Jie Lian, Ph.D., has been named the William Weightman Walker Professor at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI). An endowed chaired professorship is among the highest honors bestowed on a Rensselaer faculty member.  

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute will announce the appointment of Kristie Bowers, Ph.D., as its new associate vice president and director of athletics at a press conference at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, August 23, 2023 at the East Campus Athletic Village’s main arena. Bowers comes from Boston University, where she has served as senior associate athletic director and senior woman administrator since 2019. She is succeeding Dr. Lee McElroy, who retired at the beginning of the summer after eight years with RPI. Bowers will be the first woman appointed to the role.

Two RPI faculty emeriti will be prominently featured during the first half-day of a major international conference later this month. The 20th International Topical Meeting on Nuclear Reactor Thermal Hydraulics (NURETH-20), to be held Aug. 20-25 in Washington, D.C., is the premier gathering for experts in nuclear reactor thermal hydraulics and related topical areas. This meeting is held every two years.

Graduate students in the Lally School of Management at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute enjoyed a unique opportunity to partner with the New York Mets for their capstone project.

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s Jian Shi, Ph.D., associate professor of materials science and engineering, as well as physics, applied physics, and astronomy, has won the prestigious 2023 IEEE Ferroelectrics Young Investigator Award. The award recognizes “the important contributions of young scientists/engineers in reference to their contributions to fundamental research, integration, application, or education.” Recognizing only one or two exceptional scientists in the relevant field each year, this highly competitive award serves as a prestigious accolade for independent scholars under or at the age of 40.

The Undergraduate Program and the Teaching and Learning Collaboratory have awarded seed grants to four teams testing new pedagogical approaches or technologies that will impact student learning. The purpose of a seed grant is to develop a project to the point that it is competitive for external funding. 

Rensselaer’s Lighting Research Center congratulates recent doctoral graduate Akila Udage, Ph.D., who has been awarded the 2023 IESNYC Thesis Award from the New York City chapter of the Illuminating Engineering Society. Dr. Udage’s doctoral thesis, titled “Design Analysis of 3D Printed Internal Cavity Lens for Lighting Applications,” demonstrated innovative research into the design and manufacturing of internal-cavity flat optics for LED lighting systems using 3D printing technology.

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s Alexander Hiland, senior lecturer in the School of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences, recently judged a unique debate competition. Students from the Bard Prison Initiative competed against the team from Harvard University in a rematch of a debate that took place eight years ago and garnered international media attention and inspired a PBS documentary. The Bard Prison Initiative provides college opportunities for incarcerated students, and its debate team actually won against the top-ranked Harvard team in that match in 2015.

Will Pepi, a Ph.D. candidate in the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Center for Architecture, Science and Ecology (CASE) in Industry City, Brooklyn, presented his paper, “Modeling Indoor Botanical Fresh Air Generation” in the Biowalls and Biofiltration poster session at the ASHRAE conference in Tampa on June 28. Pepi then traveled to Miami, where he spoke about his research on designing with plants to CASE’s industry partner, the global architecture firm OBMI, at their Miami office.

This summer, some lucky Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute students have experienced a new course called Field Experiences in Aquatic Biology. Co-taught by Darrin Hunt and Jonathan Stetler, lecturers in biological sciences, the course has introduced Arch students to scientific data collection and citizen-led science. The Arch refers to the summer after sophomore year in which Rensselaer students live on campus and benefit from focused attention from professors and experiential learning. This new course was filled overnight!