New Faculty Fall 2020 - Cullen College of Engineering - University of Houston

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NEW FACULTY THE CULLEN COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING IS PLEASED TO WELCOME

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NEW FACULTY.

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Letter from the Dean While 2020 has presented a unique set of challenges for our community, the Cullen College of Engineering has remained committed to its high standards for excellence in engineering education and research. Despite having to modify our instructional approach, our faculty and students have continued to excel, proving just how resilient they are even under the most challenging of circumstances. Two of our faculty received prestigious NSF CAREER Awards to further their groundbreaking technological research in the health and medical fields, and even though this is arguably one of the most difficult periods for student success, our students have defied the odds and brought our six-year

TOP 25%

NATIONWIDE 6-YEAR GRADUATION RATE

graduation rate to an all-time high. I am beyond proud to report that the Cullen College’s graduation rate is now 71.2 percent, putting us in the top 25 percent nationally for all public schools.

The outstanding faculty at the Cullen College are the backbone of these successes and are why we continue to excel in our pursuit of excellence. And so, I am proud to introduce three new members of our faculty, all of who will be joining our civil and environmental engineering department this fall as assistant professors. From laser mapping to computational modeling techniques, each of them brings impressive academic credentials, research achievement and expertise. I look forward to celebrating their future accomplishments at our college.

Warm Regards,

Joseph W. Tedesco, Ph.D., P.E. Elizabeth D. Rockwell Dean and Professor

NEW FACULTY | FALL 2020

$35M+ IN ANNUAL RESEARCH EXPENDITURES

UH ENGINEERING BY THE NUMBERS FY 2020 Degrees awarded*:

621 252 86

BACHELOR’S DEGREES

30+

ACTIVE LABORATORIES

MASTER’S DEGREES DOCTORAL DEGREES

#67

BEST ENGINEERING SCHOOL IN THE NATION *(Source: U.S. News & World Report)

X=Y

14

139

TOTAL FACULTY

NATIONAL ACADEMY OF ENGINEERING FACULTY

19

(NSF) NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION CAREER AWARDS SINCE 2008

University of Houston | Cullen College of Engineering

DR. VEDHUS HOSKERE CEE ASSISTANT PROFESSOR Hoskere will start the Structures and Artificial Intelligence Lab (SAIL) at the college. He completed his doctorate in civil and environmental engineering this summer, along with a M.S. in computer science at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in May. He earned a M.S. in Civil and Environmental Engineering from there in May 2016, and his B.S. in civil engineering was completed at the B. M. S. College of Engineering in Bengaluru, India in May 2014.

In the aftermath of natural disasters like earthquakes, fast and reliable assessment of structures is crucial to allow people to resume occupying their homes and offices with delays severely exacerbating economic and societal disruption. To mitigate these problems, Hoskere’s research investigates development of an automated inspection framework for buildings and viaducts using drones and deep learning methods. He has also worked closely with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to develop solutions for automated inspections and monitoring of navigational locks and dams that form a crucial part of the inland navigation system. In his free time, he enjoys singing Indian classical music, swing dancing, flying drones, and going on runs and hikes.

NEW FACULTY | FALL 2020

DR. XIE HU CEE ASSISTANT PROFESSOR Hu will be working at the National Center for Airborne Laser Mapping, which she described as a well-known geosensing institution and a draw when applying for a position. Hu uses radar imagery, taken from satellites or aircrafts, to measure the ground motion within millimeter accuracy.

This approach can be used to monitor various kinds of geohazards, and the Earth’s shallow and deep processes associated with natural or anthropogenic triggers, such as landslides, earthquakes, aquifer systems, mining, oil and gas productions, and groundwater pumping.

Hu earned her Ph.D. in geophysics from Southern Methodist University in 2018. She received a master’s in remote sensing from Wuhan University in 2014, and her B.E. in GIS from the China University of Geosciences (Wuhan) in 2011. Prior to being hired by UH, Hu worked as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of California Berkeley.

In her free time, Hu enjoys spending time with her family and friends, as well as traveling.

University of Houston | Cullen College of Engineering

DR. DIMITRIOS KALLIONTZIS CEE ASSISTANT PROFESSOR Kalliontzis said the University of Houston’s continued improvement was the reason it appealed to him. “Year by year, the Cullen College of Engineering rises in the U.S. Rankings, which shows momentum when it comes to advancing its position in the map of research and teaching innovations,” he said.

Kalliontzis’ research combines computational modeling techniques with laboratory testing to better understand how critical structures behave under extreme loading conditions.

Kalliontzis received his doctorate in structural engineering from the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, in August 2018. He earned a master’s in structural engineering from Iowa State University in August 2014, and received his diploma in civil engineering from the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki in Greece.

Since earning his doctorate, Kalliontzis has been a postdoctoral researcher at the University of California, San Diego. In his free time, he enjoys traveling, running, spending time with his family, and reading books about history, cosmology and religion.

NEW FACULTY | FALL 2020

The University of Houston Cullen College of Engineering The University of Houston Cullen College of Engineering addresses key challenges in energy, healthcare, infrastructure and the environment by conducting cutting-edge research and graduating hundreds of worldclass engineers each year.

With research expenditures topping $35 million and increasing each year, we continue to follow our tradition of excellence in spearheading research that has a real, direct impact in the Houston region and beyond.

University Cullen of Houston College| of Cullen Engineering College of| Spring Engineering 2020

UH Cullen College of Engineering Office of Communications Cullen College of Engineering Building 2 4722 Calhoun Road, Suite E311 Houston, Texas 77204-4009 @UHEngineering

NEW FACULTY FALL 2020