Mechanical Engineering Newsletter - Fall 2021

FALL 2021

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TABLE OF CONTENTS 5 A MESSAGE FROM THE DEO 7 STERN RECEIVES $1.3 MILLION IN GRANTS 9 LAMUTA RECEIVES DARPA AWARD 12 XIAO RECEIVES NSF GRANT 14 NEW FACULTY SPOTLIGHT: DEEMA TOTAH 17 STUDENT AWARDS AND ACCOMPLISHMENTS 18 ALUMNI SPOTLIGHTS 19 DR. DEIERLING PROMOTION 19 GRADUATE SCHOLARSHIPS

Jessie Kasik—New ME Office Assistant Jessie began working with the Mechanical Engineering Department in August of 2021, making this her first newsletter contribution. She is also a designer for the Daily Iowan, a member of SCOPE Productions and Students to Assist Recruitment (STAR) on campus. Jessie previously has been involved in Dance Marathon, HerCampus Iowa, and American Advertising Association. She is also a volunteer at Cedar Valley Humane Society in Cedar Rapids.

Jessie is a double major in Communication Studies and Art with an emphasis in Graphic Design and is also earning a certificate in Event Management. Jessie hopes to intertwine her creative and people skills into her future career. Outside of school, she enjoys thrifting, reading, and finding her next favorite coffee shop in Iowa City.

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A MESSAGE FROM THE DEO During the annual ME faculty retreat in August, we announced and designated this year as “Year of Research” after focusing on curriculum advancements over the past three years. This designation marks our endeavor to advance our graduate program by developing action plans and metrics in alignment with the College of Engineering (CoE) strategic research priorities. One of the action plans and associated metrics is to increase our number of PhD students per tenure-system faculty to the CoE targeted number over the next few years. As a consequence, this newsletter issue places an emphasis on the research programs and recently funded projects of selected faculty across the rank, including Assistant

Professor

Caterina

Lamuta,

Associate

Professor

Shaoping Xiao and Professor Fred Stern. In addition, a story on our new Assistant Professor Deema Totah provides the prospects of the strengths and energies that she added to the momentum that the department has been building in the new research thrust area of artificial intelligence, control, robotics and autonomous systems.

Given that the undergraduate program as well as the undergraduate to graduate (U2G) accelerated program are vital to the success of our graduate program, the ME Undergraduate Committee has also been working to meet our student success goal by continuously improving our curriculum, faculty advising and student retention. Additionally, we officially created the ME Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) Committee to develop a vision that aligns with the college-wide DEI action plans and lay a foundation to identify and enact realistic advances in DEI. Several initiatives have also been proposed and discussed this semester. We will keep you posted on the progress of these initiatives in the near future.

Wish you a joyful holiday season and a new year filled with good health, peace and happiness!

Ching-Long Lin, DEO Edward M. Mielnik and Samuel R. Harding Professor

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ME PROFESSOR STERN RECEIVES $1.3 MILLION IN RESEARCH GRANTS Professor Frederick Stern of Mechanical Engineering and co-PI Yugo Sanada have received three new grants totaling $1.3M from the Office of Naval Research, including a highly competitive Defense University Research Instrumentation Program (DURIP) award.

Stern, who is also an IIHR research engineer and the George D. Ashton Professor of Hydroscience and Engineering, joined IIHR in 1983. Since then, he has led IIHR’s ship hydrodynamics research program and brought in more than $41M in grant funding, some of which has provided a significant portion of the funding for the development and instrumentation of IIHR’s towing tank and wave basin facilities. Both of these world-renowned, state-of-the-art facilities use the most advanced measurement systems to provide essential experimental data for physical understanding and CFD validation in ship hydrodynamics Stern and Sanada will use the DURIP funding to acquire an instrumentation system to support his complementary ONR grant, titled “Global and Local Flow Modeling and Validation Experiments for Free-Running Office of Naval Research Tumblehome (ONRT) Surface Combatant Maneuvering in Waves.”

The ONR Tumblehome or ONRT is an experimental model ship hull frequently used in fundamental research.

The instrumentation will support global and local flow modeling and validation experiments using the ONRT at the IIHR Wave Basin and Towing Tank. The equipment includes:

neuvers; and • Instrumentation for increased accuracy of the tracking system and the wavemaker controller, as well as lenses for increased resolution of time resolved volumetric particle tracking velocimetry (4DPTV).

The propeller side force measurement system and 6Dof soft spring mount have been developed in collaboration with Osaka University (Prof. Yasuyuki Toda) and manufactured by Sanshin and Mori Engineering, Japan. The three-year research project combines IIHR’s extensive experience with towing tank experiments using captive model ships for local flow measurements (wave elevations and 4DPTV), and wave basin research on free running and semi-captive model ships to gather 6DoF measurements. The experiments will build on previous data but with a focus on identifying/separating trends because of waves and initial conditions and identifying conditions for local flow measurements in consideration of validation variables and collaborative data driven machine learning and CFD studies (CNR-INM (Dr. Matteo Diez) and NATO-AVT 348 Assessment of Experiments and Prediction Methods for Naval Vehicles Maneuvering in Waves).

The third ONR award, “Global and Local Flow Modeling and Validation Experiments for Free-running KCS Maneuvering in Waves,” also uses the new instrumentation for similar research for a Korea Research Institute of Ships and Ocean Engineering (KRISO) Container Ship (KCS).

• Load cells and amplifiers to measure propeller side forces; rudder axial and side forces; and yaw moment, as well as metal propellers for enhanced volumetric local flow velocity measurements; • Six degrees of freedom (6DoF) soft spring mount (surge, sway, and yaw linear motor) to measure horizontal wave drift forces (X,Y) and moment (N) during the model ma-

About ONR As an executive branch agency within the Department of Defense, the Office of Naval Research (ONR) provides technical advice to the U.S. Navy. IIHR has received funding from the Office of Naval Research since the mid-1950s.

For more information, visit the ONR website.

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Anyone who has seen a cephalopod such as an octopus ful, lightweight and less than a millimeter in thickness. or squid move knows that they are amazing creatures. Once applied to vehicles and robots, S4 would provide Caterina Lamuta, assistant professor in the Department attributes such as fine manipulation, swimming dexterof Mechanical Engineering and assistant research engi- ity, bio-inspired propulsion, and the ability to adapt to neer in IIHR-Hydroscience & Engineering at the Univer- conditions to control underwater drag. sity of Iowa, has taken a keen interest in these creatures Lamuta’s work is not only focused on soft actuators and has found new ways to mimic cephalopod tentacles for underwater movement and manipulation. She also in the lab. Lamuta was recently awarded a prestigious plans to combine S4 with other soft skins she recently Young Investigator Award from the Defense Advanced developed for the United States Navy, that are capable Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to develop new of changing texture, so that she can completely mimic self-morphing, stretchable cephalopods’ performance soft skins (S4) for use in unfor both manipulation and derwater vehicles and roThis project has tremendous potential camouflage purposes.

The DARPA award will bots. for applications across a wide spectrum fund Lamuta’s work for “Cephalopods can perform very fine and complex including the military, healthcare, and private three years and is one of the most prestigious motion because their ten- industry. awards professors can retacles are formed by thin layers of soft tissues and muscles which have no solid ceive early in their careers. Lamuta’s research has also structures such as bones,” said Lamuta. “We want to been supported by agencies such as Office of Naval Remimic this unique performance by embedding our twist- search, the National Science Foundation, the Air Force ed and coiled artificial muscles (TCAMS) inside thin rub- Office of Scientific Research, and NASA for a total of ber-like layers to develop soft skins that can be assem- $2,000,000 in funding.

“This project has tremendous potential for applications bled to reproduce tentacle-like soft actuators for marine across a wide spectrum including the military, healthvehicles and robots.”

The lightweight and strong TCAMs can lift up to 12,600 care, and private industry,” said Lamuta. “I am grateful times their own weight with a very small input voltage. that DARPA has chosen to support me in this project, and Using the TCAMs as the base, Lamuta’s S4 will be power- I am excited to see how our S4 continue to develop.”

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Fall Foliage

Multicolored treetops seen at UI MacBride Nature Recreation Area

NSF GRANT SUPPORTS SHAOPING XIAO’S STUDY OF SPECIALLY MODIFIED MATERIALS Will Fineman University of Iowa Technology Institute Associate professor Shaoping Xiao is developing a new method to study materials that can better withstand the demands of use in high-tech industries, including automotive, aerospace, and biomedical. Xiao is also a research scientist at the University of Iowa Technology Institute (ITI).

Enhanced by machine learning, the new method will examine the materials, including titanium, titanium boride, and ceramics, under different thermal environments from nanoscale to microscale, and then to macroscale.

Titanium and titanium boride have high specific strength, specific stiffness, fatigue resistance, and hardness. These materials are also biocompatible.

“Titanium based composites can hardly be machined and suffer from low hardness and poor wear resistance,” said Xiao. “Adding ceramics can overcome these obstacles for automotive and aerospace applications.”

Xiao was awarded a National Science Foundation grant to develop this new computational method for investi-

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gating the mechanics of a modified group of materials at multiple scales. Xiao directs the Multiscale Computational Science and Engineering Laboratory. Caterina Lamuta and Phillip Deierling, professors in the UI Department of Mechanical Engineering, will serve as co-principal investigators in this project.

If developed and validated by experimental testing, the proposed process will aid the design of next-generation materials for applications in several high-tech industries, including aerospace, automotive, and biomedical.

The $486,358, 3-year grant provides funding for undergraduate education in data science and engineering as well as finances for recruitment of female, underrepresented minority, and LGBTQ+ students. The award will also allow for more university outreach programs to K-12 students.

Spatially tailored materials are composites consisting of two or more distinct materials in which the component distribution continuously changes in space.

This unique group provides advantages over traditional composites due to its ability to use the predominant characteristics of the base materials and to modify the ef-

fective material properties depending on conditions and temperatures.

For example, the concept of spatially tailored material allows structural engineers to change the stiffness and strength properties through the thickness of aircraft wings in order to tailor the structural behavior, Xiao said.

The risk of that the wings snap off or fail can be reduced.

Unlike spatially tailored materials, a regular composite with a constant volume fraction usually doesn’t have the material properties varying in space.

Current practices for numerical modeling of spatially tailored materials use principles of micromechanics to transition to the macroscale.

Most of these methods cannot model certain inter-

actions taking place at the molecular level and the microstructure uncertainties at the microscale level. Both drawbacks prevent researchers from accurately predicting material responses at the micro and macro scales.

Researchers will work toward the development of a data-enabled approach in hierarchical multiscale modeling to pass information through multiple scales, and it will attempt to establish an efficient way to generate microscale models of composites to take account of microstructure uncertainties.

“The research develops a novel computational method enhanced by artificial neural networks to design composite materials,” Xiao said. “The methodology framework can be applied to study and design other materials.”

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NEW FACULTY SPOTLIGHT: DEEMA TOTAH

Deema Totah received her BSE from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and her MS and PhD from the University of Michigan.

New faculty member Deema Totah arrived at the share ideas with a professor, and it could lead someUniversity of Iowa eager to continue her research fo- where where you can combine expertise,” she said. cusing on medical devices and how they can improve “It’s nice to be in that atmosphere.” patient lives.

Before landing at the UI, Totah conducted multiple Totah earned a BS in mechanical engineering from research projects during her master’s and PhD proMassachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) with a grams at the University of Michigan under her PhD focus on medical devices. She continued her education co-advisors Kira Barton and Deanna Gates. Totah also at the University of Michigan, where she obtained worked with Deanna Gates as a postdoctoral research both MS and PhD degrees in mechanical engineering. fellow in the School of Kinesiology at the University of Totah is now an assistant professor at the University Michigan. of Iowa (UI) where she intends to continue to pursue While completing her PhD, Totah’s research studied her research on the efficacy of assistive devices ankle-foot orthosis devices (AFOs), specifically AFO for customized patient care. Her work leverages stiffness and how it affects biomechanics and huwearable sensing (sensors that can be worn on the man movement. Through her research, Totah discovbody or integrated into ered that measuring specific clothing), mechatronics (the properties of these devices combination of mechanical The fact that the College of Engineering is necessary to understand engineering and electronics), effects on the patient and the medical school are both strong parts their and machine learning (the and to determine the best use of computer algorithms of the University of Iowa is exciting for me and designs for that individual, to help see patterns in data) my research. resulting in the creation of to answer biomechanics two robotic devices to meaquestions. sure and emulate stiffness.

Totah is excited to be at the UI to further her reWhile working with Gates, Totah said she learned search because of the university’s proximity to clinical about the importance of the clinical side of her work facilities and the medical school. “I always pictured and allowing that to drive the research. “Deanna could [that] I would end up somewhere with a strong health- speak clinical language very well which helped bridge care and medical program,” Totah said. “The fact that the gap between engineering and clinical work,” Totah the College of Engineering and the medical school are said. “She created an environment where you could both strong parts of the University of Iowa is exciting exist in both of those worlds.” for me and my research.”

Totah’s master’s research focused on machine learnBeing able to lead her own research group and to ing and modeling techniques to predict human intent mentor PhD students and research assistants one- in order to prevent back injury. A device was used to on-one is something else Totah is looking forward to look at and sense low back muscle activity while lifting continuing at the UI. Totah said she enjoys the collab- weights. The device used machine learning to predict orative environment that academia provides. “You can how much force the subject was going to produce and

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what weight they were going to lift before they lifted it.

Barton encouraged Totah to mentor other students (undergraduate and graduate) while working in the Barton Research group. Barton taught her how to collaborate and engage in multidisciplinary research.

While Barton’s lab allowed Totah to collaborate with students in other areas of engineering study, Totah was the only person studying human-related processes. Totah said this made it challenging to find colleagues with whom to discuss her work.

To overcome this challenge, Totah decided to start a Biomechatronics Journal Club, where she met with several other students in her area of study. She is still in touch with many of them today, including Rachel Vitali, an assistant professor here at the UI. The two are currently collaborating on a project.

Before deciding to focus on medical devices, Totah explored multiple areas of study. During her time as an undergraduate at MIT, she took a seminar titled, “Developing World Prosthetics,” which sparked her interest in medical devices.

Totah’s advice to current undergraduates is to go all in. “Give 100 percent of your effort and if you end up not liking the track you are on, or if you end up switching majors or career paths, it won’t be a waste,” she said. “You will still have those experiences and skills and can build upon them.”

The University of Iowa Department of Mechanical Engineering is excited to welcome Deema Totah as a new member of the faculty!

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STUDENT AWARDS & ACCOMPLISHMENTS

XUEHUAN HE Post-Comprehensive Research Fellowship Recipient

This fellowship program provides an opportunity for advanced Ph.D. students to benefit from protected and supported time to pursue their scholarly research activities. The fellowship is intended to recognize students with distinguished academic achievement during their early graduate training. These achievements should be evident from a combination of outstanding academic performance in coursework, as well as early scholarly research activities.

Ph.D. candidate Mehedi Bappy was awarded the Ballard/Seashore fellowship for the Spring 2022 semester from the University of Iowa Graduate College. This fellowship program provides an opportunity for Ph.D. students to benefit from a final semester of protected and supported time to focus on completing their scholarly research activities and the writing of their dissertations.

Bappy’s work is focused on modeling the cavitation inception in the turbulent flow based on statistical description and applying the model to the subgrid-scale of a CFD simulation where the turbulence is not properly resolved.

SAMANTHA BELL Dean’s Fellowship Recipient

MEHEDI BAPPY Ballard/Seashore Fellowship Recipient

Samantha Bell is a recent graduate from Texas A&M University with a bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering in May of 2020. During her undergraduate years, she spent four quarter rotations as an intern at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Titusville, FL. She wants to focus on robotics in the medical field while at the University of Iowa. She has a specific interest in prosthetics and exoskeletons, which is why she is working in the Smart Multifunctional Materials Systems (SMMS) laboratory with Dr. Lamuta. Here, she will have the opportunity to work with Lamuta’s artificial muscles to develop upper/lower limb devices.

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ALUMNI SPOTLIGHTS: WHERE ARE THEY NOW?

MIKAELA THIEL

JEREMY HILL

I graduated from Iowa in Mechanical Engineering in 2020. I currently work at Medtronic in Minneapolis, MN as a Product Engineer in the cardiac and vascular group, where I support the manufacturing of components that feed into pacemakers and defi brillators.

My job requires me to think on my feet and come up with creative, effective solutions to problems that occur on the manufacturing line- all while keeping an emphasis on the quality of our product for the patient.

While in undergrad, I enjoyed being able to customize my classes for my focus area within my ME degree. I did a “tailored” EFA, which allowed me to take a combination of biomedical, manufacturing, and mechanical design classes. Being able to take a few classes within the BME department gave me an upper hand while searching for jobs in the medical industry that I was interested in, while still getting the mechanical engineering principles and manufacturing background. I was also actively involved in the Society of Women Engineers (SWE) while at Iowa. It was actually through a SWE conference in Minneapolis that I was able to land my first internship with Medtronic, which ultimately led to my full-time job out of college. The many opportunities through SWE were so valuable to me, and I know so many people have had similar experiences through all the engineering student orgs.

Needless to say, I’m proud to be a Hawkeye engineer!

I graduated from Iowa in December of 2020 with a BSE in Mechanical Engineering and started right away in 2021 as a Manufacturing Engineer at Boston Scientific Corporation in Minneapolis, MN. Within Boston Scientific I work in the Balloons Catheter Assembly business unit acting as the line owner for several different assembly lines. The processes I work with range from specialty balloon catheter sub-component assemblies to the proproccessing of tubing before the tubes are molded into balloons.

I am also working with a team to bring new products onto each of the assembly lines I own. This position has given me the opportunity to leverage my problem-solving skills I learned through my classwork and student organizations at Iowa to help solve various quality and scrap challenges.

I greatly enjoyed my time as an undergraduate in the College of Engineering and my experiences have been highly valuable in my career. The senior design project class gave me the framework to build my projects off of and my time working as a teaching assistant greatly improved my teaching and communication skills that are important when working with all different levels of people in an operations environment. Everyone be sure to get involved in some of the great student organizations and opportunities that the college has to offer! Go Hawks!

CLASS OF 2020

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CLASS OF 2020

CONGRATULATIONS, DR. DEIERLING! Congratulations to Dr. Phillip Deierling who was promoted to Associate Professor of Instruction effective Fall of 2021. Deierling has a BSE, MSE, and Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering, 2009, 2010, and 2016, respectively, all of which are from the University of Iowa.

Prior to obtaining his Ph.D., Deierling worked for Dana Holding corporation in Maumee, OH as a Design and Analysis Engineer from 2011-2013. While working towards his doctoral degree, Deierling held appointments with the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) Munitions Directorate and University of Florida as a research associate from 2013-2016. Upon successful completion of his doctorate degree, Deierling was a National Research Council Post-doctoral research associate working with the AFRL Munitions Directorate from 2017-2018.

Deierling was awarded the “Excellence in Teaching and Dedication to Student Success” in May 2019. He also received two consecutive (2019 and 2020) recognitions from the University of Iowa Graduating Class as nominated by students for making a positive influence. Deierling also received a Career Kudos award in 2020 as nominated by students for making a difference in their career and professional development goals.

Congratulations, Dr. Deierling!

Graduate Student Scholarships, 2021-2022 Academic Year • Rajyalakshmi and Shankay Planjery scholarship awarded to Nichalas Winter, MS Candidate working with Professor Austin Krebill.

• Sharada Devi Planjery scholarship awarded to Xuan Zhang, PhD Candidate working with Professor Ching-Long Lin. • Venkatachalam Planjery scholarship awarded to Michael Swafford, PhD Candidate working with Professor Casey Harwood.

• Richard Stewart scholarship awarded to A.S.M Sazzad Parvey, PhD Candidate and Rahat Mollick, PhD. Candidate working with ...Professor Albert Ratner.

• Sweigert scholarship awarded to Calvin Kielas-Jensen, PhD Candidate working with Professor Venanzio Cichella The scholarships make a difference on the students’ research and education and the ME Department appreciates all of the scholarship donors! If you are interested in starting a scholarship in your name, please contact Matt Kuster, email matt.kuster@foriowa.org.

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Baja Club headed to Wisconsin in October for BackWoods Baja where they brought home the gold.