UTSA College of Engineering

San Antonio Water System Joins Energy Research Alliance of San Antonio

Mon, 02 Nov 2009 19:15:30 -0600

By Christi Fish
Public Affairs Specialist

Dedicated to exploring new and innovative energy solutions, San Antonio Water System (SAWS) announced today it has joined the Energy Research Alliance of San Antonio, established in June by The University of Texas at San Antonio, Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) and CPS Energy. The four organizations will collaborate to define and implement new and alternative strategies for the development of energy technology.

“Working together to find new synergies in solutions to essential issues like water and energy is essential to the well-being of San Antonians,” said Steve Clouse, SAWS chief operating officer. “Our ratepayers depend on groups like this working together to find the most economical, efficient methods. We welcome the opportunity.”

“The energy challenges that our world faces today and will be facing in the future must be addressed now by dedicated researchers with a broad array of skills and specialties,” said Robert Gracy, UTSA vice president for research. “We are excited to join Southwest Research Institute and CPS Energy in developing the Energy Research Alliance of San Antonio. The addition of San Antonio Water System to the partnership will certainly catalyze our progress. Together, we will be able to develop energy solutions that each individual organization could not accomplish by working on its own.”

“We welcome SAWS as a new partner in the Energy Research Alliance of San Antonio,” said Danny Deffenbaugh, vice president of the Mechanical and Materials Engineering Division at Southwest Research Institute. “Adding our local water supplier to the alliance reflects the critical relationship between water and energy.”

Cris Eugster, CPS Energy executive vice president and chief sustainability officer, said, “San Antonio has the opportunity to be a leader in clean-energy technologies and their practical applications, and the Energy Research Alliance of San Antonio will be a key catalyst in this endeavor.”

No additional funding is required to support the joint initiative.

——————————————

ABOUT THE ENERGY RESEARCH ALLIANCE OF SAN ANTONIO PARTNERS

San Antonio Water System
Since 1992, San Antonio Water System has provided leadership in managing and developing water resources in the San Antonio region. Water and wastewater services are provided to more than 1 million consumers in the San Antonio area. For more information, visit the San Antonio Water System Web site.

The University of Texas at San Antonio
The University of Texas at San Antonio is one of the fastest growing higher education institutions in Texas and the second largest of nine academic universities and six health institutions in the UT System. As a multicultural research and teaching institution of access and excellence, UTSA aims to be the Next Great Texas University, providing access to educational excellence and preparing citizen leaders for the global environment. UTSA serves more than 29,100 students in 64 bachelor’s, 47 master’s and 21 doctoral degree programs in the colleges of Architecture, Business, Education and Human Development, Engineering, Honors, Liberal and Fine Arts, Public Policy, Sciences and Graduate School. Founded in 1969, UTSA is an intellectual and creative resource center and a socioeconomic development catalyst for Texas and beyond.

Southwest Research Institute
Southwest Research Institute is an independent, nonprofit, applied engineering and physical sciences research and development organization using multidisciplinary approaches to problem solving. The institute occupies more than 1,200 acres and provides more than 2 million square feet of laboratories, test facilities, workshops and offices for more than 3,300 employees performing contract work for industry and government clients.

CPS Energy
CPS Energy is the nation’s largest municipally owned energy company providing both natural gas and electric service. Acquired by the City of San Antonio in 1942, the company serves approximately 700,000 electric customers and more than 320,000 natural gas customers in and around America’s seventh-largest city. CPS Energy ranks among the nation’s lowest-cost energy providers, owns the highest financial ratings of any electric system in the United States, stands No. 1 in wind-energy capacity among municipally owned utilities across the country and ranks No. 1 in Texas in the amount of solar-generated electricity under contract.

College of Engineering Welcomes Five New Faculty

Fri, 30 Oct 2009 16:11:00 -0500

This fall, the UTSA College of Engineering welcomes five new faculty members to its staff who bring a wealth of academic, research and industry experiences to the college.

Kiran Bhaganagar, Ph.D., joins the faculty as an assistant professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering. Before coming to UTSA, Bhaganagar was an assistant professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Maine and an assistant research scientist at the University of Michigan.

Bhaganagar’s research areas include fluid mechanics and turbulent flows and applications in coastal, atmospheric flows and physiological flows, such as coronary flow. With the use of supercomputers, Bhaganagar solves complicated and turbulent flow problems.

Attracted to its vibrant research, Bhaganagar joins UTSA with several goals, one of which is to be a leading researcher in the field of computational turbulence.

JingYong Ye, Ph.D., joins the faculty as an assistant professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering. Before coming to UTSA, Ye was an Associate Research Scientist at the University of Michigan where he was honored with the Outstanding Research Scientist Award in 2007.

Ye brings extensive research experience to the college covering a wide range of areas in biophotonics and nanobiotechnology, and has been in charge of several National Institutes of Health (NIH) funded research programs. He is a senior member of IEEE, and serves as a reviewer for funding agencies including NIH, the National Science Foundation and the Petroleum Research Fund. Ye’s innovative research has led to nine patents.

At UTSA, Ye plans to continue his creative research and contribute to making the university one of the nation’s leading research-intensive institutions. Additionally, Ye hopes to “develop a number of cutting-edge technologies to address critical issues at the frontier of biomedical research and life science, thus improving quality of life and human well-being.”

Hariharan Krishnaswami, Ph.D., joins the faculty as an assistant professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. Krishnaswami, who has a doctorate in electrical engineering from the University of Minnesota, was a senior design engineer at GE Healthcare in Bangalore, India before entering academics.

Opportunities to contribute through research and teaching to UTSA’s goal of becoming a premier public research university are what attracted Krishnaswami to the institution. His research areas include power electronic converter and control technologies for renewable energy integration, power conversion efficiency improvement through innovative power converter topologies, and power electronic applications to power systems and future smart electric grid.

One of Krishnaswami’s goals that will contribute to making UTSA a premier public research university is establishing a power electronic research group to work on current converter and control technologies with varied applications, including renewable energy. “I hope to bring to the program a power and energy systems focus by performing high quality research in this area while educating future engineers to meet the increasing demand of electrical energy workforce,” said Krishnaswami

Byeong Lee, Ph.D., joins the faculty as an assistant professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. After earning his doctoral degree in computer engineering at The University of Texas at Austin, Lee spent five years as a design engineer at Texas Instruments and ten years on the senior research staff of the Agency for Defense Development.

Lee’s research areas consist of computer architecture, low power design, application-specific embedded systems, workload characterization of emerging applications, parallel computing and parallel architecture design, performance modeling, and early-stage power estimation.

With 15 years of industry experience, Lee is intent on bringing that expertise to his classroom and research labs. “I want the students to have a professional engineering mind, which is different from the scientific one,” Lee said..

Ruoting Pei, Ph.D., joins the faculty as an assistant professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering. Prior to coming to UTSA, Pei was a postdoctoral researcher at Duke University.

Pei’s research areas focus on the applied environmental microbiology, antibiotic resistance, microbial indicator, molecular microbial ecology, biological remediation, and environmental toxicology.

A dynamic and supportive research environment is what attracted Pei to UTSA where she looks to accomplish many goals. One such goal is to widen the breadth of the civil and environmental engineering department. “I want to bring environmental biotechnology into the program, and establish cutting-edge research in environmental engineering, bioremediation and applied engineering approaches to solve environmental problems,” said Pei.

Students are invited to nominate engineering faculty for an...

Mon, 19 Oct 2009 17:46:00 -0500

Students are invited to nominate engineering faculty for an award recognizing oustanding classroom teaching.

Download your nomination form and consider the following:

Base your nomination on courses(s) taught in Spring 2009 and Fall 2009
Nominations should include:
- Name of faculty
- Course name and number
- Semester taught
- Brief description of teaching qualities
- Student name
- Student banner ID
Nominations from at least three students will be required to consider the nominee for the award.

Drop nominations in the ballot box located in either BSE 2.106, EB 3.04.04 or EB 3.04.61.

The deadline for submitting your nomination is NOVEMBER 21, 2008.

Professor Mo Jamshidi to Discuss System of Systems Engineering Tomorrow During Live International Video-Conference

Mon, 19 Oct 2009 17:23:00 -0500

By: Christi Fish
Public Affairs Specialist

Mo Jamshidi, UTSA’s Lutcher Brown Endowed Chair of Electrical Engineering, will deliver a two-hour lecture tomorrow by video-conference about System of Systems Engineering. The video-conference will be broadcast live to researchers in Buenos Aires, Argentina and Madrid, Spain. UTSA students, faculty, staff and alumni are invited to attend.

The live video conference will be broadcast from 9 to 11 a.m. on Tues., Oct. 20 from Biotechnology, Sciences and Engineering Building 2.102 to audiences at Universidad Nacional de Salta in Argentina and Universidad Politécnica de Madrid in Spain.

System of systems engineering combines simple systems to form larger systems that are capable of completing more complex tasks than their smaller components could do. The discipline has applications in the defense, energy, environmental and health care industries.

During the international discussion, Jamshidi will offer:

an introduction to System of Systems (SoSE) engineering, “From Definition to Implementation”
an overview of how multi-robotic systems work in air, on land and in the water
insight into the development of UTSA’s first hybrid green energy system, which uses solar and wind power
an introduction to cloud computing and its intersection with System of Systems Engineering
video clips of System of Systems research activities taking place in UTSA’s Autonomous Control Engineering (ACE) Laboratory with Spanish subtitles

Jamshidi will follow the video-conference with a visit to Argentina in early 2010, where he will be joined by System of Systems engineers from Spain.

With a career spanning more than four decades, Jamshidi is known internationally as a leader in system of systems engineering. In the past, he conducted research for U.S. Air Force, the U.S. Department of Energy, NASA, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Los Alamos National Laboratory and Sandia National Laboratories. During that time, he worked on the first generation of adaptive optics for the Hubble Telescope, the engineering of nuclear breeder reactors, the Mars Pathfinder Project and the applications of robotics for energy efficiency. His current research, conducted in UTSA’s Autonomous Control Engineering (ACE) laboratory, focuses on the applications of System of Systems engineering to land, sea and air robots, and solar-wind energy systems.

College of Engineering Signs Agreement with Top Engineering School in India

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 17:51:00 -0500

Earlier this year, The University of Texas at San Antonio College of Engineering and the Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur (IIT-K), India, became founding members of the Indo-US Public-Private Joint Center on Biomaterials for Health Care. The center, funded by the Indo-US Science and Technology Forum, brings together researchers from the United States and India committed to improving public health through the development of artificial organs made from biomaterials.

In September, C. Mauli Agrawal, dean of the UTSA College of Engineering, traveled to India to sign a more comprehensive memorandum of understanding with the IIT-K, which is the top-ranked engineering school in India. The memo calls for the two educational institutions to focus on research collaboration and faculty and student exchange programs in multiple engineering areas.

Above: C. Mauli Agrawal, dean of the UTSA College of Engineering, and Sanjay Dhande, Ph.D, Director of IIT-K sign the MoU.

Sanjay Dhande, Ph.D., Director, IIT-K, signed the agreement at a special ceremony and indicated that he looked forward to a close working relationship between the two institutions.

The first joint seminar held between UTSA and India took place last Friday morning using video conferencing. Mark Appleford, assistant professor of biomedical engineering at UTSA, presented while faculty and students from IIT-K and UTSA participated.

Above: Mark Appleford of UTSA gives a presentation during the first joint seminar between UTSA and IIT-K.

COE Adds Four New Advisory Council Members

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 10:37:00 -0500

By: Christi Fish
Public Affairs Specialist

Michael D. Burke, Michael J. Burke, Ben Streetman and Philip Howlett joined the advisory council of the College of Engineering at The University of Texas at San Antonio.

“The support of our advisory council is essential to the success of the College,” said Mauli Agrawal, dean of the College of Engineering. “We count on the council to help direct and support our growth, and we work with its members to raise awareness of the wonderful achievements of our students, faculty and alumni. Our advisory council members are our biggest fans and most trusted advisors. I am delighted that four outstanding leaders in their respective fields have agreed to join the council.”

Michael D. Burke is the founder and chair of the San Antonio Clean Technology Forum and president of MDB Capital Ventures, a private equity investment and management consulting firm. Prior to that, Burke was the director, president and CEO of EOTT Energy Corporation, a $12 billion NYSE corporation and the largest marketer and transporter of crude oil in North America. Burke’s professional career includes tenure at Tesoro Petroleum Corp. and Texas Eastern Corp., among others.

Michael J. Burke is a retired manufacturing professional, whose experience includes 13 years with Kinetic Concepts Inc (KCI) as senior vice president of manufacturing, quality, global supply chain, and research and development and 25 years with Sterling Drug. At the latter, he served in multiple capacities, including four years as its Hong Kong / China general manager.

Ben Streetman is a professor of electrical and computer engineering at The University of Texas at Austin and holds the Dula D. Cockrell Centennial Chair in Engineering. Streetman was dean of the Cockrell School of Engineering from 1996-2008 and was the founding director of its Microelectronics Research Center. His teaching and research interests center on semiconductor materials and devices. He is the author of the book “Solid State Electronic Devices,” which has been translated into Japanese, Korean, Chinese and Polish, and he has authored more than 290 scholarly articles. Streetman is a member of the National Academy of Engineering.

Philip Howlett, an undergraduate alumnus of UTSA’s program in civil engineering, is a mobility engineer at the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT). Howlett is also an associate member of Professional Engineers in Government and serves as a San Antonio district liaison for VIA’s new Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) system.

Other advisory council members for the College of Engineering include:

H. Norman Abramson, Southwest Research Institute (emeritus)
Wayne Alexander, AT&T
Bruce Barshop, Barshop Ventures LLC
Steve Bartley, CPS Energy
Stephanie Chandler, Jackson Walker LLP
Jeffrey Clarke, Dell Inc.
Samuel Dawson, Pape-Dawson Engineers Inc.
Walter Downing, Southwest Research Institute
Antonio Gonzalez, Boeing Aerospace
Stephen Graham, San Antonio River Authority
Scott Gray, J.M. Waller Associates Inc.
Roger Hemminghaus, CTS Corp. (emeritus)
James Henry, Standard Aero San Antonio Inc.
Randy Holman, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
Bradley Hunt, Wilson, Hughey & Yarbrough LLC
Lissa Martinez, Martinez & Hughes (emeritus)
Victor Mieres, National Instruments Corp.
John Monday, AT&T Services
Kelley Neumann, San Antonio Water System
Gabriele Niederauer, Entrigue Surgical Inc.
Hon. Louis Rowe, Goetting & Associates Inc. (emeritus)
Joe Sanchez, Air Intelligence Agency
Chris Schultz, Raba-Kistner Consultants Inc.
G.P. Singh, Karta Technologies Foundation
David Spencer, Mandelbrot Ventures Inc.
Klaus Weiswurm, Instruments Technology Machinery
Thomas Wendorf, HNTB

College Gears Up for Move Into New Applied Engineering & Technology Building

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 10:10:00 -0500

By: Christi Fish
Public Affairs Specialist

Although the official ribbon-cutting will not take place until Spring 2010, UTSA students, faculty and staff are stirring with excitement at the anticipated completion of the new $82.5 million Applied Engineering and Technology Building (AET) on the UTSA Main Campus. The new 145,440-square-foot facility, a phase II expansion of its neighbor, the Biotechnology, Sciences and Engineering Building (BSE), will be completed by the end of the month.

The four-story AET building includes 87 faculty offices, 36 research laboratories and other support spaces. In addition, the AET’s Ground Floor includes five classrooms—three of which are already in use—as well as a Hydrology laboratory, Animal Science laboratories and a teaching laboratory.

Faculty slated to occupy the new building are moving between Sept. 28 and Nov. 6. To support the rapid growth in the student population and the research activity in the College of Engineering, its four departments will expand into the AET’s first and second floors. They include the Department of Biomedical Engineering, the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, the Department of Computer and Electrical Engineering and the Department of Mechanical Engineering. The College of Sciences’ Department of Physics and Astronomy will occupy the third floor.

Designed by San Antonio architectural firm Garza Bombarger and engineered by Austin-based HMG & Associates, the new building has been constructed by general contractor Walbridge / Bartlett Cocke, a joint venture with San Antonio connections, under the supervision of the University of Texas Office of Facility Planning and Construction (OFPC) and the UTSA Office of Facilities. The $82.5 million building was funded by Permanent University Funds and Tuition Revenue Bonds.

Architectural Profile
The five-story Applied Engineering and Technology Building (AET)’s exterior facade includes 18,000 cubic yards of excavated native limestone rock, blending with its neighboring BSE Building, which features a blend of limestone, stucco and sloped clay-tile roofs. Construction materials for the AET included 2,200 linear feet of foundational piers, 200 tons of erected steel, 10,000 cubic yards of concrete and 1,400 tons of stone veneer.

Mechanical specifications include a 950 kilowatt generator (30,000 pounds), double-ended 4,000 amp electrical service (60,000 pounds), 32 miles of mechanical and plumbing piping, 72 miles of conduit and 242,170 pounds of ductwork.

The new building’s North Plaza, currently in progress, will include a bronze fountain with stainless steel elements, a design based loosely on atomic and molecular structure. Recycled condensate from the chillers cooling the AET will supply the fountain with recycled water. In addition, the North Plaza will include two stainless steel, LED illuminated light columns and six stainless steel / mahogany sculptural benches.

The AET Building Project Scope Sheet is available for download.

Robert Rodriguez, of the University of Texas in San Antonio,...

Wed, 14 Oct 2009 15:20:32 -0500

Robert Rodriguez, of the University of Texas in San Antonio, sets the standards for green policies at the South Texas institution as the “sustainability officer.” The energy manager gives a tour on what UTSA is doing to save energy.

(via Diverse Education)

UTSA President Ricardo Romo delivers "State of the University" address

Fri, 02 Oct 2009 13:13:00 -0500

By: Christi Fish
Public Affairs Specialist

UTSA President Ricardo Romo delivered his inaugural “State of the University” address this week to more than 600 members of the UTSA and Greater San Antonio communities, discussing UTSA’s bid to become a tier one research university and the notable advances it has made in support of that vision.

Dignitaries present at the inaugural address included Texas Senator Leticia Van de Putte (D-San Antonio), whose advocacy has strengthened the economic climate for higher education in Texas by helping UTSA realize a 7.5 percent increase in its operating budget and $4 million in support of the San Antonio Life Sciences Institute (SALSI). Also present was Texas Representative Dan Branch (R-Dallas), chairman of the House Higher Education Committee and author of House Bill 51, which established funding for Texas’ emerging public research universities.

“When we speak of becoming a ‘premier university,’ or a ‘national research university,’ or a ‘tier-one university,’ what we really mean is that UTSA creates an environment where young people can come to achieve their full potential, and where scholars can come to reset the boundaries of human knowledge and creativity,” said Romo. “This is the university we are becoming!”

Presently, UTSA is among the top-third of American Universities for funding in research and sponsored programs. It is ranked eighth in the nation for research expenditures among Hispanic-serving institutions and third in Texas for research expenditures in the life sciences, behind The University of Texas at Austin and Texas A&M. In addition, UTSA is second in the University of Texas System for research funding in biology, social sciences, arts and humanities, microelectronics and computer technology.

Additional accomplishments noted by Romo included:

An increase in total student enrollment from 28,400 students in fall 2008 to a historical high of 29,100 students in fall 2009 and a 20 percent increase in graduate student enrollment
The recruitment of more than 50 top faculty from across the nation and internationally—leaders in their fields of research
The addition of football to UTSA’s athletics program and the recruitment of Head Coach Larry Coker
The UTSA College of Business’ ranking as No. 1 in the country according to Hispanic Outlook in Higher Education
The enhancement of student life at UTSA and the university’s transition from a commuter school to a campus community
The new discoveries made by UTSA’s researchers and its 19 campus-based research institutes and centers
UTSA’s initiative to develop academic and research partnerships with strategically-aligned universities worldwide

In addition, Romo spoke about UTSA’s plans for the future, including its goal of reaching $100 million in research expenditures by 2016; the new Campus Master Plan and a reduction in student-to-teacher ratios; the expansion of the Main Campus library; and the university’s 10-year re-accreditation by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools.

View the text of President Romo’s address.

Watch the address online.

UTSA staff pictured with the CITE Advisory Board. Front rows...

Fri, 02 Oct 2009 12:53:00 -0500

UTSA staff pictured with the CITE Advisory Board. Front rows (L-R): Lynda de la Vina, dean of UTSA’s College of Business; Paul Castella, chair; Alan Weinkrantz; C. Mauli Agrawal, dean of UTSA’s College of Engineering; John Kirk and Whitney Solcher Miller. Back row (L-R): Dean McCall; William Tolhurst; Lawrence Crynes; Cory Hallam.

UTSA Technology Entrepreneurship Center Names Inaugural Board

By: Wendy Frost
UTSA College of Business

The Center for Innovation and Technology Entrepreneurship (CITE), a joint venture of The University of Texas at San Antonio College of Business and College of Engineering, has named its inaugural advisory board members.

“We are really excited with the creation of the inaugural CITE board as it will play a key role in linking UTSA to the regional technology entrepreneurship ecosystem,” said Cory Hallam, assistant vice president for commercialization, alliances and innovation and CITE’s director.

The board is chaired by Paul Castella, MBA ‘05, managing general partner, Incyte Ventures. Members are Nick Anthony, founder and president, Greektown Restaurants Ltd.; John Bray, lawyer, Cox|Smith; Lawrence Crynes, senior process engineer, Marathon Oil Company; John Kirk, owner, the JFK Firm LLC; Dean McCall, CEO and co-founder, Ideagin; Whitney Solcher Miller, managing director, San Antonio Capital Management LLC; William Tolhurst, BS ‘85, managing director, Quantimum LLC; and Alan Weinkrantz, president, Alan Weinkrantz & Company.

The board is charged with building the profile of CITE, integrating CITE with regional technology entrepreneurship resources and participating in the growth and funding of the center to enable long-term success.

The center sponsors yearly technology entrepreneurship boot camps, student technology business plan competitions and hosts an incubator for new ventures. CITE focuses on fostering the growth of entrepreneurs and new technology-based ventures through a process of education, experiences, resources and support.

UTSA to Host Technology Entrepreneurship Boot Camp

Wed, 23 Sep 2009 16:07:19 -0500

To help solo entrepreneurs and established companies commercialize new technologies, UTSA’s Center for Innovation and Technology Entrepreneurship will host the Jackson Walker Technology Entrepreneurship Boot Camp from 8:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Friday, October 2 in Business Building Room 2.06.04 on the Main Campus.

The daylong boot camp will offer participants an intensive crash course on the commercialization of new technologies. Throughout the day, expert presentations on fundamental technology entrepreneurship skills will include opportunity identification; business planning and pitching; IP and business law; social media, public relations and branding; and funding a technology start-up in San Antonio.

Keynote speaker Larry J. Miller, M.D. will kick off CITE’s daylong boot camp for entrepreneurs. Miller is the founder, chairman and chief medical officer of Vidacare, a successful multi-million dollar San Antonio technology venture.

The CITE Entrepreneurship Boot Camp is co-sponsored by the UTSA’s College of Business, College of Engineering and Office of the Vice President for Research as well as the San Antonio Technology Accelerator Initiative.

Registration is free for UTSA faculty, students and staff as well as faculty and students from others institutions of higher education. To register, click here. The cost for the general public is $95.00. Payment can be made by cash or check the day of the event. For more information, call (210) 458-5782.

The College of Engineering’s Student Council has launched...

Fri, 28 Aug 2009 12:39:00 -0500

The College of Engineering’s Student Council has launched a new website that serves as a hub for all undergraduate student organizations in the COE. With an integrated, color-coded calendar showing events for all student organizations as well as the College, the new COE Student Council website is a great resource for engineering students wanting to get involved with campus events, meet new people, and expand upon their skill sets with like-minded students.

Visit the new College of Engineering Student Council website by directing your browsers to utsaengineering.org. As always, you can view a list of all of the College’s student organizations and their contact information by visiting our Student Organizations page.

$5 million Grant Awarded to Develop New Center

Mon, 24 Aug 2009 10:49:00 -0500

The College of Engineering at UTSA announced today it will receive $5 million from the National Science Foundation over the next five years to create a research and educational center on Simulation, Visualization and Real-Time Prediction (SiViRT Center).

The SiViRT Center’s goals are multi-faceted and include attracting under-representative minorities (URM) to careers in engineering and science, as well as improving the retention rates of those students. By effectually combining education and research, the SiViRT Center will establish itself as a research leader in the areas of Simulation, Visualization and Real-Time Prediction and enhance the research capabilities and productivity of the university, in line with UTSA 2016. A research team led by Stathis Michaelides of the Department of Mechanical Engineering, will oversee the Center and its successes.

Funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA), this grant is the largest ARRA award received by the university thus far

UTSA, Southwest Research Institute, CPS Energy form energy research alliance

Tue, 21 Jul 2009 08:25:00 -0500

By Christi Fish
Public Affairs Specialist

United in a common interest to explore new and innovative energy solutions, The University of Texas at San Antonio, Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) and CPS Energy have signed a memorandum of understanding to form the Energy Research Alliance of San Antonio.

Although UTSA, SwRI and CPS Energy have a long-standing tradition of collaboration in a variety of areas, the memo is the first formal agreement on the topic of energy among the three organizations. Specifically, it calls for the trio to:

Prioritize energy-related initiatives for collaboration including energy workshops
Define a strategic regional roadmap for emerging energy technology
Collaborate on energy grant applications and publications
Organize joint research and academic and scientific activities such as research projects, demonstration projects, courses, conferences, seminars, symposia or lectures
Promote the exchange of researchers, teaching personnel and students
Exchange publications and other materials of common interest
Jointly work to raise public awareness and education on energy topics

“The energy issues we face are exceedingly complex, and their solutions require a broad spectrum of research skills,” said Robert Gracy, UTSA vice president for research. “At UTSA, we are particularly pleased with the partnership because it brings together the full range of research capabilities of all three organizations. This synergy will undoubtedly provide energy solutions that each individual component could not accomplish by working on its own.”

“We welcome the opportunity for Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) to join with UTSA and CPS Energy in this important area,” said Danny Deffenbaugh, vice president of the Mechanical Engineering Division at SwRI. “This collaborative effort will address one of the most critical challenges we face today: providing energy to support our way of life, while minimizing climate change,” Deffenbaugh said.

Cris Eugster, executive vice president and chief sustainability officer of CPS Energy said, “San Antonio has the opportunity to be a leader in clean energy technologies and their practical applications, and the Energy Research Alliance of San ANtonio will be a key catalyst in this endeavor.”

The five-year agreement was formally executed by James Casey, director of the Office of Contracts and Industrial Agreements at UTSA; Walter Downing, executive vice president of SwRI; and CPS Energy’s Eugster.

No additional funding is required to begin this initiative.

(via UTSA Today)

University of Texas at San Antonio Students to Build Bolivia

Tue, 30 Jun 2009 08:59:00 -0500

The UTSA student chapter of Engineers Without Borders (EWB), a registered student organization, is raising funds for its first international, humanitarian project. Engineers Without Borders is a nonprofit organization that designs and implements sustainable engineering projects worldwide. The national organization comprises 300 student and professional chapters active in 47 countries. A group of UTSA students formed a student chapter in 2007.

After a year of organizational groundwork (and a false start on a project in the town of La Ligilla, Mexico, that had to be put on hold because of escalating violence in the region), EWB-UTSA has established a partnership with the town of San Lorenzo, Bolivia, to “adopt” an engineering project.

Located in a largely rural area of southern Bolivia - a country with one of the highest infant mortality rates in South America - San Lorenzo (pop. 7,100) is seeking improvements to its only medical clinic, which has gone years without updates and is in poor condition.

“The project entails updating and helping them build a new health clinic to serve their growing community,” said EWB-UTSA president Krista Paredes, a senior civil engineering major. More than a dozen students participate in the UTSA chapter.

The cost of each EWB project is shared by the community in which the project takes place and the chapter adopting the project. The town of San Lorenzo has already set aside $10,000 of an estimated $30,000 tally. The UTSA chapter must raise the remaining $20,000.

To raise monies, Paredes and other students have been holding small fundraisers on campus, and they also are planning a fundraising car wash and events that the community can participate in. The student engineers also have picked up sponsorships from engineering firms Pape-Dawson, Bain Medina Bain, and Lockheed, Andrews and Newnam.

* UTSA’s Engineers Without Borders chapter will hold a fundraising car wash from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., July 11, at the Zip-In Car Wash, 4514 DeZavala Rd. The cost for a full detailed car wash will be $15. All proceeds will go toward funding a pre-assessment trip to Bolivia.

“EWB allows the students to learn applicable engineering skills and use what they learn in the classroom through working on projects in developing countries such as water treatment or building structures,” says faculty adviser Heather Shipley, assistant professor of civil engineering who consulted with Engineers Without Borders while studying at Rice University.

With just $500 in their coffers for this project, the group has a ways to go to raise the $3,000-$4,000 needed for the pre-assessment trip, which is the first step in the project.

This initial site visit should last three or four days and will be led by civil engineering student Albert Garcia, who is serving as project manager. Another faculty adviser, Manuel Diaz, a structural engineer, is planning to attend, along with a health care professional.

Based on their site visit, the UTSA chapter will submit a report to the national chapter of Engineers Without Borders. Once given the go-ahead by the national group, UTSA can begin the project as early as December 2009.

* For updates on UTSA fundraisers, visit the Engineers Without Borders Web site. To learn more about supporting the work of UTSA’s Engineers Without Borders chapter, e-mail ewb.utsa@gmail.com.For more information please contact: Sarabjit Jagirdar, Email:- htsyndication@hindustantimes.com.

Electrical Engineering Professor Qian Receives Teaching Award

Wed, 17 Jun 2009 10:14:00 -0500

Professor Chunjiang Qian of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering is among the initial recipients of the prestigious Regents’ Outstanding Teaching Award from The University of Texas System.

To be honored with this award, Qian underwent a rigorous campus-level review. Once identified as one of UTSA’s most qualified candidates for this award by UTSA President Ricardo Romo, Qian and his fellow nominees were evaluted by an external review committee.

Only a select number of faculty members from across The University of Texas System were chosen.

Congratulations, Dr. Qian, on this esteemed accomplishment.

Federal Security Agencies Name UTSA a National Center of Academic Excellence in Research

Tue, 19 May 2009 15:00:00 -0500

Want to learn about information assurance and security? You might want to consider The University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA). The university has received the elite National Center of Academic Excellence in Research (CAE-R) designation from the National Security Administration (NSA) and the Department of Homeland Security for five years through 2014.

“This designation is not a college designation, but a designation for the entire university,” said Glen Dietrich, chair of the Information Assurance Department in UTSA’s College of Business. “It takes into account faculty, programs, research and funding from the College of Business, the College of Engineering, the College of Sciences and our Center for Infrastructure Assurance and Security.”

The CAE and CAE-R programs are jointly sponsored by the NSA and DHS to reduce vulernabipity in the U.S. information infrastructure by promoting higher education and research in information assurance and by supporting a growing number of professionals with information assurance expertise. Specifically, the CAE-R program in information assurance aims to increase the understanding of robust technologies, policies and practices that will enable the U.S. to effectively prevent or respond to a catastrophic cyber event.

UTSA, an emerging research institution with a strong focus in security, first applied for CAE designation in 2001. It received that designation in 2002, making it the only CAE-designated university in Texas. Since then, six other universities and colleges in Texas have joined suit, earning their CAE designations, and one other, UT Dallas, has received the prestigious CAE-R designation.

Considerations for the CAE-R designation include:

a university’s research, faculty and academic programs in information assurance and security
its Carnegie Foundation classification
its peer-reviewed publishing rate in security
the overall number of graduate students it produces in security
its level of funding for security programs

(by: Christi Fish)

UTSA Earns Accolades from Magazine

Tue, 19 May 2009 14:50:00 -0500

The University of Texas at San Antonio has been recognized as one of the national leaders in educating and graduating Hispanic students by Hispanic Outlook in Higher Education magazine.

According to the May issue of the magazine, the university (UTSA) ranked fourth in the nation in the number of undergraduate degrees and twelfth nationally in the number of master’s degrees award to Hispanic students.

The magazine looked at the 2007-08 school year of the top 100 predominantly Hispanic-serving colleges and universities in the U.S. and Puerto Rico.

In a prepared statement, UTSA President Ricardo Romo said the recognition demonstrates the university’s vision of providing access to “educational excellence.”

“To have nine of our programs ranked in the Top 10 among the nation’s leading Hispanic Serving Institutions shows UTSA continues on the right path to building the next great Texas university,” Romo said.

UTSA is one of 200 Hispanic Serving Institutions in the U.S. It is one of the fastest-growing higher education institutions in Texas and the second largest of nine academic universities and six health institutions in the UT System.

UTSA serves more than 28,400 students through 64 bachelor’s, 47 master’s and 21 doctoral degree programs.

(via: San Antonio Business Journal)

Mechanical Engineering Students Win Awards at Regional Conference

Wed, 29 Apr 2009 13:39:00 -0500

At the AIAA Southwestern Regional Student Conference held April 17th and 18th at UTSA, Carlos Acosta and Juan Ocampo won first place in the Team category for their paper, High Performance Computing Implementation in a Risk Assessment Problem. The students received a $500 prize and travel expenses for one author to present the work at the International Aerospace Sciences meeting in Orlando, Florida. Another UTSA Engineering student, Andy Voorhees, won third place in the Masters category for his paper, Complex Variable Methods for Fatigue Sensitivity Analysis.

UTSA IEEE Robotics Team Places 4th The UTSA IEEE Robotics Team...

Fri, 24 Apr 2009 15:45:00 -0500

UTSA IEEE Robotics Team Places 4th

The UTSA IEEE Robotics Team traveled to Lubbock, Texas on April 17th, 2009 to compete in the annual IEEE Region 5 Robotics Competition where teams were challenged with designing an autonomous robot capable of detecting color and blindly maneuvering a course in search for specific boxes. The boxes on the course had to be found and moved to other locations according to their color and original location.

The Region 5 robotics Competition attracts some of the larger universities in and around Texas, such as The University of Texas at Austin, Air Force Academy, and the University of Houston. This year’s competition drew in more than twenty teams from eight different states

UTSA IEEE finished 3rd place in the first round of competition, having a score high enough to qualify the team for the final round. The team finished the final round and earned an overall place of 4th in the competition.

The fourth place finish is among one of the top finishes in the history of UTSA’s participation in the competition, next to the team’s second place finish last year. IEEE Student Chapter Chair, Kevin Messenhimer and Robotics Chair, Daniel Seiler agree that, “the competition has been an invaluable learning experience for everyone. Next year we hope to supersede this year’s accomplishments and extend the team’s knowledge to more students.”

The team would like to thank the College of Engineering, CPS Energy, Nerd: The Focus and Energy Beverage, and Southwest Research Institute for their financial support and sponsorship of the robotics team.

Congratulations to the 2009 IEEE Robotics team: Daniel Seiler, Terrence Leonard, and Chris Weldon for their commitment and outstanding representation of not only UTSA IEEE but also the College of Engineering and UTSA at large.