Who to Contact
College of Engineering
101 Hammond Building
The Pennsylvania State University
University Park, Pennsylvania 16802

Graduate Programs

• Aerospace Engineering. George Lesieutre, Professor and Head. Research areas include astrodynamics; analytical, computational, and experimental fluid dynamics and aeroacoustics; flight science and vehicle dynamics; rotorcraft; structures, structural dynamics, and adaptive structures; space propulsion; and turbomachinery. Research facilities include subsonic and supersonic wind tunnels, a laminar flow water channel, an anechoic hot jet noise facility, a supersonic shear layer facility, massively parallel computer systems, a rotor test stand, flight simulation facilities, an advanced composites laboratory, a vibration control laboratory, an electric propulsion test stand, and turbomachinery compressors and turbines.

• Architectural Engineering. Richard Behr, Professor and Head. Graduate study and research are performed in four main subject areas. Construction: process modeling, lean construction, specialty contracting, productivity improvement, project delivery methods. Illumination Systems: modeling and visualization, daylighting, optical design, photometry, human factor issues. Mechanical and Energy Systems: CFD modeling, district energy, thermal storage, indoor air quality, EMCS/real-time tools, system modeling/optimization, decoupled sensible and latent cooling, emerging technologies. Building Structural Systems: advancement of analysis and design methods, optimization, seismic evaluation, structural control, natural hazard resistance and serviceability of building envelope systems, housing, historic preservation, and cable and membrane structures.

• Chemical Engineering. Henry C. Foley, Professor, Head, and Walter L. Robb Family Endowed Chair. Research areas include biomolecular engineering-separations of biomolecules, sensing, informatics, bioreactors, protein and metabolic engineering; nanoscale engineering-nanoscale reaction and reactor engineering, catalytic membranes, nanoscale tribology, nanowire probes; computation engineering-molecular dynamics at the nanoscale, multiphase fluid dynamics, complex polymeric solids and multilength scale modeling; classical chemical engineering-polymers, mass transfer, catalysis, fluids, and control optimization.

• Civil Engineering. Andrew Scanlon, Professor and Head. Programs include civil and building construction, project management, civil engineering materials (geotechnical engineering, portland cement and asphalt concrete, pavement design), water resources (watershed models, groundwater modeling, systems analysis, hydraulics of open channels), structures (earthquake, blast, abnormal loadings; bridges, buildings, and the building enclosure; off-shore structures, structural control, reliability, and rehabilitation), and transportation (traffic engineering, transportation planning, facilities design, network optimization algorithms, and intelligent transportation systems).

• Computer Science and Engineering. Raj Acharya, Professor and Head. Interests include computer architecture, digital system design, embedded processors, fault-tolerant computing, interconnection networks, parallel processing, performance evaluation, VLSI design, database systems, distributed computing, global information sharing, programming language design, semantics and implementation, software engineering, computer networks, data communications, computer vision, document image analysis, machine learning algorithms, pattern recognition, algorithmic design, computational complexity, numerical computing, scientific visualization, and computational molecular biology.

• Electrical Engineering. W. Kenneth Jenkins, Professor and Head. Research areas include antennas, propagation, microwaves, computational electromagnetics, radar and lidar remote sensing, radiometry, in situ and remote sensing of the ionosphere; digital communications, networking, optical networks, wireless networks, image and signal processing, multidimensional signals, signal recognition, reconstruction, neural networks; nonlinear optics, fibers, optical storage, computing; silicon, III-V, organic, wide bandgap semiconductors and devices, MEMS, ceramic, ferroelectric, and quantum devices, processing techniques; linear systems, active vision, control systems; power system planning and control, drive systems, and power electronics.

• Engineering Science and Mechanics. Judith Todd, P. B. Breneman Department Head Chair. Research focuses on optical, electronic, or mechanical material property control; advanced material fabrication and processing; and material, device, and structure response simulation. Specific research areas include composite materials; rheological and biological materials; continuum mechanics; powdered materials engineering; fatigue and fracture; failure analysis; micromechanics; surface engineering; CVD and ion implantation; microelectronic materials and devices; ESR; thin films; solid-state devices; display materials and devices; nanofabrication; nanobiotechnology; biomaterials; diamond films; NDE; sensors and actuators; adaptive control; smart materials; wave-material interactions; ultrasonics; structural dynamics; chaos; acoustics; boundary and finite elements; condition monitoring; and artificial intelligence. Facilities are available for SEM, SAM, AFM, X-ray clean rooms, metallography, shock and vibration, and fatigue.

• Environmental Engineering. Andrew Scanlon, Professor and Head. Research areas include water and wastewater treatment processes, aquatic chemistry and microbiology, solid and hazardous waste treatment, industrial pollution prevention and waste minimization, air pollution treatment and control, water resource systems, and soil bioremediation.

• Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering. Richard Koubek, Professor and Head. Programs are available in human factors-ergonomics engineering, human/machine interface design, safety; manufacturing systems-metal-cutting theory, plastic deformation and welding processes, group technology, design of production systems, CAPP, engineering for production, automation, robotics, control, micromachining, CAD/CAM, flexible manufacturing systems, machine tool sensing and diagnostics, tolerancing; operations research-applied stochastic processes, decision analysis, mathematical programming, graph theory and networks, engineering economy, artificial intelligence, expert systems; and systems design-quality assurance, reliability, experimental design, and systems simulation techniques.

• Mechanical Engineering. Richard Benson, Professor and Head. Major fields of specialization include acoustics, automatic control, biomechanics, compressible and incompressible flow, computer vision, computational fluid dynamics, transport phenomena in fuel cells and batteries, combustion and flame kinetics, space propulsion, dynamics of machines, turbulence theory, simulation and modeling, transportation and vehicles, mechatronics, heat and mass transfer, design analysis, optimization and synthesis, simulation of mechanical systems, computer-aided design, robotics, smart materials, structural dynamics, vibrations and noise control, tribology, laser machining, and heat exchanger design. Departmental facilities include wind tunnels, laser facilities, advanced diagnostics for ignition, combustion and fluid flow studies, solid and liquid rocket propellants, internal combustion engines, electrochemical engines, control and mechatronics, vibrations, robotics activities, and computer-based diagnostic facilities.

• Nuclear Engineering. Jack Brenizer, Jr., Professor and Program Chair. Graduate studies and research are offered in reactor safety-advanced reactor design, thermal-hydraulic modeling, transient analysis, accident analysis; reactor theory-computational methods, transport theory; reactor control-advanced control methods, use of artificial intelligence; reactor operations-fuel management, radiation instrumentation, radiation monitoring and dosimetry; materials research-radiation effects, plant-life extension issues, hyperfine probes for defects in solids; and radiation applications-neutron radiography. Facilities include a 1-MW TRIGA reactor, hot cells, a thermal-hydraulic test facility, and gamma irradiation, neutron radiography, neutron activation analysis, reactor simulation, nuclear materials engineering, and low-level radiation monitoring laboratories.