News & Events

02-20-19

Junior undergraduate student Lewis Jones, studying mechanical engineering and aerospace engineering, has been awarded a Matthew Isakowitz Fellowship. The fellowship recognizes exceptional college juniors, seniors, and graduate students pursuing aerospace careers and includes a paid internship at a commercial space company based in the United States. Lewis will be interning at Millennium Space Systems. At Caltech Lewis founded and is the current president of the rocketry club (Parsec) which is developing a methane-oxygen rocket. [2019 class of fellows]

Tags: honors GALCIT MCE Lewis Jones

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]

Tags: honors MCE Kaushik Bhattacharya Ying Shi Teh

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

Tags: EE honors MCE CMS Adam Wierman Babak Hassibi Thanos Siapas Aaron Ames Ehsan Abbasi Gautam Goel Jonathan Kenny Palma London Xiaobin Xiong

12-11-18

Michael Ortiz, Frank and Ora Lee Marble Professor of Aeronautics and Mechanical Engineering, has received a Doctorate Honoris Causa (honorary doctorate) from his alma mater, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid. [ENGenious article featuring Professor Ortiz’s solid mechanics research]

Tags: honors GALCIT MCE Michael Ortiz

11-26-18

Chiara Daraio, Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Applied Physics, has been awarded the UC San Diego Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Outstanding Alumna Award for her outstanding achievements in mechanical metamaterials and materials science. [Award recipients]

Tags: honors Chiara Daraio MCE APh

09-26-18

Tim Colonius, Frank and Ora Lee Marble Professor of Mechanical Engineering, has received the 2018 AIAA Aeroacoustics Award for his outstanding contributions  to theoretical and computational aeroacoustics for the prediction and control of noise and his absolute commitment to educating the next generation. [AIAA release]

Tags: honors MCE Tim Colonius

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."

Tags: honors MCE Nadia Lapusta teaching

06-29-18

Mechanical engineering student Hyung Ju (Terry) Suh, advised by Professor Joel Burdick, is a recipient of the 2018 Henry Ford II Scholar Award. He has broad interests in robotics including manipulation, perception, navigation, localization, and intelligence. The Henry Ford II Scholar Award is funded under an endowment provided by the Ford Motor Company Fund. The award is made annually to engineering students with the best academic record at the end of the third year of undergraduate study.

Tags: honors MCE Henry Ford II Scholar Award Joel Burdick Hyung Ju (Terry) Suh

06-12-18

Ares J. Rosakis, Theodore von Karman Professor of Aeronautics and Mechanical Engineering, will receive the 2018 Timoshenko Medal of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) for his pioneering work on unveiling the mechanics behind earthquakes. "Many of my mentors and scientific Idols have received this award, so I really feel especially honored and humbled to be recognized with them," Professor Rosakis says. [Caltech story] [List of award recipients]

Tags: honors GALCIT MCE Ares Rosakis

06-07-18

Mechanical engineering graduate student Kimberley Mac Donald has received the 2018 Gary Cloud Scholarship from the Society for Experimental Mechanics (SEM).  The scholarship is in recognition of her unique aspirations to pursue a graduate degree in experimental mechanics and to create new knowledge that leads to sustainable improvements in the human condition. [List of past recipients]

Tags: honors MCE Kimberley Mac Donald