News & Events

09-11-14

Caltech’s undergraduate and graduate engineering programs have been ranked fourth in the country by U.S. News & World Report. Engineering graduate programs ranked very well with second in aerospace / aeronautical / astronautical, third in mechanical, third in applied math, fourth in electrical / electronic / communications, sixth in materials, and eight in environmental / environmental health. [All 2015 Caltech Rankings]

Tags: APhMS EE GALCIT MCE CMS ESE Graduate school rankings

08-12-14

Frank E. Marble, Richard L. and Dorothy M. Hayman Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Professor of Jet Propulsion, Emeritus, passed away on August 11, 2014 at age 96. He has made pioneering contributions to combustion in jet propulsion systems, flame stabilization, and propagation of acoustic waves. [Caltech Obituary] [Frank E. Marble Lecture in Aerospace]

Tags: GALCIT MCE EAS history Frank E. Marble

08-07-14

Wilfred Iwan, Professor of Applied Mechanics, Emeritus, has been selected as an honorary member of the Earthquake Engineering Research Institute (EERI). Honorary memberships are awarded in recognition of sustained and outstanding contributions to the field of earthquake engineering. Professor Iwan’s research focuses on fundamental areas of mechanics, understanding and characterization of strong earthquake ground motion, analysis and monitoring of the response of structural systems subjected to extreme events, and public policy regarding disasters.

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Tags: honors research highlights MCE Wilfred Iwan

08-04-14

For the past year, a team of Caltech students, advised by Professor Joel Burdick, met at the campus pool on Sunday afternoons to prepare for the 17th Annual International RoboSub Competition. These members of the Caltech Robotics Team carefully crafted and optimized their robotic submarine named Bruce. Bruce was programmed to perform tasks such as pulling a lever, parking between two poles, and shooting little torpedoes at a target without the help of a human operator. At the competition the Caltech team received the judges' award for Best New Entry. [Caltech release]

Tags: MCE CMS Joel Burdick

07-17-14

Mechanical and civil engineering graduate student Ryan Hurley who works with Professor José Andrade has won the BSSM (British Society for Strain Measurement) Young Stress Analyst Competition at the 16th International Conference on Experimental Mechanics (ICEM.16). The competition is an annual competition that is intended to encourage and reward young practitioners in the field of experimental mechanics. Ryan was among six finalists representing universities in Belgium, Poland, France, and the USA, who were selected from 34 applications by a panel of experts. The finalists presented their work during the ICEM.16 conference and were judged by a panel of leading researchers. [YSA Competition Information]

Tags: honors MCE Jose Andrade Ryan Hurley

07-14-14

Guruswami (Ravi) Ravichandran, John E. Goode, Jr. Professor of Aerospace and Professor of Mechanical Engineering, as well as Director of GALCIT and former members of his group have received a Journal Strain Best Paper Prize.  The paper is titled Three-dimensional Displacement and Shape Measurement with a Diffraction-assisted Grid Method. The award winning team consisted of a high school student intern, a visiting undergraduate student researcher, a graduate student, a postdoctoral scholar, and a faculty member.

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Tags: honors GALCIT MCE Guruswami Ravichandran Jacob Notbohm Alexandros Rosakis Satoshi Kumagai Shuman Xia

06-20-14

The Thomson Reuters compilation of the most highly cited researchers— those in the top 1%—from the period 2002–2012 include EAS professors Harry Atwater, Richard Murray, Joel Tropp, John Seinfeld, Kerry Vahala, and Paul Wennberg. Other Caltech professors were also among the top 1%—including Colin Camerer, Mark Davis, Richard Ellis, William Goddard, Robert Grubbs, Hiroo Kanamori, Jeff Kimble, John O’Doherty, and Charles Steidel. This compilation aims to identify researchers with exceptional impact on their respective fields.  [Detailed information on the methodology]

Tags: APhMS honors MCE Harry Atwater CMS ESE Paul Wennberg John Seinfeld Joel Tropp Kerry Vahala Richard Murray

06-05-14

Guruswami (Ravi) Ravichandran, John E. Goode, Jr. Professor of Aerospace and Professor of Mechanical Engineering, and Director of GALCIT, has been awarded the Society of Experimental Mechanics (SEM) William M. Murray Lecture and Medal. He delivered the 2014 Murray Lecture entitled, Three-Dimensional Quantitative Visualization: Application to Studying Cell-Matrix Interactions, on June 3, 2014 during the SEM Annual Conference and Exposition on Experimental and Applied Mechanics. The award was made in recognition of his pioneering contributions in experimental mechanics of deformation, damage and failure of materials under multiaxial dynamic loading. The Murray Lecture is the highest distinction awarded by SEM and is the prestige lecture of its annual conference.  The Murray Lecture was established in 1952 in honor of the first President of SEM, William MacGregor Murray who was a Professor and Executive Officer of Mechanical Engineering at MIT.

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Tags: honors research highlights GALCIT MCE Guruswami Ravichandran Ares Rosakis Wolfgang Knauss

04-28-14

John F. Brady, Chevron Professor of Chemical Engineering and Mechanical Engineering, has been elected to the 2014 American Academy of Arts and Sciences class of fellows. Professor Brady’s research focuses on the area of complex fluids and active matter which includes microstructural elements such as suspensions, colloidal dispersions, and self-propelling particles. Understanding these materials led him to develop a novel computational method called Stokesian dynamics. He has won the 2012 Fluid Dynamics Prize from the American Physical Society and was elected to the National Academy of Engineering in 1999. [Caltech Release]

Tags: honors MCE AAAS John Brady

04-25-14

Students in Professor Hillary Mushkin’s new media arts seminar (E/H/Art 89 New Media Arts in the 20th and 21st Centuries) have put on a unique exhibition highlighting art and engineering. The course provides a platform for an expanded understanding of engineering and an active, project-based engagement with art history. [List of all projects]

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Tags: EE research highlights MCE CMS Hillary Mushkin