2016 New Faculty at the Swanson School of Engineering

On behalf of the Swanson School of Engineering, it is my pleasure to introduce our 2016 new faculty cohort.

Our departments engaged in very competitive searches over the past year, and have assembled a diverse array of academics and researchers from some of the country’s best universities and engineering programs.

Most importantly, we are excited to announce that Dr. Alan George from the University of Florida will be joining us in January as Professor and Department Chair, and as the inaugural Ruth and Howard Mickle Endowed Chair of Electrical and Computer Engineering. Dr. George founded the NSF Center for High-performance Reconfigurable Computing, one of the NSF’s most prestigious research centers, and we are honored that the University of Pittsburgh will be its new home.

We are also proud of this year’s promotions of faculty members who have distinguished themselves as teachers, researchers and leaders. These include our outstanding young faculty, who have endeavored to make a name for themselves in their respective fields.

I’m sure you will recognize some of these names, so I hope you will join me in congratulating their new appointments.

Sincerely,

Gerald D. Holder U.S. Steel of Engineering

Professor • jpv20@pitt.edu

Dr. Vande Geest received his bachelor of science in biomedical engineering from the University of Iowa in 2000 and his PhD in bioengineering from the University of Pittsburgh in 2005. Upon graduation, Dr. Vande Geest began his career at the University of Arizona (U of A) in the Department of Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering and joined the U of A’s Department of Biomedical Engineering in 2009. Dr. Vande Geest was an assistant and associate professor at the U of A until 2016 when he returned to Pitt.

Dr. Vande Geest leads the Soft Tissue Biomechanics Laboratory (STBL) whose primary goal is to develop and utilize novel experimental and computational bioengineering approaches to study the structure function relationships of soft tissues in human growth, remodeling, and disease. The STBL has also devoted significant effort in the development of novel endovascular medical devices. Advances in bioengineering are established in the STBL by seamlessly bringing together state of the art techniques in tissue

fabrication, nonlinear optical microscopy, finite element modeling, and cell mechanobiology.

In 2013 Dr. Vande Geest was awarded the ASME Y. C. Fung Young Investigator Award and in 2015 he became Chair of the ASME Bioengineering Division Solids Technical Committee and a member of the Western States Affiliates Research Committee for the American Heart Association. He also serves as an Associate Editor for the Journal of Biomechanical Engineering.

D E PA R T M E N T O F B I O E N G I N E E R I N G

Assistant Professor • jmckone@pitt.edu

Dr. McKone earned a bachelor’s degree in chemistry and music from Saint Olaf College, Northfield, Minn., and a PhD in chemistry from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), where he was a Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Science Graduate Research Fellow under the direction of Nathan S. Lewis and Harry B. Gray. During his post-doc at Cornell, he mentored under Héctor D. Abruña and Francis J. DiSalvo.

D E PA R T M E N T O F C H E M I C A L & P E T R O L E U M E N G I N E E R I N G

Dr. McKone’s research group studies fundamentals and applications of electrochemistry, photochemistry, and solidstate/materials chemistry with an emphasis on renewable energy and sustainability. In addition to several publications and presentations, Dr. McKone has pursued multiple patents in energy storage technologies.

Professor and Department Chair, and the Ruth and Howard Mickle Endowed Chair • alan.george@pitt.edu

Dr. George joined the faculty at the University of Florida (UF) in 1997 and served as full professor with tenure in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE). Under the auspices of the National Science Foundation (NSF), he founded and leads one of the most successful research centers at NSF or UF, the NSF Center for High-performance Reconfigurable Computing (CHREC, pronounced “shreck”), which features more than 30 industry, agency, and academic partners. In ECE at UF, Professor George built and led graduate and research

programs in computer engineering, growing them from virtually nil to become the match of electrical engineering in every respect.

He also led the university committee that created the first supercomputer center in UF history, which is a major campus facility that has grown to become one of the foremost at any US university. Before transferring to UF, he served on the faculty in the joint college of engineering at Florida State University and Florida A&M University.

Professor George is a Fellow of the IEEE for contributions in reconfigurable and

high-performance computing. His research is in high-performance architectures, networks, systems, services, and apps for reconfigurable, parallel, distributed, and dependable computing. He works with many graduate and undergraduate students, and their experimental research often leads to new technologies. Two recent examples are the world’s foremost reconfigurable supercomputer (called Novo-G), and a hybrid and reconfigurable space computer (called CHREC Space Processor or CSP) featured on 15 spacecraft slated for launch into Earth orbit in 2017-18.

D E PA R T M E N T O F E L E C T R I C A L & C O M P U T E R E N G I N E E R I N G

Research Assistant Professor • bmg10@pitt.edu

Brandon M. Grainger earned his master’s degree in electrical engineering and bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering (with minor in electrical engineering) from the University of Pittsburgh. His PhD focused on megawatt scale power electronic systems and controls with applications in microgrids and medium voltage DC system design.

Dr. Grainger was one of the inaugural Richard K. Mellon graduate student fellows through the Center for Energy at the University of Pittsburgh. His research concentrations and interests are in all classes of power electronic technology including topology design, semiconductor evaluation (currently gallium nitride transistors), advanced controller design, power electronic applications for microgrids, HVDC and FACTS, and circuit

D E PA R T M E N T O F E L E C T R I C A L & C O M P U T E R E N G I N E E R I N G

reliability. In his career thus far, he has contributed to 30+ articles in the general area of electric power engineering and all of which have been published through the IEEE. Dr. Grainger serves as chair of the IEEE Pittsburgh PELS Chapter, which won chapter of the year in 2015. He is also an ambassador for the National Academy of Sciences and Engineering in the Pittsburgh region.

Assistant Professor • rjk39@pitt.edu

Robert Kerestes received his bachelor’s, master’s and PhD with a concentration in electric power systems from the University of Pittsburgh. His academic focus is in education as it applies to engineering at the collegiate level, and his research interests are in electric power systems, in particular electric machinery and electromagnetics. He has worked as a mathematical

modeler for Emerson Process Management, working on electric power applications for Emerson’s Ovation Embedded Simulator.

He has also taught as an adjunct professor at the University of Pittsburgh since 2014. Dr. Kerestes served in the United States Navy from 1998-2002 on active duty and from 2002-2006 in the US Naval Reserves.

D E PA R T M E N T O F E L E C T R I C A L & C O M P U T E R E N G I N E E R I N G

Assistant Professor • f.xiong@pitt.edu

Dr. Xiong received his PhD and master’s in electrical and computer engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and his B. Eng. in electrical and computer engineering from the National University of Singapore.

Prior to joining Pitt, Dr. Xiong was a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Electrical Engineering at Stanford University.

His research interests are in energy-efficient electronics, novel low-dimensional materials, next-generation memory devices,

D E PA R T M E N T O F E L E C T R I C A L & C O M P U T E R E N G I N E E R I N G

flexible electronics, nanoscale thermal transport and renewable energy harvesting. He received several awards including the Stanford Nano- and Quantum Science and Engineering Postdoctoral Fellowship, MRS Graduate Student Gold Award, Beckman Institute Graduate Fellowship and TSMC Outstanding Student Research Gold Award. Dr. Xiong is a member of IEEE and MRS.

Assistant Professor • mbedewy@pitt.edu

Dr. Bedewy was a postdoctoral associate at MIT in bionanofabrication with Professor Karl Berggren (2014-2016), and previously a postdoc at the MIT Laboratory for Manufacturing and Productivity, working with Professor John Hart on in situ environmental TEM characterization of catalytic nanostructure synthesis and interactions.

He completed his PhD at the University of Michigan – Ann Arbor, where he worked with Professor Hart on

studying the population dynamics and the collective mechanochemical factors governing the growth and selforganization of nanofilaments. He holds a bachelor’s degree in mechanical design and production engineering (honors) and a master’s degree in mechanical engineering from Cairo University.

Dr. Bedewy received the Robert A. Meyer Award from the American Carbon Society in 2016, the Richard and Eleanor Towner Prize for Distinguished Academic

Achievement from the University of Michigan in 2014, and the Silver Award from the Materials Research Society (MRS) in 2013. His research interests include advanced manufacturing, nanofabrication, nanometrology and materials characterization, selfassembly of hierarchical nanostructures, engineering of biomolecular systems, and precision design.

D E PA R T M E N T O F I N D U S T R I A L E N G I N E E R I N G

Assistant Professor • drjiang@pitt.edu

Dr. Jiang received his PhD in May 2016 from Princeton University in operations research and financial engineering. Previously, he completed a B.S. in computer engineering and B.S. in mathematics from Purdue University in May 2011. His research interests are in stochastic optimization, approximate dynamic programming, and risk-averse sequential decision making, with a variety of application areas including energy operations and energy markets.

D E PA R T M E N T O F I N D U S T R I A L E N G I N E E R I N G

Research Assistant Professor (NTS) • lluangkesorn@pitt.edu

Dr. Luangkesorn’s research focuses are data science and simulation, with particular focus on supply chain and health care issues. Prior to joining the University of Pittsburgh, he worked

as an operations researcher with the RAND Corporation focusing on military logistics and public health response, and is an active Red Cross volunteer in disaster preparedness and response. He

received his PhD in industrial engineering and management sciences from Northwestern University in 2004.

D E PA R T M E N T O F I N D U S T R I A L E N G I N E E R I N G

Assistant Professor (NTS) • jwhitefoot@pitt.edu

Dr. Whitefoot earned his PhD from University of Michigan-Ann Arbor, and previously was a General Engineer with the National Highway Traffic and Safety Administration in the Department of Transportation in Washington, DC. Dr. Whitefoot’s research interests include transportation design and policy, design optimization, and renewable energy. He has instructed two MEMS courses: Applied Thermodynamics and Thermal Systems Design.

D E PA R T M E N T O F M E C H A N I C A L E N G I N E E R I N G & M A T E R I A L S S C I E N C E

Assistant Professor • weixiong@pitt.edu

Dr. Xiong received his PhD from KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden and previously was a Research Associate at Northwestern University. Prof. Xiong’s research interests include: advanced materials and processing design based on methodologies of materials by design and

accelerated insertion of materials; predictive-science based model development for process-structure-property relation in advanced manufacturing; additive manufacturing of high performance Ti alloys and steels using LENS (Laser Engineered Net Shaping) and SLM (Selective Laser Melting).

D E PA R T M E N T O F M E C H A N I C A L E N G I N E E R I N G & M A T E R I A L S S C I E N C E

Assistant Professor • hasan.babaee@pitt.edu

Dr. Babaee earned his PhD from Louisiana State University (2013) and previously was a post-doctoral associate at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dr. Babaee’s research interests include: computational fluid dynamics and heat transfer, multi-physics modeling, multi-fidelity modeling, stochastic modeling, uncertainty quantification, high performance computing, flow instability, and computational electromagnetics.

D E PA R T M E N T O F M E C H A N I C A L E N G I N E E R I N G & M A T E R I A L S S C I E N C E

Patrick Smolinski, PhD, P.E., associate professor of mechanical engineering and materials science at the University of Pittsburgh’s Swanson School of Engineering, was named Director of the school’s Engineering Science Program.

Smolinski succeeds John Barnard, PhD, P.E., who also coordinated the program’s Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET) review in 2013.

Seeking to expand its reach across the university and with regional entities, the Swanson School of Engineering announced new leadership at its Petersen Institute for NanoScience and Engineering (PINSE). Esta Abelev, PhD, formerly a research associate at Princeton University, has been named Technical Director. David H. Waldeck, PhD, Pitt Professor of Chemistry, will assume the role of Academic Director.

Civil and Environmental Engineering

Electrical and Computer Engineering

Mark Magalotti – Professor of Practice, non-tenure stream John Sebastian – Professor of Practice, non-tenure stream Julie Vandenbossche – associate professor with tenure

Steve Jacobs – assistant to associate, non-tenure stream Industrial Engineering Mary Besterfield-Sacre – associate to full professor Jeff Kharoufeh – associate to full professor Paul Leu – assistant to associate professor Ravi Shankar – associate to full professor

University of Pittsburgh Swanson School of Engineering 104 Benedum Hall 3700 O’Hara Street Pittsburgh, PA 15261

The information printed in this document was accurate to the best of our knowledge at the time of printing and is subject to change at any time at the University’s sole discretion.

Papers Manufactured Using 100% Certified Renewable Electricity Cover: 30% Post-Consumer Waste Recycled Fiber Text: 10% Post-Consumer Waste Recycled Fiber

The University of Pittsburgh is an affirmative action, equal opportunity institution.

11/16