News

Mohsenian-Rad Receives NSF CAREER Award

Mohsenian-Rad

Dr. Hamed Mohsenian-Rad, an assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering, received an NSF CAREER Award for his proposal, "CAREER: Self-Organizing Demand Side Management for Smart Grid: A Dynamic Game-Theoretic Framework." The $400,000 award is a five-year award.

The objective of this research is to apply dynamic game theory to develop a new self-organizing demand side management paradigm that can adapt and coordinate consumers' load in response to changes in electricity prices and renewable power availability and when the system reliability is at risk, with minimal overhead on utilities.

Engineering Our Future Now Online

Engineering Our Future Magazine

The latest issue of Engineering Our Future Magazine, the college's alumni magazine is now online. The magazine features faculty, staff, student, and alumni stories and news.

Student Accomplishments

Three Engineering Undergrads to Present at NCUR

Undergrads

Selected from among 3,500 abstracts across the nation, three Texas Tech engineering undergraduate students were chosen to present research findings at the 2012 National Conference on Undergraduate Research (NCUR) on March 29-31 in Ogden, Utah.

Hosted annually, the NCUR conference promotes undergraduate research, scholarship and creative activity in all fields of study.

Students selected to present, and their respective research topics, include:

• David South, Computer Science: Integration of the Alice 3D Programming Environment with Robotics to Stimulate Interest in Computing
• Mwansa Chiyenge, Engineering Technology: Watershed Management for the Canyon Lake System in Lubbock, TX.
• Mwale Chiyenge, Engineering Technology: Degradation of Pharmaceuticals in Water by Superoxide Produced by Reaction of Selenocystamine with Sulfur

TSPE Student Chapter Featured in PE Magazine

TSPE Student Chapter

The Texas Tech University Student Chapter of the Texas Society of Professional Engineers (TSPE) is featured in the December 2011 issue of PE Magazine, published by NSPE for its 45,000 members.

The article discusses the Texas Tech students' annual fundraiser event, Professional Ethics Live!, and showcases Texas Tech, the National Institute for Engineering Ethics, the South Plains Chapter TSPE, and the work our Texas Tech students do on this event.

Professional Ethics Live! is a high-energy forum featuring live performances of ethics cases (skits) by TSPE student members from Texas Tech, as well as audience participation and commentary from distinguished panel of experts. Based on the NIEE Applied Ethics Case of the Month program, Professional Ethics Live! dramatizes applied ethics cases taken from actual professional practice with the names of the participants and the locations altered to preserve anonymity. The program has been successfully presented to national audiences of design professionals since 1999.

Faculty Recognitions

Gill Receives Funding for Cancer-Related Proposal

Gill

A new initiative between Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center (TTUHSC) and Texas Tech University (TTU) has awarded funding for cancer-related proposals.

The competitive internal funding competition is meant to provide seed funding to aid researchers in securing external funding from agencies such as the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Cancer Prevention Research Institute of Texas (CPRIT). This activity also is intended to foster long-term collaboration and closer relationships between researchers at the two universities.

Harvinder Gill, assistant professor of chemical engineering at TTU and Joehassin Cordero, associate professor and chief of the Division of Otolaryngology at TTUHSC, received a $50,000 grant for their proposal “Minimally-Invasive Treatment of Tongue Carcinomas Using Microneedles.”

Alumni News

Bell Named Woman of Excellence

Bell

Jennifer Bell, a 1997 graduate with a Bachelor of Science in mechanical engineering and a Department of Mechanical Engineering Industrial Advisory Board member, was honored as a 2011 Women of Excellence by the Federation of Houston Professional Women.

She was chosen for her dedication, leadership and service not only to the Society of Women Engineers, but to her profession and her friends and family.

Grants and Contracts

12-14-2011 – 1-23-2012

Computer Science

• Drs. Yong Chen, Noe Lopez-Benitez, and Yu Zhuang were awarded $2,500 by NSF/Georgia State University Research Foundation. The title of the proposal was "Early Adoption of NSF/TCPP PDC Curriculum at Texas Tech University."

Center for Nanophotonics

• Drs. Hongxing Jiang and Jingyu Lin were awarded $158,000 by the U.S. Department of Energy. The title of the proposal was "Optical and Electrical Properties of III-Nitrides and Related Materials."

Center for Pulsed Power and Power Electronics

• Dr. James C. Dickens was awarded $380,000 by the Office of Naval Research. The title of the proposal was "Enabling Technology for Compact Directed Energy Systems Addressing Asymmetric Explosive Threats."

Electrical and Computer Engineering

• Dr. Ranadip Pal was awarded $82,166 by the National Science Foundation. The title of the proposal was "Career: Robustness in Genetic Regulatory Network Modeling and Control."
• Dr. Vittal S. Rao was awarded $69,244 by the Northrop Grumman Corporation. The title of the proposal was "Cyber Security SCADA Network Visualization Tool."
• Dr. Yu-Chun D. Lie was awarded $241,813 by DARPA/Cobham Sensor Systems. The title of the proposal was "Microscale Power Conversion (MPC)-High-efficiency Broadband RF/MM Transmitter System, Circuits and Envelope/Supply Modulator IC Design using the Envelope Tracking (ET) Technique."
• Dr. Yu-Chun D. Lie was awarded $250,000 by DOD/NoiseFigure, LLC. The title of the proposal was "Navy Phase II STTR N09-T035 Development of Novel Phase Shifterless RF Phase Array Antenna Systems."

Industrial Engineering

• Dr. Iris V. Rivero was awarded $24,463.50 by NSF/Selenium Ltd. The title of the proposal was "Selenium Biopolymer Spacers to Prevent Biofouling of Reverse Osmosis Modules."

Mechanical Engineering

• Dr. Timothy T. Maxwell was awarded $1,500 by David Branson. The title of the proposal was "Variable Range Ballistic Targeting System for Archery."

Nano Tech Center

• Dr. Luis E. Grave de Peralta was awarded $79,785 by the National Science Foundation. The title of the proposal was "CAREER: Plasmon Tomography."

Water Resources Center

• Dr. Audra N. Morse was awarded $24,463.50 by NSF/Selenium Ltd. The title of the proposal was "Selenium Biopolymer Spacers to Prevent Biofouling of Reverse Osmosis Modules."

Events of Interest

See a full listing of the college's events on the Engineering Master Calendar.

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