April, 2017
Design Day serves up a feast of ingenuity
Apr. 28, 2017—The School of Engineering’s annual Design Day is a banquet of innovation, problem-solving, teamwork, and design thinking at work. The 2017 event – a mashup of a sophisticated science fair and electronics show – featured 70 teams of graduating seniors standing by to demonstrate their engineering answers to real-life challenges. Corporate and nonprofit sponsors propose...
Dean Fauchet reappointed for five-year term
Apr. 27, 2017—Philippe Fauchet has been reappointed as dean of the School of Engineering for a five-year term beginning July 1, 2017.“I want to thank Dean Fauchet for his leadership and service to date,” said Provost and Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs Susan R. Wente. “During his tenure, the faculty has grown in strategic directions, new programming...
Vanderbilt joins 40 academic partners to create, deploy robotic technology in critical manufacturing sectors
Apr. 25, 2017—Vanderbilt University is one of 40 academic partners in a new robotics manufacturing institute in Pittsburgh that will be funded with $80 million from the Department of Defense and $173 million in matching funds from more than 200 participating partners, including companies, local governments, academic and nonprofit organizations. The Defense Department awarded the contract to...
Heart valve disease research earns grad student a young investigator award
Apr. 24, 2017—A biomedical engineering graduate student at Vanderbilt University has received a young investigator award for her work on heart valve disease. Doctoral student Meghan Bowler won the Allan D. Callow Young Investigator Award for best poster presentation at the 15th biennial meeting of the International Society for Applied Cardiovascular Biology. Bowler investigates the mechanism of calcific...
Team competing at NREL has big ambitions for home design
Apr. 21, 2017—The Vanderbilt undergraduate engineering team competing this weekend at NREL – the National Renewable Energy Lab – set an impressive goal for its home design. “We wanted to show that anyone can have a Net Zero home,” said Kate Thomson, team captain and a civil engineering senior. “It isn’t just for extreme environmentalists who are...
First-year engineering student places first in ‘Places and Spaces: Mapping Science’
Apr. 20, 2017—Three other engineering students are winners Two student projects—one using an interactive webpage that explores the complexity of sorting algorithms, and the other a study of human movement over space and time —were the top winners in a Vanderbilt student data visualization competition held April 13 in conjunction with the campus exhibition Places and Spaces:...
NSF recognizes double ME alum with Waterman Award
Apr. 20, 2017—An Engineering School alumnus with notable Vanderbilt academic and football careers has received one of the nation’s most distinguished awards for young researchers in science and engineering. The National Science Foundation has named Baratunde “Bara” A. Cola a recipient of the 2017 Alan T. Waterman Award, which recognizes outstanding researchers age 35 and under in...
Two ME undergrads from same lab named Goldwater Scholars
Apr. 11, 2017—Lauren Branscombe and Joshua Fleck have much in common. Both are juniors in mechanical engineering, focused on medical robotics. Both work in Biomedical and Assistive Technology (BAT) lab with Karl Zelik, assistant professor of mechanical engineering, physical medicine and rehabilitation, and biomedical engineering. Both plan to pursue a Ph.D. in mechanical engineering, continue research and improve the...