New Faculty

Dr. Isaac Torres-Díaz joined the Chemical and Materials Engineering Department as an Assistant Professor. He received his BS in Mechanical Engineering from Universidad Nacional de Trujillo, and the M.S. in Mechanical Engineering and Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from University of Puerto Rico, Mayagüez campus. Prior to joining UAH, he worked as Postdoctoral Fellow at Johns Hopkins University. His research combines the synthesis, characterization, real-time imaging, and multi-scale modeling, to fundamentally understand the interactions and collective response of colloidal suspensions composed of anisotropic particles.

Dr. Rui Ma joined the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering as an Assistant Professor. He received his Ph.D. degree in Civil Engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in 2013, and the B.Eng. degree in Automation from Tsinghua University in 2009. Prior to joining UAH, he was a Lecturer and Postdoc Scholar in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at University of California, Davis, where he was teaching undergraduate and graduate courses and conducting research on dynamic transportation network modeling, new mobilities, sustainable transportation systems and urban traffic data analytics .

Dr. Mehrnaz Doustmohammadi joined the Department of Civil and Environmental engineering as a Lecturer and Research Scientist. She earned a Bachelor’s degree from Khajeh Nasir Toosi University of Technology in Tehran, Iran in 2013 and received her Master’s degree in Industrial Engineering and her Ph.D. in Civil Engineering from UAH in 2015 and 2018, respectively. Her area of research is in traffic safety and modeling. As a Research Scientist, she works closely with the Alabama Department of Transportation and leads a program which provides instruction and training to drivers.

Dr. Aubrey Beal joined the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering as an Assistant Professor. He received the B.E.E. (2010), M.S. (2012) and Ph.D. (2015) degrees in Electrical Engineering from Auburn University. Prior to joining UAH, he held a postdoctoral appointment with the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oakridge Institute for Science and Education for the U.S. Army AMRDEC he served as a researcher and electronics engineer with the U.S. Army RDECOM at Redstone Arsenal. His research interests include enhancement and security of cyberphysical systems though advances in nonlinear dynamics, machine learning and signal processing.

Dr. Nicholas Loyd joined the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering and Engineering Management as a Clinical Assistant Professor. He also serves as Director of the Center for Management and Economic Research at UAH. He has over 20 years of experience researching and implementing Lean production systems and supply chain concepts. He specializes in strategic plan deployment, leadership skills development, value stream mapping, and kaizen facilitation.

Dr. Nagavenkat Adurthi joined the Department Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering as an Assistant Professor. He received his Ph.D. degree from the University at Buffalo, New York. Prior to joining he was a postdoctoral research associate at Texas A&M University. He also worked at Rithmio, a startup company where he developed machine learning algorithms for pattern recognition. His primary area of research is in the development of scalable numerical and computational control algorithms applied to problems of robotics and space situational awareness.