Areas of Research

Research Interest Groups

The faculty is organized into four interest groups according to research specialty. Mechanical Engineering Faculty conduct research, both individually and in collaboration with other faculty in ME and other departments, in four thrust areas. Research within these thrust areas is shown in the matrix below:

INTEREST GROUP THRUST AREA
  Environmentally-Sensitive Energy Conversion Health Systems & Biotechnology Mechatronics Advanced Materials, Structures & Manufacturing
Energy and
Fluids		 Energy conversion
Acoustic monitoring
Design for environment
Energy usage		 Microelectro-mechanical systems Electronic cooling
 Polymer processing
Optical fibers
Mechanics of
Materials & Manufacturing		 Energy Harvesting and Storage for future airplanes
Light weight materials
Optimal design		 Biomaterials
Biomechanics
Prosthetics
Surgical simulation
Mobility aids		 Smart materials
Sensors/actuators
Bioinspired material design		 Cutting and forming
Welding and joining
Solid modeling
Systems and
Dynamics		 Energy storage
Noise and vibration		 Robotic surgery
Cardiac control		 Disk drives
Finite element analysis		 Robotics
Production control
Design for manufacture
Rapid prototyping


See presentations below for a summary of current ME research efforts:

ME Research Focus in
Health and Energy

These documents outline the research and expertise of ME faculty in the fields of health and energy, updated for 2011:

Health Research Expertise

Energy Research Expertise