Professor Hunt Named 2019 SURF Dedicatee
03-11-19
Melany Hunt, Dotty and Dick Hayman Professor of Mechanical Engineering, has been honored as the 2019 Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowships (SURF) program dedicatee. The SURF Administrative Committee selects the dedicatee based on their record of extraordinary impact to the program, Caltech students, and the Institute. In the words of Professor Katherine Faber, SURF Board Member who introduced this year’s dedicatee, “Professor Melany Hunt fits the bill in all three of these categories. She has mentored over 50 SURF students since 1991. In the classroom, she has twice received the Associated Students of the California Institute of Technology (ASCIT) award for excellence in teaching. She has inspired students in courses on Thermal Science, Thermodynamics, Heat and Mass Transport and Multidisciplinary Systems Engineering.” In regard to Professor Hunt’s extraordinary impact on Caltech Professor Faber mentioned the Giving Voice program which uses recorded vignettes to “guide discussions on unconscious bias and provides concrete suggestions on how to start workplace climate conversations.” [Giving Voice] [SURF Program]
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honors
MCE
SURF
Melany Hunt
Katherine Faber
Graduate Student Wins First Place At Ferro2019
02-12-19
Mechanical engineering graduate student, and Resnick fellow Ying Shi Teh, advised by Professor Kaushik Bhattacharya, has won first place for her poster presentation at the Fundamental Physics of Ferroelectrics and related materials workshop (Ferro2019). Her poster featured her work on modeling the photovoltaic effect in multi-domain ferroelectric perovskite oxides. The Ferro2019 is the 30th in the series of workshops that has gathered the world’s leading theorists and experimentalists working in the field of ferroelectrics and related materials every year since 1990. [List of award recipients]
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honors
MCE
Kaushik Bhattacharya
Ying Shi Teh
Meet the 2018 Amazon Fellows
01-16-19
The Amazon Fellows program is the result of a partnership between Caltech and Amazon AWS around Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence (AI). The 2018 Amazon fellows are Ehsan Abbasi, Gautam Goel, Jonathan Kenny, Palma London, and Xiaobin Xiong. Abbasi is interest in contributing to a deeper understanding of convex and non-convex learning methods in AI and is an Electrical Engineering graduate student working with Professor Babak Hassibi. Goel’s research interest is at the interface of the theory and practice of machine learning and is advised by Professor Adam Wierman. London is also working with Professor Wierman. She is developing efficient algorithms for solving extremely large optimization problems. The methods are applicable to distributed and parallel optimization. For example in a distributed data center setting, the algorithms are robust to unreliable data transfer between data centers and take into account privacy concerns. Kenny is a Computation & Neural Systems graduate student working with Professor Thanos Siapas on deep neural networks to identify and classify brain states. Xiong is a mechanical engineering graduate student who enjoys working on real physical robots, to make them walk, jump, and run in real life. He is advised by Professor Aaron Ames and their research is focused on robotic bipedal locomotion
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EE
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MCE
CMS
Adam Wierman
Babak Hassibi
Thanos Siapas
Aaron Ames
Ehsan Abbasi
Gautam Goel
Jonathan Kenny
Palma London
Xiaobin Xiong
Professor Lapusta Receives GSC Mentoring Award
09-17-18
The Caltech Graduate Student Council (GSC) has selected Professor Nadia Lapusta as the recipient of the 2017-2018, GSC Mentoring Award. The GSC Teaching and Mentoring Awards recognize individuals “who have an extraordinary impact on Caltech graduate students through their roles as teachers and mentors.” Nominators described Professor Lapusta as being an excellent cheerleader who fosters her students' ties with the community. Despite leading a large group, she makes significant amounts of time for her students. One student said, "the path ahead always seems more optimistic after our meetings."
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MCE
Nadia Lapusta
teaching
Richard B. Chapman Memorial Awards
07-03-18
Morgane Anne Marie Grivel advised by Professor Morteza Gharib, Kazuki Maeda advised by Professor Tim Colonius, and Jason Schlup advised by Professor Guillaume Blanquart are recipients of the 2018 Richard B. Chapman Memorial Award. Morgane's research focuses on using hydrophilic and hydrophobic regions to modify hydrodynamic flows. Jason's research utilized computational fluid dynamics to investigate the highly unstable combustion of hydrogen-air mixtures with a focus on accurate, cost-effective modeling techniques. Kazuki does research in multi-phase flow, computational fluid dynamics, and biomedical engineering. The Richard B. Chapman Memorial Award is given to an EAS graduate student in hydrodynamics who has distinguished himself or herself in research.
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GALCIT
MCE
Richard B. Chapman Memorial Award
