Faculty & Staff

I have enjoyed technical topics since high school, when I was encouraged by my physics teacher to enroll in a pre-engineering course and learned computer programming. I was one of the first women to attend WPI and earned all three of my degrees here, being the first woman to receive a Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from WPI. Prior to my graduate studies, I worked in industry for several years, both in Massachusetts (Norton Company) and Illinois (Olin Corporation), and was usually the only female engineer in my engineering group. ... View Profile

Prior to joining the faculty at WPI in 2001, I was a Senior Staff Engineer in the Advanced Propulsion Technology Group at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). My research at JPL included application of plasma sources for materials processing and the development of pulsed plasma and small-scale hydrazine thrusters. In the mission support area, I worked as the propulsion engineer for the Deep Space 3 Interferometer and Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) missions. ... View Profile

Chris Brown has been on the WPI faculty since 1989. In 1983 he completed his doctoral work on machining at the University of Vermont, where he also worked in orthopedics and studied ski injuries. As an undergraduate, he was Vermont’s only walk-on All-American skier. He raced and coached there during the longest regular season undefeated streak in NCAA history and is a member of UVM’s athletic hall of fame. ... View Profile

Dr. Cote is an Assistant Professor in Materials Science & Engineering at WPI. She received her B.S. from the University of New Hampshire in Chemical Engineering and M.S. and Ph.D. in Materials Science & Engineering from WPI. She also worked as a research engineer at Saint-Gobain High Performance Materials in the Polymer Characterization research group. ... View Profile

I joined WPI in the fall of 2015 to teach thermo-fluid courses in the Department of Mechanical Engineering. The objective of my teaching is to guide students in the application of thermodynamics, fluid mechanics, and heat transfer to solve practical problems in fields such as transportation, energy, and life sciences. I advocate project-based learning and hands-on experience in the laboratory and shop. My research involves experimental studies of fluid behavior. ... View Profile

As a college professor, I have the opportunity not only to excite students about my field of materials science and engineering, but to help them develop holistically as critical thinkers, lifelong learners, innovators, and effective and ethical communicators during an important formative period in their personal and professional lives. I was an undergraduate at WPI and really valued the project-based learning, the Global Projects Program, and the extent of contact I had with my professors. Those same values drew me back to WPI as a faculty member. ... View Profile

Professor Fischer is the William Smith Dean's Professor and a faculty member in Mechanical Engineering and Robotics Engineering with an appointment in Biomedical Engineering at WPI. He received his PhD in Mechanical Engineering in 2008 from Johns Hopkins University, where he was part of the NSF Engineering Research Center for Computer Integrated Surgery. At WPI he has been an integral part of developing the Robotics Engineering program and teaches primarily junior-level and graduate courses in Robotics. ... View Profile

It has been a great pleasure to teach at WPI, a school with motivated students from all over the world. ... View Profile

Prior to joining the faculty at WPI in August 2015, I worked as a post-doctoral research associate at Graduate Aerospace Laboratories at California Institute of Technology. My research at Caltech focused on the development of a Granular Element Method (GEM) based force visualization technique for the study of 2D granular systems under impact loading. I examined of the role of granular fabric on the wave motion and formation of force chains in granular media. ... View Profile

Teaching is my way of sharing my enthusiasm for Science and Engineering. I believe that these are great professions because they give us the ability to effect real and positive change in this world. I particularly enjoy hearing the varied and interesting contributions of the students in class, and the collaborative environment of WPI as a whole. View Profile

Professor Liang’s research explores the physics of interfaces between the nanometer and micron scales. Her team responds to the challenging interdisciplinary nature of their research endeavor through successful collaboration with colleagues with expertise in metrology, physics, bioscience, medical science, chemistry, and fire protection engineering. Her educational effort includes novel approaches to project-based learning and global centers for science and engineering. ... View Profile

Makhlouf M. Makhlouf is professor of Mechanical Engineering at Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI). He was Director of the Advanced Casting Research Center (ACRC) between 1992 and 2015. ACRC is a collaboration between the academic and industrial sectors focusing on issues that benefit the global foundry industry. It brings fundamental understanding to existing processes, develops new methods, and addresses management-technology interface matters. ... View Profile

As an active researcher in the field of Additive Manufacturing (AM), Sneha Prabha Narra explores novel applications in AM by utilizing interdisciplinary knowledge from mechanical engineering, materials science, and data analytics, with a particular focus on alloys. Her research investigates microstructure and porosity control in alloys using AM processes, additive manufacturing of non-standard materials and powders, and how data analytics and physics-based knowledge of a process can be combined to reduce the need for experimentation in engineering problems. ... View Profile

An integral part of a rewarding academic career is being an educator. It is a wonderful opportunity to work with students and guide their development to fulfill their potential. I enjoy teaching the fundamentals of robotics engineering, science and technology as well as training students in advanced independent research. I aim to teach students about research-based thinking and problem solving, to give them a real career choice to determine their future in further research or the industry. ... View Profile

David Planchard is the founder of D&M Education LLC. Before starting D&M Education, he spent over 27 years in industry and academia holding various engineering, marketing, and teaching positions. He holds five U.S. patents. He has published and authored numerous papers on Machine Design, Product Design, Mechanics of Materials, and Solid Modeling. He is an active member of the SOLIDWORKS Users Group and the American Society of Engineering Education (ASEE). ... View Profile

My inspiration for teaching comes from my dad who has been a teacher for over four decades in India. That interest was strengthened when I became a teaching assistant at the University of Texas at Austin and continued in that position for six years. Teaching gives me an opportunity to interact with students and to continually learn and impart new concepts at the same time. I joined WPI in August 2014 and have had a great experience thus far. ... View Profile

The project mode of education is a significant tenet of WPI; project based courses are common, along with the required Interactive Qualifying Project and Major Qualifying Project. Managing this close knit intellectual activity has m any parallels to coaching sports; watching individuals " light up" is tremendously rewarding. The recent addition of the Great Problems Seminar allows strong interaction with the freshman class as well. The thermofluid area is critical to world sustainability and extends beyond technical expertise to socio- political and economic context. View Profile

Prior to joining WPI, Dr. Soboyejo was a Professor in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at Princeton University for approximately 17 years. He is a materials scientist whose research focuses on biomaterials and the use of nanoparticles for the detection and treatment of disease, the mechanical properties of materials, and the use of materials science to promote global development. ... View Profile

I am William Smith Foundation Dean's Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Worcester Polytechnic Institute. Here at WPI, my main responsibilities are teaching and research. I have taught Introduction to Materials Science, materials processing and materials for electrochemical energy system. I enjoy teaching and interacting with students because I like to impart my knowledge/experience to the students. At the same time, I can also absorb different knowledge and culture from the students. ... View Profile

Prof. Jun Yang Joined WPI following her position as a postdoctoral associate at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), where she worked on the mesoscale modeling of cell biomechanics and rheology with particle based method at Nanomechanics Laboratory. Her experience on multiscale modeling is in smoothed dissipative particle dynamics (SDPD) method, smoothed particle hydrodynamics (SPH), dissipative particle dynamics (DPD), mechanobiology of sickle cell anemia, theoretical and computational modeling for evaluating biomechanical and biophysical properties of healthy and diseased cells. View Profile