The PhD in Aerospace Engineering program at WPI gives you the tools, facilities, and support to lead independent research and advance your professional capabilities into the technology and the science of aircraft and spacecraft. The degree program is flexible and offers both full-time and part-time options so you can earn your degree while keeping up with your current responsibilities.
Our innovative and involved faculty contribute to aerospace research and currently have research under way in fluids and propulsion, dynamics and control, and materials and structure. You’ll work closely with faculty to find your best path and contribute to high-level research projects as well as developing your own body of work.
You can apply for the PhD program with a bachelor’s degree or a master’s degree, with the bachelor’s degree requiring a longer course of study to completion of the PhD degree. The course work requires several aerospace engineering courses; graduate seminars; and proposal, completion, and defense of a dissertation. Our faculty will help you match your research interests to your professional goals so you can launch right into a career upon graduation.
Students may use these academic planners to help determine their credits:
The PhD in Aerospace Engineering program allows candidates the opportunity to delve deep into original research they are particularly passionate about. Our expert faculty invite collaboration and innovation in our classrooms and state-of-the-art labs to advance aerospace engineering research.
Recent research projects:
WPI’s aerospace engineering facilities are extensive and well funded by government partners. Researchers have access to the latest equipment and enjoy an open and encouraging atmosphere.
Our labs:
In my teaching I bring fluid and aerodynamics experiments, including wind tunnels, into the classroom each day. Fundamental concepts are demonstrated in these experiments, and collected data is immediately compared to the theory and equations learned during lecture. Students see that they can use what they are learning in class to predict the behavior of aerospace systems. They then go on to design improved systems in MQP projects and during their careers.
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Professor Demetriou is very active with the Controls and Systems research community. He served as an Associate Editor in the IEEE Tr. on Automatic Control (2004-2007), in the ASME Journal of Dynamic Systems, Measurement, and Control (2009-2011), and in SIAM J. Control and Optimization (2009-present). He is also serving in the IEEE-Control Systems Society Conference Editorial Board as an Associate Editor (1997-present). In 2003 he established the IEEE-CSS Technical Committee on Distributed Parameter Systems and served as his first chair (2003-2012).
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Autonomous vehicles – aircraft, cars, rovers, over- and underwater vehicles that can move in the real world by themselves without human pilotage – have gained immense importance not only due to the broad spectrum of their potential military and civilian applications, but also due to the concurrent development of sensor technology and embedded systems that enable the realization of true autonomy.
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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.
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My research is aimed towards understanding fundamental aspects of reacting flows at thermodynamic conditions of relevance to aircraft, rocket, and automobile propulsion. Reacting flow phenomena occurring in engines are complicated as a result of turbulent flow, interaction with solid boundaries, and extreme thermodynamic conditions. In order to understand and simulate combustion phenomena under such conditions, there is a necessity to develop accurate chemical kinetic and molecular transport models in addition to fluid mechanics models.
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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.
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