

Events

The department won two grants from FIU University Graduate School to enhance the graduate student experience through seminars where guest speakers were brought in from outside the university to speak about research topics relevant to students, and to enhance the graduate student recruitment ability to include modernization of the department website, having a meet and greet with outside companies, and creating updated brochures to send to prospective students.

Fall Term Enrollment

Five Year Fall Term Enrollment MME

Degrees Awarded

Degrees Awarded MME