Krish Roy, Bruce and Bridgitt Evans Dean of Engineering, announced 20 awards at a May 6 reception following the final School of Engineering faculty meeting of the 2024-2025 academic year. Vanderbilt University also announced spring award winners during the May 1 Faculty Senate meeting and a reception followed. Engineering faculty receiving university awards are Deyu Li, professor of mechanical engineering; Daniel Fleetwood, Olin H. Landreth Professor of Engineering, professor of electrical and computer engineering and professor of Physics; and Kevin Galloway, research associate professor of mechanical engineering, director of DIVE and director of making at the Wond’ry.
Li was this year’s winner of the Joe B. Wyatt Distinguished University Professor Award, which recognizes faculty who develop significant knowledge from research or demonstrate exemplary innovations in teaching. Li’s pathbreaking research aims to enhance materials’ capability to conduct heat. Through extraordinary and fundamental breakthroughs in thermal sciences, he is pushing the boundaries of energy and materials technologies at nanoscale. The resulting super-efficient radiative cooling approaches have the potential to revolutionize a wide range of engineering practices. The National Science Foundation recognized the potential of Li’s research with a Trailblazer Engineering Impact award, which enables researchers with a track record of innovative breakthroughs and unconventional hypotheses to pursue groundbreaking ideas in engineering.
Fleetwood received the Excellence in Undergraduate Research Mentoring Award. Fleetwood is the author of more than 600 publications on radiation effects in microelectronics, 13 of which have been recognized with Outstanding Paper Awards. These papers have been cited more than 30,000 times. In 2009, he received the IEEE Nuclear and Plasma Sciences Society’s Merit Award, which is the society’s highest individual technical honor. According to the student nominator, Fleetwood fostered “an environment where I felt comfortable asking questions, proposing ideas and taking ownership of my projects.” Fleetwood’s support and encouragement advanced this student’s research skills and opened doors to future collaborations and accomplishments.
Galloway won an Excellence in Immersion Mentoring Award, honoring faculty members who have been exceptional Immersion Vanderbilt mentors. Galloway strikes the perfect balance as a mentor, allowing students to take ownership of their projects while always being available as a resource. With his guidance, students feel empowered to explore, create and problem-solve. “His reminder that everyone faces challenges and that what matters most is perseverance was a turning point in my path,” a student nominator noted.
At the May 6 reception, Roy presented 12 faculty awards—including one recognizing efforts working with graduate students on an outstanding research paper. Seven staff members also received awards.
Award for Excellence in Teaching: Bridget Rogers, Associate Professor of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
Edward J. White Engineering Faculty Award for Excellence in Service: Research Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering Tim Holman and Robert Tairas, associate professor of the practice of computer science and Immersion Coordinator for computer science.
School of Engineering Faculty Research Awards
- Rising Star Research Award: Jonathan Brunger, assistant professor of biomedical engineering; David Hyde, assistant professor of computer science; and Xiaoguang Dong, assistant professor of mechanical engineering.
- Innovative Research Award: Ipek Oguz, associate professor of computer science
- Interdisciplinary Research Award: Ravindra Duddu, associate professor of civil and environmental engineering, and Dan Work, professor of civil and environmental engineering.
- Interdisciplinary Research Publication Award: Jason Valentine, professor of mechanical engineering, Deputy Director, Vanderbilt Institute of Nanoscale Science and Engineering, and University Liaison to Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Multichannel meta-imagers for accelerating machine vision, Nature Nanotechnology, 19 471-478 (2024)
- Community Impact Research Award: Abhishek Dubey, associate professor of computer engineering and Chancellor Faculty Fellow.
Best Paper Award
Maizie (Xin) Zhou, assistant professor of biomedical engineering and computer science. Zhou’s graduate students Henry Liu, who is pursuing a Ph.D. in computer science, and Can Luo, who is getting a Ph.D. in biomedical engineering, were first co-authors on the paper, “Tradeoffs in alignment and assembly-based methods for structural variant detection with long-read sequencing data,” in Nature Communications, 15:2447 (2024).
Judith A. Pachtman Engineering Staff Awards
- Team Spirit and Collaboration: Katie Dey, research program manager, and Regan Williams, senior research program coordinator, Institute for Software Integrated Systems; Matthew Sevilla, senior financial analyst, Office of the Dean
- Innovation and Creativity: Joanne Wang, executive director of Strategic Partnerships, associate professor of the practice of engineering management, and assistant dean.
- Outstanding Service and Support: Jackie Youngs, graduate program manager, Civil and Environmental Engineering, and Barry Templeton, assistant director for administration – facilities.
- Research Advancement: Eric Hall, IT security manager, Institute for Software Integrated Systems.
Contact: brenda.ellis@vanderbilt.edu