Congratulations to Materials Engineering student Alexandra Del Carmen Basantes Defaz, of Ecuador, on winning second place in the engineering, Mathematics, and Physical Science category with her “Intelligent Welding” photograph in UIC’s Image of Research contest.Her image will be on exhibit at UIC’s Daley Library, the Library of Health Sciences, and featured on light pole banners around campus. She also will be honored and receive a cash prize during an awards reception featuring the winners and the finalists for this year's 10th Anniversary exhibition, which will take place at Gallery 400 on Oct. 24th, 2017.The description accompanying the “Intelligent Welding” picture provides a deeper look into the research it portrays and the student involved.“I am not your stereotypical welder. I am an M.S. student in the…

UIC’s student chapter of Institution of Transportation Engineers (ITE) captured second place at the ITE Collegiate Traffic Bowl (Midwestern District) during the ITE Midwestern District Conference 2017 at Madison, Wisconsin, from June 18 to 20.The UIC ITE team, which consists of Civil and Materials Engineering department students Diana Briones, Burbank, Illinois, and Austin Bernat, of Bartlett, Illinois, and alumnus Natalia Kuvakina, of San Jose, California, competed hard as they narrowly missed securing the top spot during their first time participating in the competition.The Midwestern District comprises of schools from Illinois, Wisconsin, Missouri, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Kansas, Iowa, Minnesota, North Dakota and South Dakota.  “Lacking any previous experience, the team’s performance was commendable in the face of stiff competition from other schools,”…

Associate Professor Jie (Jane) Lin was recently featured in Wallethub’s recent article 2017’s Best & Worst Cities to Drive in. Lin was asked a series of question in the Ask the Experts section that focuses on cost, safety and environmental impact.  She also provided her expertise as she answered questions about autonomous vehicles and their potential consequences for society.The full article can be found at Wallethub. 

Donor, volunteer, mentor, advisor, instructor, and friend Christopher Burke has for more than a decade shared his time, resources, and business acumen with UIC’s College of Engineering. Recently, the College celebrated the investiture of Farhad Ansari, PhD, as the inaugural recipient of The Christopher B. and Susan S. Burke Professorship, the first endowed professorship in the UIC Department of Civil and Materials Engineering.Dr. Ansari (PhD ’83), UIC Distinguished Professor, currently serves as Associate Vice Chancellor for Research and as a faculty member in the Department of Civil and Materials Engineering. Acknowledged as the pioneer in applying optical fiber sensors for structural health monitoring, he has consulted on and designed structural monitoring systems for bridges around the world, including New York’s…

CME students have been winning scholarships throughout the school year and the accolades continue to flood the department.Lisha Wu was awarded the Chancellor’s Graduate Research Award for her research on the Removal of Chromium from water using Sustainable Manganese Oxide Based Sorbents and received a $5,000 prize. She is working under the direction of Associate Professor Amid Khodadoust in the Environmental Separations Lab.Since its inception in 2009, the Chancellor’s Graduate Research Award has supported multidisciplinary scholarship in an attempt to expose graduate students to varied research and creative fields. The award mechanism has naturally evolved into a way for students early in their studies to develop new research directions for their PhD dissertations or terminal degree thesis/capstone project and has…

A team of CME students won second place overall at the 28th Annual UIC Engineering Senior Design Expo on April 21, 2017 at the UIC Forum, 725 W. Roosevelt Road, Chicago.The team of Mike Anzalone, Mary Cunningham, Yousef Dana, Garret Golden and Stephen Lashock won the Silver Award, which had a prize of $2,000, with their project Grant Park Reef Trail, which used virtual reality during their presentation.The group also won a Globe Award in the Infrastructure Improvement category. The expo was made up of 130 projects, which were presented by more than 500 students competing in five categories.The goal of the Grant Park Reef Trail project is to renovate Monroe Harbor to become a positive addition to the existing…