Richard Fu Richard Fu (M.S., Ph.D. Mechanical Engineering, ‘06, ‘12), president at Agrivolution LLC, announced that the company has received a $73,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to work with Connecticut farmers to determine the feasibility of year-round, indoor agricultural production. Fu started the company in 2012 as a graduate student at UConn. Agrivolution will use the funds to explore whether hydroponic and other indoor growing techniques will work in Connecticut.
Author: Orlando E
Alumni, Mark D. Aramli
Mark D. Aramli 
(B.S. Mechanical Engineering, ’97) appeared on the February 3, 2015 episode of the ABC television show “Shark Tank” pitching BedJet, a climate control system for beds. A NASA space suit designer-turned-entrepreneur, Aramli is the inventor and principal engineer of this patent-pending bed heating or cooling system. Initially funded by a Kickstarter campaign, BedJet debuted at the 2014 Las Vegas World Market trade show. Aramli earned an MBA in finance from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.
Technologies passed down three generations
John Krenicki, Jr. (B.S. Mechanical Engineering, ’84; Hon.D.Sc. ‘07) was appointed to the board of directors of CHC Group Ltd. (HELI) and will serve as chairman. Initially, he will also serve on the company’s newly created Chairman Search Committee. Krenicki joined CD&R in 2013 after a 29-year career at General Electric. He currently serves as chairman of Wilsonart International, chairman of The ServiceMaster Company and lead director of Brand Energy & Infrastructure Services, Inc. He holds an M.S. in Management from Purdue University. Moore Engineering, founded by Wade Moore, a recent graduate of UConn, was recently named “Murphy’s Monday Manufacturer” by U.S. Senator Chris Murphy. Moore, 23, who graduated with a degree in mechanical engineering, founded the company in 2010 after being inspired by his great-grandfather, Richard Moore, who established the well-known Moore Special Tool Company. Today, Moore Engineering is based in Milford and operates out of an 800-square-foot facility and is run by Wade with the part-time help of his three brothers. The company uses measuring and machining technologies that have been passed down three generations from Richard Moore. 
Manuel A. Santos (B.S. Mechanical Engineering, ‘99) was elected mayor of the City of Meriden, Connecticut in December 2013. When elected, Santos was a senior mechanical design engineer at Ultra Electronics, Measurement Systems Inc. in Wallingford, CT. Prior to that position, he was a design engineer with Ripley Tools, formerly a division of Capewell Components Co. LLC, designing innovative hand tools for the fiber optic industry.
Alumni, Anthony DeCarmine
Anthony “Tony” DeCarmine, Jr. (B.S. Mechanical Engineering/Materials Engineering, ’92) was named the first chief technology officer at Oxford Performance Materials Inc.(OPM). In this position, DeCarmine is responsible for advancing the company’s process technologies, including OsteoFab, the company’s primary area of innovation for the medical industry, and OXFAB, a proprietary technology for aerospace and industrial customers. He joined OPM in 2003 and has held a number of senior positions, including director of application development and technical director.
Jay Leno drives the UConn SAE race car during his visit.
Jay Leno drives the UConn SAE race car during his visit. Watch video
Dr. Robert Gao Wins Award From IEEE
Dr. Robert Gao Wins Award From IEEE Instrumentation and Measurement Society
Dr. Robert Gao (ME) has been awarded the Technical Award by the IEEE Instrumentation and Measurement Society. The I&M Society Technical Award is given to an individual or group of individuals for outstanding contribution or leadership in advancing instrumentation design or measurement technique. The citation reads: “For significantly advancing the state-of-the-art in electrical capacitance tomography instrument design.” Dr. Gao received this award at the IEEE International Instrumentation and Measurement Technology Conference (I2MTC) held in Montevideo, Uruguay. The award came with a $2,000 prize and a plaque.
Lee Langston In Sweden
Professo
r Emeritus Lee Langston Serving As Short-Term Professor In Sweden
Lee Langston, Professor Emeritus, Mechanical Engineering, is currently serving as a short-term professor at KTH, Sweden’s Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm. The appointment takes place from Sept. 10 to Oct. 2, 2014. He will give seminars on gas turbine technology and participate as a member of the grading committee for the disputation of a Ph.D candidate.
Program Wins Grant from the Harvey Hubbell Foundation
A program designed to improve learning outcomes for students in Engineering and eventually other STEM fields has been awarded a $178,384 grant from the Hubbell Foundation in Shelton, CT. The proposal, “Improving Educational Outcomes for Undergraduate Students in Engineering: The UConn Lifelong Learning Project” is a collaboration of the School of Engineering and the School of Nursing, with the support of the Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning to improve the success of undergraduate students, particularly underrepresented students. The PIs for the program are Daniel Burkey, Associate Dean for Undergraduate Education and Diversity for Engineering, Kevin McLaughlin, Program Director for the Engineering Diversity Program and Thomas Van Hoof, Associate Professor of UConn’s Schools of Nursing and Medicine.
Meet the New Faculty For UConn Mechanical Engineering
Meet the New Faculty For UConn Mechanical Engineering
Xu Chen joins the Mechanical Engineering department. Dr. Chen’s research interests are theory and applications of 
dynamic systems and controls to advance the technology development in advanced manufacturing, mechatronics, robotics, precision engineering, system and optimization, and human-machine interactions. He has worked closely with the precision control and information storage industries, and helped Western Digital Corporation develop multiple new servo designs for industrial mass production. Dr. Chen is a recipient of the Young Investigator Award in 2014 ISCIE / ASME International Symposium on Flexible Automation and the 2012 Chinese Government Award for Outstanding Students. He received his Ph.D. from UC Berkeley in 2010 and 2013, respectively.
Julian Norato 
joins the Mechanical Engineering department. His current research interests lie in incorporating localized failure mode criteria (such as stress and fatigue), as well as manufacturing, cost and geometric constraints in topology and shape optimization for the design exploration of structures and materials, with the aim of exploring efficient structures tailored to a specific manufacturing process. Prior to joining our department, he was responsible for the Product Optimization group at Caterpillar, where he and his team researched numerical methods and developed computational tools for structural and multidisciplinary optimization. He earned his Ph.D from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2005.
Savas Tasoglu joins the Mechanical Engineering department. His current research interests are complex fluid dynamics, 
micro-assembly approaches, magnetics, microfluidics, cell and tissue mechanics, regenerative medicine, cryopreservation, and cell-based diagnostics for point-of-care. Dr. Tasoglu’s achievements in research and teaching have been recognized by fellowships and awards including Chang-Lin Tien Fellowship in Mechanical Engineering, Allen D. Wilson Memorial Scholarship, and UC Berkeley Institute Fellowship for Preparing Future Faculty. His work has been featured as the cover of Advanced Materials, Small, Trends in Biotechnology, and Physics of Fluids and highlighted in Nature Medicine, Boston Globe, Reuters Health, and Boston Magazine. He received his Ph.D. in 2011 from UC Berkeley. 
Xinyu Zhao joins the Mechanical Engineering department. Her research interests are in the area of computational fluid dynamics with a focus on high-fidelity simulations of complex reacting flows as well as heat and mass transfer in turbulent, particle laden flows. She received her Ph.D. from Pennsylvania State University in 2014.