Ae n g i n e e r i n g . p i t t . e d u

spring/summer 2011

university of pittsburghswanson school of engineering

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engineering.pitt.edu

The alumni magazine of the Swanson School of Engineering

SwanSon School of EnginEEringGerald D. Holder u.S. Steel dean of engineeringSonia Gill director of Marketing and Communications/editorTeralyn Iscrupe Associate director of Marketing and Communications/Contributing Writer Adelyn Biedenbach Marketing and Communications intern UnivErSity markEting commUnicationSKelly Sjol Communications Manager/editorDon Henderson Assistant Creative director/designerChuck Dinsmore production ManagerSarah Jordan Rosenson editorial Assistant Niki Kapsambelis Morgan Kelly Contributing Writers

On the CoverSwanson School students are applying their knowledge and understanding of engineering concepts on intern and study abroad trips all over the world (see cover story, page 12). Locations have included (clockwise from top left) the beachside city of Vung tau, Vietnam, where as part of the renowned plus3 program, students hiked to the top of Mount nho to see the Christ of Vung tau statue; iguazu Falls, on the border of Argentina and Brazil, where engineering for a Better environment: Brazil students visited the largest hydroelectric power plant in the Americas; republic of Mali, West Africa, where Mike Bosek (BSCe ’09) and other engineers Without Borders students completed assessments before constructing a fish farm in the village of Maliki; and Seville, Spain, where students visited as part of exchange programs with a number of Spanish universities through the global engineering education exchange (global e3) program.

Awards2006, 2007, and 2008 iABC golden triangle Award of excellence, Magazines: 4-Color design

Have a comment or story idea for Pitt Engineer? Contact teralyn iscrupe at 412-624-0265, or send an e-mail to tei6@pitt.edu.

the university of pittsburgh is an affirmative action, equal opportunity institution. published in coopera-tion with the department of university Marketing Communications. uMC77181-0611

Feature

Solving the World’s Problems with Energy Solutions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .2

roberta “robbi” Luxbacher (BSChe ’78), this year’s

Swanson School distinguished Alumni Award recipient

and vice president of global industrial and wholesale

marketing at exxonMobil Fuels Marketing Company,

uses her engineering skills to make a difference at her

company while also encouraging students to make a

difference in the world.

Cover Story

International Experiences Offer Competitive Edge to Undergraduates . . . . . .12

undergraduate engineers at the Swanson School take

advantage of global opportunities to further their education

and broaden their understanding. Language courses work

with the engineering curriculum, and the engineering

international programs office provides unique, life-changing

travel experiences for students.

Departments

Around the School . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .5

Distinguished Alumni . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .14

I Am a Pitt Engineer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .16

A Message from Our Dean

PPerhaps more than in any other profession, the engineer entering today’s job market is facing an array of employers who operate in a truly global environment . You’d be hard pressed to find a com-pany in the United States that does not manufacture some component of its end products abroad .

For that reason, we at the University of Pittsburgh Swanson School of Engineering strive to provide an array of international experiences for our undergraduate students—an emphasis we know will make them more competitive when they graduate . (See cover story, page 12 .) Our students study and solve problems all over the world, from South America and Africa to Europe and Asia . When they are in Pittsburgh, they also collaborate with international teams identified by our faculty mem-bers through their many research and academic partnerships with overseas institutions .

Eventually, an international experience may become a requirement for all Swanson School students; it is a rule already in place for industrial engineering majors . In this regard, our school has been visionary, giving our students an advantage not only in the excellence of the education they receive, but also in the breadth of knowledge and experience study abroad offers .

Roberta “Robbi” Luxbacher, the distinguished alumna featured in this issue (see page 2), was a pioneer in interning abroad when she was a student here in the 1970s . Back then, it was rare for undergraduates to travel internationally as part of their education . But it came in handy when Robbi went to work for Exxon; today, her customers span 40 different countries, so she knows firsthand the value cross-cultural collaboration can bring to a business .

To paraphrase Robbi, engineers solve the world’s problems with solutions like clean water, abundant energy sources, and better living conditions . By bringing those problem solvers together from the earliest point of their educational experience, we are not only helping them to find their way in the world, we also may be finding ways to make our collective future brighter .

Gerald D . Holder U .S . Steel Dean of Engineering

printed on 10% post-consumer waste paper

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Photo courtesy of John Bell

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W“Energy and technology move people out of poverty. You can plow a field with a donkey, or you can plow a field with a tractor.”

Roberta “Robbi” Luxbacher (BSChE ’78)

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solving the world’s problems with energy solutions

When Roberta Luxbacher entered Pitt as a freshman in the 1970s, she initially planned to become a physical therapist. She knew she was playing to her strengths—math and science—and figured it would be a solid career.

Her brother, however, had other ideas .

“He said, ‘No, no, you need to be an engineer . Engineers get jobs; they make money; they run things,’ ” she recalls . “The only thing he didn’t include was they save the world while they’re at it .”

For Luxbacher, vice president of global industrial and wholesale marketing for ExxonMobil Fuels Marketing Company, saving the world is the common denominator in all engineers’ job descriptions . Take some of the most complex, impossible problems—sending a man to the moon, bringing clean water to an impoverished village, creating robotic devices that can work in radioactive environments unsafe to humans—and the person behind the solution’s curtain is, most likely, an engineer . At their heart, all engineers are trained to be logical problem solvers—and who else is better suited for these jobs?

In her position, Luxbacher regularly travels to business sites located in 40 countries around the globe . She has seen firsthand how the fruits of an energy company’s labors can drastically change the fortunes of people in developing countries .

“Energy and technology move people out of poverty,” she says . “You can plow a field with a donkey, or you can plow a field with a tractor . 1 .4 billion people worldwide lack access to electric-ity and the productivity boost it provides .”

As people become more productive, they gain greater access to goods and services and become healthier and better educated, she says . “All of that requires access to reliable, affordable energy,

which in turn creates increasing energy demand .”

Ahead of Her TimeOf course, when she graduated in 1978 with a degree in chemical engineering, Luxbacher had no way of knowing just how broad her horizons would become . A serious-minded student with a flair for leadership, she served both as a class officer and Engineering Student Cabinet officer her senior year . In fact, Luxbacher laments she was too busy to eat French fries at the “O” (Original Hot Dog Shop), something she now makes time for when she returns to campus .

Luxbacher also was ahead of her time with an intern abroad scholarship that allowed her to take a technical summer job in Sweden before her senior year .

“Today, it’s a key part of the college experience, but then, it was quite unusual,” she says, noting that her own daughter, Rachel, went to Brazil for a high school service project, taking a cell phone so she could talk to her parents . By contrast, “my parents didn’t hear from me for a week to even know I’d arrived safely .”

The experience, along with her other achieve-ments, caught the attention of an Exxon recruiter, who snapped up the promising young Luxbacher as soon as she graduated . Impressed by the company’s breadth of opportunities and its reputation for management development, she launched her career in technical marketing of lubricants . She moved from sales to analysis and planning responsibilities through a series of management positions in marketing, supply, and natural gas and also at the corporation’s Dallas, Texas, headquarters, gaining a wider

2011 SWAnSOn SCHOOL DiSTinguiSHED ALumni AWARD RECiPiEnT

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(Above) 2011 Distinguished Alumni Award recipient Roberta “Robbi” Luxbacher mentors young women like Swanson School student Julie Fatula as part of the National Math and Science Initiative, encouraging them to make a difference as she has in her career as vice president of global industrial and wholesale marketing for ExxonMobil Fuels Marketing Company.

Around the

SchoolResearchers Engineer Arteriesuniversity of pittsburgh researchers have grown arteries that exhibit the elasticity of natural blood vessels at the highest levels reported, a development that could overcome a major barrier to creating living tissue replacements for damaged arteries, the team reported in the February 15, 2011, issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (published online January 31).

the pitt team used smooth muscle cells from adult baboons to produce the first arteries grown outside the body that contain a sub-stantial amount of the pliant protein elastin, which allows vessels to expand and retract

in response to blood flow. Lead researcher yadong wang, associate professor of bioengineering; his postdoctoral researcher, kee-won lee; and Donna Stolz, associate professor of cell biology and physiology in pitt’s School of Medicine, cultured the baboon cells in a nutrient-rich solution to bear arteries with approximately 20 percent as much elastin as an inborn artery.

the pitt process is notable for its simplicity, Wang said. elastin—unlike its tougher coun-terpart, collagen, which gives vessels their strength and shape—has been notoriously difficult to reproduce. the only successful

mEmS Faculty member Honored by Society of manufacturing Engineershoward a. kuhn, adjunct professor in the department of Mechanical engineering and Materials Science (MeMS), received the eli Whitney productivity Award from the Society of Manufacturing engineers for his “distinguished accomplishments in improving capability within the broad concept of orderly produc-tion.” Over the course of his distinguished career, Kuhn has developed undergraduate and graduate courses in deformation process-ing, powder metallurgy, engineering design,

failure analysis, and mechanical metallurgy. He also instituted materials processing laboratories for undergraduate instruction and graduate research and established research programs in deformation processing, powder metallurgy, computer-aided design, and expert systems under industrial and government funding. these projects resulted in 21 phd dissertations and 22 MS theses. in addition to his successful career in academia, Kuhn cofounded deformation Control technology,

“This isn’t nerdy; this is helping solve the world’s most pressing problems, traveling the world, applying technol-ogy to transform people’s lives.”

perspective of how the company was run . While each move deepened her skills set, she retained and used the fundamental training in analytical problem solving she had learned at Pitt’s engineering school .

Though ExxonMobil—and the energy sector —have evolved significantly in the decades since then, one constant remains clear: Engineers are driving the company’s future .

Speaking to an undergraduate class at the Swanson School in March, Luxbacher said, “All of you are idealistic . You’ve got great ideas . You want to get out of here and make a difference in the world, and we need you to do that .”

Her hope is that she can offer the perspective neces-sary to help students ground their ideals in reality so they know how they can best apply their skills to make a difference .

“We continue to need basic research,” she says . “How do we develop economical, large-scale alternative energy sources? How do we make biofuels so we don’t compete with food?” she asks .

In addition to developing traditional energy sources and researching alternative energy sources, the company sees improving energy efficiency as critical to economic growth, as is reducing the amount of energy such growth requires .

Expanding Horizons

Though her job is based in Fairfax, Va ., Luxbacher’s home is in Dallas, where son Nathan, 17, is a senior in high school . (Rachel recently graduated from college .) Her husband, Steve Alaniz, works with high school robotics teams to encourage kids to enter engineering careers, much as Luxbacher’s own high school physics teacher—and her brother—encouraged her .

Boosting interest in science, technology, engineering, and math careers—the so-called STEM disciplines—among girls is a passion of

Luxbacher’s . She notes that while women gained numbers in these careers about the time that she was graduating, the percent-ages haven’t risen much since then .

“The United States lags behind in graduat-ing students with STEM degrees,” she says . “If we could just get more young women to enter math, science, and engineering, that would close the gap .”

To contribute to that solution, among other efforts, Luxbacher volunteers as

a mentor through the National Math and Science Initiative, which matches profes-sional women with promising young college students . This year, she was matched with Julie Fatula, a student at the Swanson School .

The program sponsors webinars during its three-month run, giving students a chance to hear the professionals speak on a topic . Their individual mentors also discuss the questions with them one on one .

“It helps these women expand their view of the opportunities available to them and, I hope, inspires them to become mentors themselves,” says Luxbacher . “I’m really thrilled to be matched with a young woman here at Pitt .”

Her hope is that, eventually, uninten-tional biases among teachers, guidance counselors, and other touchpoints in the educational system will disappear . She hopes to serve as a role model to other young women, showing them the glamor-ous, globe-trotting, soul-satisfying side of engineering .

“It’s all in how you present it; it’s all in how you think about it,” she says . “This isn’t nerdy; this is helping solve the world’s most pressing problems, traveling the world, applying technology to transform people’s lives . Engineers really make a difference .”

methods have involved altering cell genes with a virus, rolling cell sheets into tubes, or cultur-ing elastin with large amounts of transforming growth factor, Wang said. And still these previous projects did not report a comparison of elastin content with natural vessels.

Wang and his colleagues had strong, functional arteries in three weeks. the next steps in the project, Wang said, are to design a vessel that fully mimics the three-layer structure of a human artery and to prepare for surgical trials. the project received support from the national Heart, Lung, and Blood institute of the national institutes of Health.

inc., a consulting firm, and Concurrent technologies Corporation, an independent nonprofit applied research and development firm that grew to more than 1,500 employees with offices around the world. He also served as vice president and chief technical officer at Scienda and today is research and development director of the ex One Company, LLC, with responsibility for development and implementation of rapid manufacturing and rapid tooling technologies.

Wang

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Some information in this section was previously published in the Pitt Chronicle.

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Bioengineering Professor Wins One of the Field’s most Prestigious Prizes

David vorp, a professor of bioengineering and surgery whose research combines human blood vessels with mechanical theory, has been awarded the ASMe 2011 Van C. Mow Medal, one of the most prestigious awards in engineering. the annual prize recognizes notable and lasting contributions to the field of bioengineering.

Vorp is the second pitt professor to win the award since 2009, joining michael Sacks, the John A. Swanson endowed Chair in bioengineering. pitt is the only institution with faculty members who have received the award twice since it was established in 2004 to honor the founder of Columbia university’s biomedical engineering department. Other past recipients have represented such institutions as duke university; rice university; and the university of California, Berkeley.

As a researcher, Vorp focuses on vascular biomechanics and how the structure of vessels contributes to various medical conditions. His current projects include studying the mecha-nisms of abdominal aortic aneurysm rupture, the urethra and stress urinary incontinence, and aneurysm weakening. He also works on the design of tissue-engineered blood vessels.

Vorp serves as a director of the Center for Vascular remodeling and regeneration and as director of the Vascular Surgery and Vascular Biomechanics research Lab, both based in the pitt/upMC Mcgowan institute for regenerative Medicine.

Vorp also was named a fellow of ASMe.

The Swanson School’s 2010 Outstanding Cooperative Education Employer was Vocollect. Pictured here are Vocollect team members Mike Churman, Angie Woods, Rakesh Thapar, Joseph Lesik, and David Hardek (BSEE ’94).

Vocollect was named Outstanding Cooperative education employer for 2010. recipients of this honor display a serious and sustained commitment to the school’s Cooperative education (Co-op) program. Vocollect began working with the university of pittsburgh in May 1996. Since that time, the company has hired more than 40 co-op students, many as full-time employees.

Maureen Barcic, Co-op program director, said, “they’ve been so committed to our program, and even when the economy was down, they maintained their promise to our students. they really showed a commitment to our school.” in addition, Vocollect showed interest in the Swanson School’s pitt eXCeL program, which provides resources for underrepresented students in engineering.

Swanson School Names 2010 Outstanding Cooperative Education Employer and Co-op Student of the Year

The Swanson School’s 2010 Co-op Student of the Year Jared O’Connell (BSChE ’10), pictured with (left to right) Greg Lockwood, senior staff engineer at The Hershey Company; Maureen Barcic, Co-op Program director; and Sam Kelly, O’Connell’s mentor at The Hershey Company

Jared O’Connell (BSChe ’10) was named 2010 Co-op Student of the Year. O’Connell completed his co-op rotation with the Hershey Company, where he worked as a process engineer and supervised 16 multicultural contractors. O’Connell today is employed by BASF Corporation in texas. Said Barcic, “Jared is a well-deserved recipient of the Co-op Student of the Year award. He made outstanding contributions to the Hershey Company, particularly at its Mexico site. He is also a well-rounded individual with an excel-lent academic track record and involvement in campus activities such as pitt women’s vol-leyball, for which he was an assistant coach, and men’s volleyball, as captain.”

recipients of pitt’s Co-op Student of the Year award go on to compete in a national cooperative education competition.

Being named a fellow of a professional society is evidence of substantial knowledge and leadership in that subject area. Congratulations to the latest Swanson School of engineering faculty members to receive fellow status:

•PatrickLoughlin, William Kepler Whiteford professor in the departments of Bioengineering and electrical and Computer engineering, named fellow of ieee

•mary E. Besterfield-Sacre, associate professor of industrial engineering, named fellow of the American Society for engineering education

Study Suggests nonchemical water treatments touted as “green” FailtoPreventBacterialGrowthinAir-CoolingSystems found in hospitals, large Buildingsnonchemical treatment systems are touted as environmentally conscious stand-ins for such chemicals as chlorine when it comes to cleaning the water-based air-conditioning systems found in many large buildings. But a recent study by university of pittsburgh researchers, led by Janet Stout, research associate professor in civil and environmental engineering, and radisav vidic, William Kepler Whiteford professor and civil and environmental engineering chair, suggests that this diverse class of water treatment devices may be ineffective and can allow dangerous bacteria to flourish in the cooling systems of hospitals, commercial offices, and other water-cooled build-ings almost as much as they do in untreated water.

Engineering Faculty members Receive Fellow Status

Vorp

Loughlin Besterfield-Sacre

After a chlorine treatment was administered, the microbial populations in both model cooling towers fell by four orders of magnitude within three days.

More than 100 of the world’s top sustainability thinkers and entrepreneurs discussed the latest efforts to translate green ideas into sustainable projects and products at engineering Sustainability 2011, the fourth biennial confer-ence sponsored by pitt’s Mascaro Center for Sustainable innovation and Carnegie Mellon university’s Steinbrenner institute for environmental education and research (Seer).

topics covered included developing electric vehicles and efficient sanitation systems, instituting solar power, reusing brownfields and landfills, and reusing the nation’s plentiful stock of old buildings and constructing better new ones, among others.

in lieu of giving out conference swag, the Mascaro Center and Seer decided to offset the more than 97 short tons of carbon churned out by attendees with a contribution to methane reduc-tion projects at farms in Maryland, new York, and pennsylvania. Nativeenergy, inc., a native American-owned renewable energy company, is helping the farms install manure digesters and 100 kilowatt biogas-fired electrical generators.

Other green steps undertaken by the conference organizers included hosting the event at the david L. Lawrence Convention Center—a gold Leed certified building—as well as serving locally grown food, using washable dishware and utensils, serving drinks in pitchers, and distributing the conference proceedings on Cds rather than on paper. All materials were printed on recycled paper.

the conference was held April 10–12 at the convention center in downtown pittsburgh. nearly 350 were in attendance.

Engineering Sustainability Conference Puts Green Ideas Into Action

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Gerald McGinnis Chair in Bioengineering Receives Distinguished Teaching AwardChancellor Mark A. nordenberg awarded Sanjeev Shroff, associate department chair and gerald Mcginnis Chair in Bioengineering, a 2011 Chancellor’s distinguished teaching Award.

Shroff received the award for his many contribu-tions to the department of Bioengineering; for his “passion for teaching students both in the classroom and in the laboratory,” wrote norden-berg; and for his “pioneering contribution to the creation of innovative simulation-based teaching tools that are having a national impact on the training of bioengineers, health care providers, and medical students. ... it is evident from your student evaluations that you have a unique ability to engage students and that your instruction is precise, insightful, and very exciting for them. Your instruction provides students with the tools they need to become independent researchers and to pursue careers in bioengineering and medicine.”

Shroff also is a professor of medicine. the Chancellor’s distinguished teaching Award comes with a cash prize and grant funding in support of teaching activities. Shroff is one of five faculty members to receive this recognition from the university this year.

Bioengineering Chair on 25th Anniversary of implanting of Artificial Heart: “i Was in the Operating Room.”

October 2010 marked the 25th anniversary of pittsburgh’s first artificial heart implant, and harvey Borovetz, now chair of the depart-ment of Bioengineering, was there. “i was in the operating room,” says Borovetz, who in 1985 was a faculty member in the department of Surgery in pitt’s School of Medicine. the procedure was one of the first in the nation to use an artificial heart as a temporary solution until a donor heart could be transplanted.

the historic procedure was completed by cardiac surgeons Bartley griffith and robert

Hardesty, both then part of the university of pittsburgh School of Medicine, with assistance from a team of cardiac surgical fellows, residents, and bioengineers. explains Borovetz, “My role was to operate the total artificial heart equipment and verify that the heart pump was functioning properly. We validated pump operation using various computer tracings whose characterization provided insight regarding the blood filling and blood pumping of the total artificial heart.”

to date, more than 600 patients have benefited from mechanical blood pumps at pitt.

Rising Stars: Faculty net Early Achievement Awardsthree Swanson School assistant professors netted prestigious awards aimed at rewarding young researchers who show exceptional ability.

Di gao, William Kepler Whiteford Faculty Fellow and assistant professor of chemical and petroleum engineering, was awarded the 2011 Owens-Corning early Career Award from the American institute of Chemical engineers. the award “recognizes outstanding independent contributions to the scientific, technological, educational or service areas of materials science and engineering.”

OlegProkopyev, assistant professor of industrial engineering, received a Young investigator program award from the Air Force Office of Scientific research, the objective of which is to “foster creative basic research in science and engineering; enhance early career development of outstanding young investigators; and increase opportunities for the young investigator to recognize the Air Force mission and related challenges in science and engineering.”

lisa weiland, assistant professor of mechanical engineer-ing and materials science, received the ASMe gary Anderson early Achievement Award, which is “awarded to a young researcher in his or her ascendancy whose work has already had an impact in his/her field within Adaptive Structures and Material Systems.”

Reengineering the u.S. Power grid for Better Efficiency, integration of Renewable EnergyA research team led by gregory reed, associate professor of electrical and computer engineering and director of the school’s power & energy initiative, has launched a large-scale project to integrate modern and efficient power delivery technology into the rapidly growing but outdated American power grid.

By employing the same simulation technology used to design and engineer electricity grids, researchers will model an expanded power grid that delivers electricity from the power plant to homes and businesses with less infrastructure and a more reliable and efficient flow of electric-ity. this improved infrastructure would not only conserve electricity but also make it easier to tap into renewable resources, particularly solar and wind power, which are typically generated in remote locations far from consumers.

reed’s team has industry and government sup-port—including a recent $600,000 grant from the Commonwealth of pennsylvania—and is one of only a few in north America investigating the best ways to upgrade the power grid from 20th-century AC to modern, more efficient dC.

More information on this project is available on the pitt power & energy initiative Web site at www.power.pitt.edu.

Redesign of National Donor-Liver Network Could Boost Transplants by Several Hundred per Year, Pitt Researchers ReportA redesign of the nation’s donor-liver distribution network developed by university of pittsburgh researchers could result in several hundred more people each year receiving the transplants they need.

the team reports in the journal Manage-ment Science that donor livers currently are doled out to 11 national regions that evolved with little regard for geography or demographics, an arrangement that pre-vents many livers from getting to prospec-tive recipients in time. the pitt researchers instead trimmed the network down to six regions that better account for urban and rural population differences, geographic distance, and the anticipated supply of and demand for donor livers. they calculated that their rearrangement could result in up to 14 percent more transplants each year, a sizable increase considering that more than 6,000 transplants were performed in 2009 alone.

now at google’s pittsburgh office; and mark S. roberts, professor and chair of health policy and management in pitt’s graduate School of public Health. the project was supported by grants from the national Science Foundation and the Air Force Office of Scientific research.

“We’re simply redesigning the hierarchy by geographic and demographic information to increase the likelihood that recipients will be found closer to the liver’s point of origin,” Schaefer said. “under the current system, a liver harvested in new Jersey is more likely to go to a patient in Beckley, W.Va., than one in new York City. plus, it is well known that there are big geographic disparities in procurement and that there are some places where it is better to be on an organ waiting list than others.”

illustrations of the current regional breakdown and both pitt rearrangements are available on pitt’s Web site at www.news.pitt.edu/news/Schaefer-donor-liver-redesign.

andrew Schaefer, an associate professor of industrial engineering, said the team’s proposed regions do not change how livers are allocated—the most critical patients still receive an organ first—but rather put more potential donors and recipients within range of one another. Schaefer worked with his former doctoral student and lead author nan kong (phd ’06), a pitt alumnus now at purdue university; Brady hunsaker, a former pitt assistant professor of industrial engineering

Borovetz

Schaefer

Gao

Weiland Prokopyev

Faculty member to Lead SmEJohn murphy, visiting research professor in the department of Chemical and petroleum engi-neering and executive director of the Mcgowan institute for regenerative Medicine, has been asked to serve as the national president of the Society for Mining, Metallurgy and exploration (SMe). SMe is a national professional society with about 14,000 members primarily in the united States but with some sections in other countries. the term of his presidency is from March 2011 to March 2012.

Shroff

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new Executive Director of Center for Energy to Steer Private and Public Support, need for Solutions to Pitt ResearchersDon Shields, director of corporate relations for the Swanson School of engineering, now also will serve as executive director of the university’s Center for energy. Shields will take a leading role in developing strategy, acquiring funding, and expanding the focus and influence of the university’s nationally recognized energy research center. the new position builds on Shields’ extensive efforts at the Swanson School to secure government and industry support for new research and educational programs in the energy area.

pitt’s Center for energy is dedicated to improving energy technology development and sustainability through research in such areas as energy efficiency, advanced materials for demanding energy technologies, carbon management, and energy diversification. Shields will work to connect faculty members and their research with private and public organizations with a need for their work, supplying pitt researchers with important problems they can solve and the means to solve them.

Shields, who also serves as codirector of pitt’s Swanson institute for technical excellence, has nearly 25 years of experience in technology management and higher education resource develop-ment. Shields earned his bachelor’s degree in geosciences and biogeology at penn State university, his master’s degree in geology at the university of nebraska, and a Master of public Management degree at Carnegie Mellon university.

the country’s foremost scientific organization for biomaterials has honored william wagner, professor of bioengineering, surgery, and chemical engineering, for his work develop- ing medical technology that functions in synchronicity with the body.

the Society for Biomaterials presented Wagner with the 2011 Clemson Award for Applied research, which recognizes the application of basic science to a significant accomplishment in biomaterials. Wagner, who also is deputy director of pitt’s Mcgowan institute for regenerative Medicine (MirM), is known for his work developing technology to treat and diagnose cardiovascular disease, particularly devices that help patients in heart failure. the award includes a $1,000 prize.

Wagner is principal investigator for pitt of a significant biomaterials project, an $18.5 million national Science Foundation-funded joint effort with north Carolina Agricultural and technical State university and the university of Cincinnati. the project focuses on producing biodegradable and self-adapting devices for craniofacial and orthopedic reconstructive

Society for Biomaterials Honors Professor

surgery, similarly behaving cardiovascular devices such as stents, and miniaturized sensing systems that monitor and control the safety and effectiveness of biodegrad-able metals inside the body. the metallic devices will be designed to adapt to the body and naturally dissolve, thereby sparing patients with conditions ranging from bone fractures to coronary heart disease from undergoing multiple surgeries to refit and remove stents and other corrective hardware.

Wagner’s research group also is working to hone the biocompatibility of pediaFlow, a ventricular assist device for children developed at pitt. the device, which is made of a titanium alloy and is about the size of a AA battery, draws blood via a high-speed rotor that essen-tially floats within its housing due to magnetic

Engineering graduating Seniors Awarded Prestigious Scholarships for international StudyComputer Engineering Graduating Senior Receives 2010 David L. Boren Award Four university Honors College students— one a computer engineering and Japanese double major—received 2010 david L. Boren Scholarships for international Study.

heather Duschl studied Japanese last summer through the Hokkaido international Foundation’s Japanese Language and Japa-nese Culture program. duschl plans to attend graduate school to earn a phd in computer or electrical engineering with a focus on embed-ded computing solutions for the medical field.

Boren Scholarships and Fellowships are sponsored by the national Security education program, a major federal initiative designed to build a broader and more qualified pool of u.S. citizens with foreign language and international skills. Boren Awards provide u.S. undergradu-ate and graduate students with the resources and encouragement to acquire language skills and experience in countries critical to the future security and stability of the nation. in exchange for funding, Boren Award recipients agree to work in the federal government for a period of at least one year. this is the eighth consecutive year a pitt student has been awarded the honor, and since 1997, 23 pitt students have received Boren Scholarships.

Bioengineering Graduating Senior Receives Rotary Ambassadorial Scholarshiprotary international has selected four pitt graduating seniors—including a bioengineer-ing, mathematics, and economics triple

major—to receive rotary Ambassadorial Scholarships to study abroad for the 2011–12 academic year.

David gau will study at the university of new england in Australia and will use the rotary award to continue his research on breast cancer and encourage underrepresented students in Australia to participate in science and engineering via outreach programming to various local schools.

At pitt, gau worked as an undergraduate researcher in the Center for Biotechnology and Bioengineering, studying cell migration in breast cancer. He has coauthored several papers and posters and has presented his work at conferences and symposia. gau traveled to Vietnam and taiwan through pitt’s innOVAte program to study the effects of globalization on those countries. He also spent time in China, gaining exposure to Chinese engineering and business practices. gau is founder of the pitt Association for Leadership and Success, a leadership development organization that works to improve the university in sustainability, tech-nology, residence life, and campus life. He was president of tau Beta pi, an engineering honors society, and president pro tempore of pitt’s Student government Board. gau also served as an undergraduate teaching assistant at pitt. As a pitt pathfinder, gau conducted tours of the university and city for prospective pitt students and their families. Among gau’s many honors are being named pitt’s 2011 Omicron delta Kappa Senior of the Year.

rotary Ambassadorial Scholarships provide undergraduate and graduate students with the opportunity to study at universities in the more than 200 countries and geographical areas where rotary clubs are active. While abroad, scholars participate in community service projects and speak at local rotary club meetings and conferences, schools, civic organizations, and other forums where they serve as “goodwill ambassadors” for their home countries.

levitating forces. the project team was awarded a $5.6 million federal grant in 2010 to continue developing the technology.

Wagner is the second pitt professor to receive the Clemson Award since it was established in 1973. He joins Stephen Badylak, a profes-sor of surgery in pitt’s School of Medicine and fellow deputy director of MirM, who received the 2005 award.

Researchers Devise Model for Stronger Self-Healing Materials

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A team of pitt and Carnegie Mellon researchers has developed a new model of how self-repairing materials function, showing that materials with a certain number of easily breakable bonds can absorb more stress, a natural trick found in the resilient abalone shell.

in the February 24, 2011, issue of the journal Langmuir, the team presented a new model laying out the inner workings of self-healing materials made of nanoscale gel particles that can regenerate after taking damage and are being pursued as a coating or composite mate-

rial. Moreover, the researchers discovered that an ideal amount of weak bonds actually make for an overall stronger material that can withstand more stress.

Although self-healing nanogel materials have already been realized in the lab, the exact mechanical nature and ideal structure had remained unknown, explained anna Balazs, corresponding author, distinguished professor of Chemical engineering, and robert Von der Luft professor. the team’s findings not only reveal how self-healing

nanogel materials work, but also provide a blueprint for creating more resilient designs, she said. Balazs worked with lead author and pitt postdoctoral researcher isaac Salib; chet gnegy, a pitt chemical and petroleum engineering sophomore; german kolmakov, a postdoctoral researcher in Balazs’ lab; and krzysztof matyjaszewski, a chemistry professor at Carnegie Mellon with an adjunct appointment in pitt’s department of Chemical and petroleum engineering.

William Wagner (center) receives the 2011 Clemson Award for Applied Research from Art Coury and Jonathan Black

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international Experiences offer competitive Edge to Undergraduates

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Swanson School students look to international educational and research opportunities to better prepare them for careers in a global field. Here, Kristine Lalley, director of international engineering initiatives, meets with Taylor Holmes (BSEE ’11). Holmes studied for a semester at ENSEA, an electrical engineering and computer science graduate school, in Cergy, France, near Paris.

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Thanks to the impact of globalization, today’s engineer is more likely than ever to work as part of an international team . For example, he or she might travel overseas, accept a job with a company headquartered outside the United States, or work in the United States but collabo-rate with colleagues in other countries . Toward that end, the Swanson School is offering a variety of international experiences to better prepare students to adapt, learn, and solve problems from a multicultural perspective .

“[An international focus is] becoming more central to our mission and what we are able to offer,” says Kristine Lalley, director of international engineering initiatives . “We’re clearly in a very interconnected world these days . … This is how we can potentially enhance the way in which we deliver engineering education in the U .S .”

Experiences could range from a traditional semester abroad to a short-term course carried out overseas or partial study overseas . Foreign language courses also are offered in several formats designed to work around the tightly woven engineering curriculum .

Ahra Kwon, a junior from York, Pa ., who is study-ing chemical engineering, first traveled overseas in 2009, when she won a scholarship allowing

her to spend six weeks in Australia study-ing sustainable energy practices . She was fascinated by that country’s political and social approaches to environmental issues and felt the experience bolstered her inter-est in pursuing further study in sustainability .

This summer, she’s traveling to Brazil as part of a six-student cohort that will spend a month continuing research that began in Pittsburgh and examines the use of bamboo as a replace-ment for traditional timber in residential construction . She believes the trip will challenge her as she applies her beginner’s grasp of Portuguese and also thinks it will help her to gain a real-world perspective of the principles she has been studying .

“Today, with globalization and understanding different cultures around the world, it’s becom-ing more and more important to work with people internationally to solve the problems that we are facing,” she says .

WWhether they’re working in a research laboratory in a german medical school or building a clean water system in Africa, undergraduate students at the Swanson School of Engineering are learning how to apply their training within a global context.

That’s the whole idea, says Lalley: “If we capitalize on these connections through our faculty, through our students, we can really explore ways for students to go overseas and have a challenging, in-depth experience .”

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diStinguiSHed ALuMni

congratulations, 2011 Distinguished alumni!in recognition of individual accomplishments in their respective fields, the Swanson School of engineering and its departments honored seven alumni at the 2011 distinguished Alumni Banquet on March 3. the awards include the schoolwide distinguished Alumni Award and alumni awards for each of the Swanson School’s departments.

The Swanson School has honored its top graduates through the Distinguished Alumni Awards since 1964.Swanson School of Engineering Distinguished alumni awardRoberta Luxbacher Bachelor of Science in Chemical and Petroleum Engineering, 1978 Vice President, Global Industrial and Wholesale Marketing Exxon Mobil Corporation ExxonMobil Fuels Marketing Company

Department of BioengineeringEric A. Chen Master of Science in Bioengineering, 2002 Director, Humanitarian Use Device Program Office of Orphan Products Development U .S . Food and Drug Administration

DepartmentofChemicalandPetroleumEngineeringAnthony V. CuginiBachelor of Science in Chemical and Petroleum Engineering, 1981 Master of Science in Chemical and Petroleum Engineering, 1986 Doctor of Philosophy in Chemical and Petroleum Engineering, 1993 Director, National Energy Technology Laboratory U .S . Department of Energy

Department of civil and Environmental Engineering

Anthony M. ParasidaBachelor of Science in Civil and Environmental Engineering, 1978 President, Global Services and Support Boeing

Department of Electrical and computer Engineering

Robert K. HenryBachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering, 1969 Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer (Retired) Harris Corporation

Department of industrial Engineering

Nishan G. Vartabedian Bachelor of Science in Industrial Engineering, 1967 Executive Vice President (Retired) Fidelity Investments Institutional Services Company, Inc . (a business unit of Fidelity Investments)

Department of mechanical Engineering and materials Science

John P. Schoeppner Jr.Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering, 1960 Major General (Retired) U .S . Air Force

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Dean Gerald D. Holder presents Roberta “Robbi” Luxbacher (BSChE ’78) with the Swanson School’s Distinguished Alumni Award.

View event photos online at engineering.pitt.edu/alumni/2011/distinguished_alumni_banquet

Save the Date!Homecoming 2011October 13–15, 2011For the latest updates, visit engineering.pitt.edu/alumni/events/

All photos on this spread courtesy of John Bell

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Dennis (above right, middle) submitted his photo using our Web portal. Are you interested in being featured in a future segment of I Am a Pitt Engineer? Visit www.odar.pitt.edu/iamapittengineer to submit your photo!

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EnginEEr (A) Minking Chyu and Larry Shuman led innOVAte 2011, a travel program designed to expose engineering students to international business practices. the group traveled with students and faculty from rice university and toured Alcoa inc.; Cisco Systems, inc.; and eaton Corporation facilities in China.

(B) David Wohlfarth (BSpet ’68) and his wife, Leigh, are enjoying life in Jacksonville, Fla., since his retirement from new Jersey’s public Service enterprise group (pSeg) incorporated.

(C) Kenneth Wilson (BSee ’68) worked for iBM Corp. for 30 years and now is living near raleigh, n.C.

(d) Richard Murdy (BSpet ’43) is retired and living in Hattiesburg, Miss., with his wife, ruth. He served our country and now enjoys woodworking and oil- and acrylic-based painting.

(J) John P. Schoeppner (BSMe ’60); Butch Bryner, director of development for the Swanson School; and Michael Bilirakis (BSpet ’59) caught up at the pitt vs. university of South Florida (uSF) game in tampa, Fla., in november. Both Schoeppner and Bilirakis are past recipients of a departmental distinguished Alumni Award from the Swanson School.

(K) Dennis Jerome (BSMet ’69) on the Kinzua reservoir.

(L) Dan (BSChe ’60) and polly Salopek show their school spirit at the pitt-uSF game.

(F) Cousins Alan Obley (BSMe ’51) and Ross Obley (BSie ’51) share a drink and a laugh at a dinner with dean gerald d. Holder and fellow pitt engineers in naples, Fla.

(g) Xiaodan Wu, materials science and engineering graduate student and teaching assistant, helps students to design, manufacture, and test devices by launching model rocket engines for a class project.

(H) An original member of the student service group, pex, Delbert “Del” Shaffer (BSee ’49) has been happily retired in pembroke pines, Fla., since 1987.

(e) The Triplets of Benedum Hall Andrew (BSMe ’10), Corey (BSMe ’10), and Stephen (BSee ’10) Churilla are identical triplets who graduated from the Swanson School in April 2011. they share a penchant for engineering and science, but don’t mistake them as being the same—from their personalities to their academic strengths, they’re as distinct as three longtime friends.

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(i) Donald Gillott (BSee ’56, MSee ’59, phd ’64) lives in the Sacramento, Calif., area and is the retired dean of the College of engineering and Computer Science at California State university, Sacramento. gillott actively serves on several boards and enjoys spending time with his wife, Betty; his children; and his grandchildren.

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Visit www.engr.pitt.edu

Swanson School of EngineeringOffice of Development and Alumni Relations104 Benedum Hall3700 O’Hara Street Pittsburgh, PA 15261

engineering.pitt.edu

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