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Professor X. George Xu Recognized for Leadership in Nuclear Engineering Research
Radiation Expert at Rensselaer Polytechnic
Institute Appointed Member of EPA Science Advisory Board,
Elected Fellow of American Nuclear Society
Radiation expert X. George Xu, head of the Nuclear
Engineering Program at Rensselaer Polytechnic
Institute, has been appointed to serve on the Radiation
Advisory Committee of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
(EPA) Science Advisory Board. In this three-year role, Xu will
advise the EPA on national policies related to radiation
protection and safety.
“Dr. Xu is an internationally recognized authority in the
area of radiation dosimetry, so it is fitting the EPA Science
Advisory Board would seek to appoint him to this critical
advisory board to help inform national policies relating to
radiation and nuclear safety,” said
David Rosowsky, dean of the School of Engineering
at Rensselaer. “The fields of nuclear medicine and radiation
safety continue to evolve, and George’s deep knowledge of these
and related topics will be of significant benefit to our
nation’s lawmakers. George’s success and stature reflect
brightly on the School of Engineering and the entire
Institute.”
Xu was also recently elected a fellow of the American
Nuclear Society (ANS) and was additionally recognized with the
Professional Excellence Award from the ANS Radiation Protection
and Shielding Division.
In announcing Xu’s election as a fellow, ANS cited his
“ground-breaking research and technical leadership in
computational phantoms and Monte Carlo simulation methods for
nuclear engineering, health physics, and medical physics
problems that resulted in significant advancements in the field
of radiation dosimetry and that impacted practices in radiation
protection, imaging, and radiotherapy both nationally and
internationally.”
When announcing the Professional Excellence Award, the ANS
Radiation Protection and Shielding Division lauded Xu’s contributions as founder of the
Consortium of
Computational Human Phantoms (CCHP), his role as the
co-editor and contributor to the Handbook of Anatomical
Models for Radiation Dosimetry, and his success in
publishing more than 100 full journal papers over the past 20
years on the topic of Monte Carlo calculations.
A professor in the Department of Mechanical,
Aerospace, and Nuclear Engineering, with a joint
appointment in the Department of Biomedical
Engineering, Xu conducts research in experimental and
computational methods for measuring ionizing radiation
involving the human body, environment, or nuclear systems. With
his students in the Radiation
Measurement and Dosimetry Group at Rensselaer, he has
pioneered several computational methods for calculating
radiation levels in the human body from nuclear power plants
and medical imaging and therapeutic devices, toward the goal of
ensuring radiation safety of nuclear workers and patients.
After receiving his doctorate from Texas A&M University,
Xu joined the Rensselaer faculty in 1995. He was named
associate professor in 2001 and a full professor in 2006. Since
1995, Xu has graduated 15 doctoral students and 10 master’s
students. A prolific researcher, Xu is an author or coauthor of
more than 140 peer-reviewed journal papers, 250 conference
abstracts, and 90 invited seminars and plenary presentations.
In his time at Rensselaer, he has secured nearly $15 million in
research funding from the NSF, National Institutes of Health,
U.S. Department of Energy, National Institute of Standards and
Technology, and from industry.
In 2005, Xu co-founded the international CCHP, playing a
leading role in an emerging research field. Xu is a past
president of Council on Radiation Measurements and Standards
(CIRMS), an elected member of the National Council of
Radiation Protection and Measurements (NCRP), and a fellow
of the American Association of Physicists
in Medicine (AAPM).
The Nuclear Engineering Program at Rensselaer is among
the oldest in the nation, dating back to the late 1950s
when the university received a grant to construct an electron
accelerator. The university bestowed its first nuclear
engineering doctoral degrees in 1962 and its first nuclear
engineering bachelor’s degrees in 1967. Today, Rensselaer
consistently ranks among the top nuclear engineering programs,
and for several years graduated more nuclear engineering
undergraduates than any other university in the United States.
Currently, about 150 undergraduate and graduate students are
enrolled in the Nuclear Engineering Program at Rensselaer.
For more information on Xu’s research and nuclear
engineering at Rensselaer, visit:
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Published
December 13,
2012 |
Contact: Michael Mullaney
Phone: (518) 276-6161
E-mail: mullam@rpi.edu |
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