2014

T H E U N I V E R S I T Y O F N E W M E X I C O

U N M Engineering

Creating Stronger Connections

2014

It is an honor to be once again serving as the Dean of the School of Engineering. And I am particularly pleased to be writing to you on the inside cover of UNM Engineering, a publication that is celebrating its 10-year anniversary.

Let me begin with a brief profile of the school. I’m proud to say that our enrollments are at an all-time high of 3,100 students, including 2,224 undergraduates, 441 at the master’s level, and 435 Ph.D. students. The sizable fraction of graduate students is a reflection of our research-driven focus, along with a significant amount of technology transfer and commercialization. And speaking of research, I’m also proud to say that during the past five years, despite shrinking federal support, annual research expenditures have remained

at approximately $30 million. With about 100 tenure/tenure track faculty, this translates into an average of approximately $300,000 per year per faculty, a figure that places us among the top 20 schools of engineering across the U.S.

While we take pride in what we have achieved, we could not have done these things without strategic collaborations. In this issue, you will read about one of our longstanding and close collaborators, Sandia National Laboratories. Particularly over the past 25 years, UNM has strengthened its research programs and aligned many of them with areas critical to Sandia. Currently, UNM is actively

working with the Labs in foundational areas, such as nanotechnology, bioscience, quantum computing, materials science, advanced energy, infrastructure security, and space systems.

Our relationship with the Labs is certainly a source of pride in the school, but our impact goes far beyond research. We are also making direct impacts in our community. One great example is the work of recent Civil Engineering alumna Adrienne Martinez and Professor Emeritus Bruce Thomson. Their work on building a working 1:84 model of Albuquerque’s North Diversion Channel railroad bridge — a bridge that was quite literally over troubled water — led to major (and very impactful) modifications in the once-threatened structure. The school is also connecting with the next generation of engineers. Through our K-12 outreach programs, we are giving dozens of high school students the chance to work on real-life engineering problems through internships, projects with faculty, and hands-on workshops.

Alumni are another source of pride in the school. In this issue, we feature Scott Lovald (who was also featured on the cover of UNM Engineering in 2006), who holds four degrees from UNM — three in Mechanical Engineering and an MBA. This young alumnus started a company as a student, is already a textbook author and patent-holder while working in the medical device industry, and is eager to put his UNM knowledge to even more use in entrepreneurial ventures.

I hope you enjoy this issue, which is sporting a new look, symbolic of the vast changes that have taken place in the school the last decade and the exciting innovations that are yet to come.

Message from the Dean

Our enrollments are at an all-time high of 3,100 students,

including 2,224 undergraduates,

441 at the master’s level, and 435

Ph.D. students.

Joseph L. CecchiDean of Engineering

contents

02 Creating Closer Collaborations Agreements, research strengthen our ties with Sandia National Laboratories

06 Reaching Out to the Future

07 Heart of the Matter NSF grant will support research on heart valve tissue engineering, inspire future scientists

08 Poking Holes in the Wall

09 At the CREST

10 Disaster Diversion Civil engineering helps the Albuquerque Watershed Authority prevent flooding

12 Transitions

13 Achievements

14 A Winning Team UNM engineers, PNM help businesses manage energy use

15 Ways to Give Back

16 Alumni Profile: Scott Lovald

17 Five for Jane Lehr

On the coverJeffrey Brinker (left), UNM distinguished professor and a Sandia researcher, and Bill Hammetter, manager the Advanced Materials Laboratory (shown here), are two of the leaders of the UNM-Sandia collaboration.

UNM Engineering2014, Volume 10

UNM Engineering is published annually by the University of New Mexico School of Engineering. Subscriptions are free; requests should be submitted to the address below. Material may not be reproduced without permission.

School of Engineering, Centennial Engineering Center, Room 3071, MSC01 1140, 1 University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM 87131-1140. 505-277-5521engineering.unm.edu

Interested in receiving UNM Engineering electronically? Contact Kim Delker at ksdelker@unm.edu

Managing EditorKim Delker

WritingMegan Fleming Writing & Creative Services and Kim Delker, UNM

DesignSparkplug Studio

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Agreements, research strengthen our ties with Sandia National Laboratories

NANOSCIENCE, SUPERCOMPUTERS, AND THE SMART ENERGY GRID WERE IDEAS

OF THE FUTURE WHEN THE FIRST PARTNERSHIPS BETWEEN THE SCHOOL OF

ENGINEERING AND SANDIA NATIONAL LABORATORIES (SNL) BEGAN IN THE 1950s.

By Megan Flemingand Kim Delker

Edl Schamiloglu’s research activities involve the use of pulsed power. Shown in this image is Sandia National Laboratories’ Z Machine. It creates powerful, short pulses of electrical energy and is the world’s most powerful electrical device.

The Technical Development Program (TDP) was one of the first partnerships between the school and the lab. Starting in 1959, the TDP helped many engineers at Sandia to earn their graduate degrees.

Today, the partnership has expanded to include educational opportunities for UNM students at SNL, outreach efforts and, most importantly, research. In the 1990s, SNL helped develop the Center for High Technology Materials and the Center for Micro-Engineered Materials at UNM.

One very tangible symbol of UNM and Sandia’s collaboration, the Advanced Materials Laboratory, was built in 1992 and was a joint undertaking to create a bridge between the two institutions. Located in the Science and Technology Park on UNM’s south campus, most of the facility was built in collaboration with Sandia. The 45,000-square-foot facility fosters collaboration among Sandia, UNM, and private companies in materials research, development and application, and provides a conduit for tech transfer from the labs and university to private companies for commercialization.

AML reports directly to the UNM provost and is administered by representatives of UNM and Sandia.

Bill Hammetter, manager of AML since its inception, said the partnership the last 22 years has resulted in two main advantages for Sandia.

“We have unlimited access to UNM students, and students from elsewhere, and access to facilities at UNM, such as conference space, libraries, and equipment,” he said. “This has resulted in closer ties between the two institutions. AML represents the most enduring gateway between UNM and Sandia.”

Hammetter said there are about 18 full-time Sandia employees that work at the facility, and at peak times, as many as 120 people, including students, visiting students and scholars, occupy space at AML.

The partnership has been reenergized with a recent announcement of a joint hire in materials science and engineering, Fernando Garzon. Garzon’s research focus includes fuel cell materials, energy storage technology, and high-temperature

materials and devices. Garzon holds the position of professor in the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering and the position of joint university faculty research scientist at Sandia. His time is split between the two institutions, and he has access to equipment and facilities at both UNM and Sandia.

Garzon joins Jeffrey Brinker, Distinguished Professor of Chemical and Biological Engineering, as a joint UNM-Sandia faculty researcher in the School of Engineering. Brinker has served in a joint capacity since 1999.

TODAY, THOSE FUTURISTIC IDEAS ARE REALITY. THEY’RE ALSO ACTIVE RESEARCH AREAS AT BOTH

SNL AND THE SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING, WHICH ARE COLLABORATING TO ADVANCE SCIENTIFIC

FRONTIERS WHILE TRAINING NEW GENERATIONS OF SCIENTISTS AND ENGINEERS.

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The partnership has been reenergized with a recent announcement of a joint hire in materials science and engineering, Fernando Garzon ( B E LOW )

Bill Hammetter The Advanced Materials Laboratory Jeffrey Brinker

C r e a t i n g S t r o n g e r C o n n e c t i o n s

ALTHOUGH DETAILING THE MANY WAYS THAT SANDIA NATIONAL LABORATORIES

AND THE SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING HAVE COLLABORATED THROUGH THE YEARS

WOULD BE IMPOSSIBLE, HERE ARE 3 PROJECTS THAT HIGHLIGHT THAT PARTNERSHIP.

The key to harnessing the full potential of renewable energy is

in the batteries that can store it for future use. Researchers at UNM and SNL are collaborating to find the best batteries for the job.

Beginning in 2009, a team composed of researchers from PNM, UNM, Northern New Mexico College and Sandia started the process in the Distributed Energy Technology Laboratory at SNL where they ran experiments integrating renewable energy sources into a simulated

distributed energy system which included buildings, batteries, and controllable energy loads. After SNL completed its

controlled

lab experiments, a team from UNM’s Department of Mechanical Engineering, headed by Andrea Mammoli, professor of mechanical engineering, in collaboration with PNM and SNL, ran the experiment on a real-life test bed with support from the Department of Energy, the Electric Power Research Institute, and other research partners.

The experiment consisted of a utility-scale PV array, coupled with large batteries that could store the energy generated by the PV for up to two hours. The system was tied to the Studio 14 power distribution feeder at Mesa del Sol, owned and operated by PNM. A microgrid, designed by a consortium of Japanese companies with funding from NEDO, was also tied to the same feeder.

The team’s mission was to see how PNM’s distributed systems equipment can be integrated into a larger distributed system, and to see how the microgrid and distributed energy system worked together to evaluate its effectiveness as a reliable source of energy for residential customers.

“We proved that batteries are essential to have on a distribution grid,” explains Mammoli. “We were able to determine how big the batteries need to be, what their function is, and what economic benefits they provide.” The collaboration between the UNM and SNL teams continues. The next step will be a Mesa del Sol distributed system which is composed of a network — essentially a group of microgrids that is integrated into the larger model that is more suitable to residential needs. “The more resources you put together, the more efficient it becomes,” he said.

Andrea Mammoli

“Both Sandia and UNM have seen that a cross-position is beneficial. At UNM we get access to top talented students. At Sandia, we get access to top facilities. Between the two, it’s a winning recipe.” I H A B E L- K A DY, P R I N C I PA L M E M B E R O F T H E

T EC H N I CA L STA F F AT SA N D I A ; R E S E A RC H

A SS I STA N T P RO F E SSO R I N D E PA RTM E N TS O F

M EC H A N I CA L E N G I N E E R I N G A N D E L ECT R I CA L

A N D CO M P U T E R E N G I N E E R I N G .

BUILDING A BETTER BATTERY

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For years UNM researchers have collaborated with both

the Air Force Research Laboratory Directed Energy Directorate and the Pulsed Power Science Center at SNL on fusion, plasma and other diagnostics, and stockpile stewardship studies. Now the partnership is poised for renewed research in high-energy density plasma physics that will shape the way we create energy and even what we know about the planets in our solar system.

Edl Schamiloglu, Distinguished Professor in the Department

of Electrical and Computer Engineering and one of the world’s top researchers in the field, is leading the university in the SNL partnership. “There’s a lot of synergy between what we do here and what Sandia does,” he says, “There aren’t that many universities working in pulsed power — it’s a niche. But it’s important to New Mexico, because we have a lot of activity in this area due to the national labs.”

Beyond the potential for important scientific findings from the partnership, Schamiloglu points to the many educational and career

opportunities available for a very specific kind of UNM engineering student. “Pulsed power and high-energy density plasma physics is not a very common topic. The students who go in to this area have a real passion for it,” he explains.

“They want to contribute to the big science that Sandia does. We’re one of Sandia’s resources that train graduate students who end up working there and helping to solve these large, complex problems.”

The School of Engineering just launched an initiative

for scalable computing to establish a formal collaboration on computer education and research between UNM and SNL computer scientists.

“Everyone senses that there are a lot of opportunities which have gone unexploited in this area, so giving people the opportunity to understand each other’s research is one of our main goals,” says Patrick Bridges, associate professor of computer science.

The initiative’s focus is on large-scale computing systems, computers that are two orders of magnitude more powerful than those that exist

today. These new, next-generation supercomputers will be used to help solve complex problems such as climate change and nuclear fusion challenges.

Researchers from UNM and Sandia are working on developing the new Hobbes Operating System, the system software that will run the new computers. The goal is to have the proof of concept on the software complete in three years so that a computer manufacturer can use it to develop a prototype of the computer.

Beyond research, the scalable computing initiative and the School of Engineering’s partnership with SNL offers excellent educational options for students by leveraging the unique expertise of SNL’s computer researchers. “We have a great opportunity to offer classes with truly specialized expertise that students can’t get anywhere else,” explains Bridges.

He expects new graduate-level classes to come online soon. Additional joint hires in the area of computing, shared space and more research partnerships are expected to follow, he said.

“There’s a lot of synergy between what we do here and what Sandia does.” E D L SC H A M I LO G LU

BUILDING SUPER SUPER COMPUTERS

THE NEXT WAVE IN PULSED POWER

“Giving people the opportunity to understand each other’s research is one of our main goals.” PAT R I C K B R I D G E S

By Megan Fleming

UNM Engineering answers those questions and more through outreach efforts aimed at everyone from pre-school students to seniors. “I love getting kids, teachers and the public excited about engineering because many people don’t have any idea about the amazing research we do that can have a profound impact on their lives,” says Outreach and Education Manager Stefi Weisburd.

Weisburd organizes about 45 outreach events annually, from family engineering nights at public schools to giving 14 teachers the opportunity to help faculty conduct research through the Research Experience for Teachers program funded by the National Science Foundation. She also arranges nearly 40 paid and unpaid summer internships for high school students. When you add in internships offered by faculty, that totals about 60 high school internship opportunities every year being offered by the School of Engineering.

Training ‘White Hats’Combining strategic computer games, Linux programming and cyber security processes, UNM’s Cybersecurity Boot Camp trained 30 high school students in “white hat” — essentially “good guy” — hacker skills. The summer camp, offered by the Department

of Computer Science and Anderson School of Management, gave participants basic cyber security skills and a taste for career opportunities in the field, plus $200 for completing the program. “There’s a real demand for people with these skills,” says Jed Crandall, associate professor of computer science. “If we can get them interested in cyber security at UNM early on, hopefully they’ll come to UNM and help fill the demand we have.” Crandall plans to offer the popular camp again next summer.

On the Road Weisburd and Katherine Love, special events coordinator, secured a two-year grant from the Army Educational Outreach Program which helped send an additional 10 high school students from around Albuquerque to UNM’s Summer Transportation Institute (STI), bringing the total number of students attending in 2014 to 26. STI builds awareness about career opportunities in the transportation field related to engineering, and prepares students to pursue college-level studies in engineering and STEM fields. Under the Army grant students were paid to attend the institute and received an additional week of instruction from UNM’s National Science Foundation Engineering Research Center grants on smart lighting, nanoscience, and solar cells.

With Governor Susanna Martinez and crowds of fans cheering them on, robots battled each other during the VEX Robotics Competition at UNM. Elementary, middle, and high school students used the VEX Robotic Design System to build the robots, which had to complete several challenges including placing an inflated balloon on top of a cylinder. Winners went on to the VEX Robotics World Championships in California.

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Stefi Weisburd

Bot Battle

C r e a t i n g S t r o n g e r C o n n e c t i o n s

What do engineers do? And why is their

work so important?

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NSF grant will support research on heart valve tissue engineering, inspire future scientists

By Kim Delker

Elizabeth L. Dirk, an assistant professor in the University of New Mexico Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, has been awarded a $400,000 National Science Foundation (NSF) Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) award.

This funding will support research on heart valve tissue engineering, as well as the development of programs to encourage students to pursue biomedical engineering. The grant, which began July 1, 2014, and runs through June 30, 2019, will be used to research aortic heart value tissue engineering with the aim of providing suitable living tissue equivalents for the treatment of valve disease. In addition, diseased-like models will also be developed to study the onset and progression of heart valve disease, leading to preventive and early treatments for those with this life-threatening disease.

“If we can create these disease states, we can work to understand the initiation, onset, and progress of heart valve disease,” said Dirk, who also holds a faculty position in UNM’s College of Pharmacy.

Dirk says about 20 years ago researchers discovered that the cell makeup of the aortic heart valve is different than the cell makeup of the rest of the heart. Studies have

found that in individuals prone to heart valve disease, healthy valvular cells become dysfunctional and begin to produce bone nodules in the aortic heart valves. This hard tissue build up stiffens the valve and restricts blood flow to the rest of the body, limiting a patient’s quality of life, eventually leading to death.

Dirk and her team will investigate physical and chemical factors that influence the behavior of these heart valve cells to learn more about how to promote healthy cell and tissue growth.

By learning more about the characteristics of healthy cells and their response to local environmental cues, better treatment for those with the disease could emerge.In addition to the research component, the grant will also fund extensive community outreach to budding scientists and engineers in New Mexico.

The grant will support a variety of programs focusing on increasing problem-based learning techniques for Albuquerque Public Schools. Dirk and her graduate and undergraduate students will develop programs that educate K-12 students and their teachers about biomedical engineering through classroom visits, lab tours, mentoring, and internships. A special focus will be on Title I schools that serve primarily underrepresented groups, as well as the nex+Gen Academy, a magnet high school that focuses on problem-based learning.

The program will enable four science teachers to work in Dirk’s lab in the Center for Biomedical Engineering each summer, learning about biomedical engineering so that the teachers can bring what they learn back to their students. In collaboration with Dirk, APS teachers will perform research as well as develop new classroom curriculum that can be shared throughout the school system.

At the college level, Dirk will be involved heavily in the creation of a Ph.D.-level track in the Biomedical Engineering graduate program focusing on biomechanics, biomaterials, and tissue engineering. She will be developing a new course, Tissue Engineering, to support this effort. This program will be the first university program with this focus in the state.

Heart of the Matter

Elizabeth Dirk and members of her team

A closer look at the Great Wall of China reveals that it has wide structural gaps where it can be breached. It turns out that the GFW has holes in it, too.

That’s the latest finding by Jed Crandall, associate professor of computer science, and a team of researchers from UNM and the Tor Project, led by UNM computer science graduate student Roya Ensafi. Crandall has been studying the GFW and Chinese censorship efforts for years. “We’re interested in China because they’re technological leaders and they have the most Internet users in the world,” he explains.

Building a firewall to control Internet usage for hundreds of millions of users is a challenge considering that hundreds of gigabits flow through the GFW every second. Crandall speculates that the volume of Internet traffic in China occasionally overloads the GFW’s capacity allowing some packets to get through without being reviewed. “In our research, .5% of the time, a client in

China can talk to a banned server outside the country,” explains Crandall.

To test the GFW for holes, the UNM team used a novel side channel interference technique to test standard TCP/IP protocol. The protocol is essentially a “three-way handshake” where two machines on the Internet conduct a three-step process to connect. If censorship is present on one side, the third step of the process is never completed.

Working remotely using a computer based in New Mexico, the UNM team pretended to be a computer in China repeatedly trying to access censored servers elsewhere in the world. By measuring the responses they received to their requests, the team was able to infer whether censorship occurred between certain IP addresses.

Findings from the research will help U.S. policymakers understand the future of censorship. “This research tells us what policies we might pursue that would fight Internet censorship most effectively,” explains Crandall. “For instance, should we look at sanctions or ask companies not to sell firewall equipment to some countries? Should we have international governance over Internet policies?”

While Internet censorship spreads to countries in Africa, South America, and Asia, Internet surveillance is also on the rise. And that’s where Crandall and his team are turning their attention next, using their expertise and computer science to see who’s watching as the Internet continues to expand and connect the world.

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POKING HOLESPOKING HOLES IN THE WALL

The Great Wall of China, built over centuries, was designed to guard the vast country against intruders. Its modern-day equivalent, the Great Firewall of China (GFW), is a national-scale censorship and surveillance system that controls the information Chinese citizens can access online.

By Megan Fleming

U N M E n g i n e e r i n g 2 0 1 4

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At the CREST By Megan Fleming

In March, the Center for Water and the Environment, an interdisciplinary research center created by the School of Engineering, received a five-year, $5 million Centers of Research Excellence in Science and Technology (CREST) award from the National Science Foundation.

The Center will bring academics in engineering, economics, chemistry, biology, law and community and regional planning together to research technologic solutions to problems with water and the environment. The CREST award funds research opportunities for the center’s faculty as well as graduate and doctoral students. And the grant supports outreach to involve more K-12 students in STEM fields.

CREST NowCreating the WAVEEngineering students are building the Water Activity Vehicle and Experience (WAVE), a trailer-mounted demonstration unit that will give kids at schools, camps, and community events the chance to try water and erosion related experiments.

Supporting StudentsUNM Engineering graduate students (like civil engineering graduate student Cameron Harrington, right) are helping principal investigators advance their research by identifying watershed study sites in the Valles Caldera and conducting experiments on silica removal to prevent reverse osmosis membrane fouling.

CREST NextA dual-enrollment course for high school students that combines water engineering and sustainability classes starts in Spring 2015.

Summer field classes for incoming freshmen and transfer students start next summer.

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C r e a t i n g S t r o n g e r C o n n e c t i o n s

Built in the 1960s, the NDC connects to arroyos that collect storm water from almost 90 square miles of northeast Albuquerque. The water funnels into a straight channel along I-25, then makes a 90-degree bend before slowing and spreading out into a wide wetland and flowing into the Rio Grande River.

The NDC was designed to convey flows up to 44,000 cubic feet per second (CFS) although the highest flow recorded in 50 years was 12,000 CFS. That flow created a standing wave upstream from the railroad bridge that raised the water elevation dangerously close to the bottom of the bridge. Engineers estimated that a flow of 14,000 CFS could destabilize the bridge used by freight and passenger trains every day.

“If we had a good monsoon storm, it could happen. The threat to the bridge is very real,” explains Bruce Thomson, Professor Emeritus in the Department of Civil Engineering and District 5 Director of the Albuquerque Metropolitan Arroyo Flood Control Authority (AMAFCA).

A strategy to avert this catastrophe was identified and is now being implemented, thanks to innovative thinking, hard

The railroad bridge that runs across Albuquerque’s North Diversion Channel (NDC) was a bridge over troubled water. Literally. By Megan Fleming

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U N M E n g i n e e r i n g 2 0 1 4

work — and a large hydraulic model. AMAFCA engineers developed solutions to the problem, then turned to the Hydraulics Research Lab in UNM’s Department of Civil Engineering to test them.

“The hydraulics of the problem were just too complicated to be solved with computer models, so we built a scale model to study it,” explains Thomson.

Adrienne Martinez (’11 CE, MSCE ‘14), AMAFCA’s very first intern, worked with other collaborators to build the working 1:84 scale model of the NDC as part of her graduate research. The project combined two of her passions.

“I wanted to work in a field that allowed me to help others and civil engineering focuses on finding solutions to problems involving people and their communities,” explains Martinez. “I’m also interested in all aspects of water and how it affects people. I love storm water!”

The primary purpose of Martinez’s work was to evaluate the hydraulic effects of proposed improvements to the end of the concrete channel. Her goal was to ensure they would not only lower the water level in the channel and protect the bridge upstream, but also make channel maintenance easier.

Professor Emeritus BRUCE THOMPSON and ADRIENNE MARTINEZ stand in front of the North Diversion Channel and the threatened rail bridge.

Martinez modeled downstream structures to evaluate ways of capturing debris and floatable trash before it went into the Rio Grande. She also modeled a new road across the basin to give maintenance crews easy access to the area. The model stretched about 50 feet down the length of the lab and was connected to a pump capable of pumping over 2,000 gallons per minute. To test water flows accurately in the model, Martinez and AMAFCA engineers reconfigured the piping system to convey the water into the model at the proper angle and rate.

Martinez spent more than five months building the model to reflect the NDC’s original design. Once it was complete, Martinez used the model to validate current conditions.

“From an engineering perspective, one of the coolest things was that the model reflected the channel as it existed and we could demonstrate where the standing wave occurred in the field,” Thomson says. “That gave us confidence that the model was accurate.”

Then Martinez reconfigured the channel geometry to improve its hydraulics. Debris fences were added downstream in the wetland to capture trash carried by the storm water. Then she ran different flow rates through the model of the channel improvements to simulate channel flows up to the design capacity of 44,000 CFS. In all cases, the system performed as intended; there was adequate capacity under the bridges, especially the railroad bridge.

Martinez used the model to demonstrate the improved hydraulics first to AMAFCA engineers then to the staff at the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers who had to approve the proposed modifications. Finally, she showed the model to engineering firms who subsequently submitted bids to AMAFCA to implement the modifications.

Now that the channel has been improved, the standing wave has been lowered and the railroad bridge is out of harm’s way. Having served its purpose, the model is gone too, which is fine by Martinez.

“I’ve had the opportunity to combine what I learned in school with my desire to help improve the lives of others.

The NDC model project is the most recent of a 20-year sequence of studies in the Hydraulics Research Lab performed for AMAFCA and other clients. The lab, the only one of its size and capabilities in New Mexico, has gained UNM and AMAFCA considerable recognition. And the model earned Martinez a job. One of the companies that saw the model was so impressed that they hired her. Today, she’s busy continuing to work on storm water problems to protect her community.

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C r e a t i n g S t r o n g e r C o n n e c t i o n s

Transitions Keeping up with the people in the School of Engineering

Two becomes oneOn July 1, the Department of Chemical and Nuclear Engineering became two departments — the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering and the Department of Nuclear Engineering. It is anticipated that the change will allow each department to develop stronger recognition and reputation, which should have positive impacts on student enrollment, faculty recruitment, and overall strength and quality of the programs. Anil K. Prinja, professor of nuclear engineering, is the inaugural interim chair of the Department of Nuclear Engineering. Distinguished Professor Abhaya K. Datye is the inaugural chair of the new Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering. The Department of Chemical and Nuclear Engineering was formed in 1972, when the chemical engineering undergraduate program and the nuclear engineering graduate program were combined due to their small size. However, both programs have grown and evolved significantly in the last 40 years and both offer degrees at the bachelor’s, master’s and Ph.D. levels. UNM’s Department of Nuclear Engineering is the only nuclear engineering program in New Mexico and one of only a handful in the western United States that offers bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degrees.____________________________________________________________________________________________________

New leader for CivilMahmoud Reda Taha, a professor and Regents’ Lecturer of civil engineering, became chair of the Department of Civil Engineering, effective July 1, 2014. Taha’s research is focused on crossing the gap between structural and materials engineering for integrating nanotechnology, structural health monitoring and uncertainty quantification to develop resilient infrastructure systems. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________

New facultyFrancesca Cavallo joined the school as an assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering. She comes to UNM from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where she was a scientist the Department of Materials Science and Engineering.

Mehran Tehrani joined the School of Engineering as an assistant professor of mechanical engineering. He received his Ph.D. in engineering mechanics from

Virginia Tech in December 2012. He is also the co-founder of Nanospin Incorporated.

Fernando Garzon joined the School of Engineering as professor of chemical and biological engineering. He is a joint hire between UNM and Sandia National Laboratories in materials science and engineering. Garzon’s research focus includes fuel cell materials, energy storage technology, and high-temperature materials and devices. Garzon holds the position of joint university faculty research scientist at Sandia and is a distinguished member of Sandia’s technical staff. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________

RetiringSteve Brueck, former director of the Center for High Technology Materials who holds distinguished professorships in both electrical and computer engineering, and physics and astronomy; Juan Heinrich, professor of mechanical engineering and former chair of the department; and Tim Ward, chair and professor of chemical and nuclear engineering, retired at the end of the 2013-14 academic year.

____________________________________________________________________________________________________

Distinguished Plamen B. Atanassov, professor of chemical and biological engineering and former director of the Center for Emerging Energy Technologies, and Edl Schamiloglu, professor of electrical and computer engineering and director of the School of Engineering’s COSMIAC center, have been promoted to distinguished professors.

Juan Heinrich, Tim Ward, Steve Brueck

FacultyDistinguished Professor of Electrical Engineering and Physics Steve Brueck and Emeritus Professor of Computer Science Cleve Moler received the first UNM Presidential Awards of Distinction at the UNM commencement in December 2013.

The new award is one of the university’s most prestigious. Brueck was honored for nearly 30 years of leadership and service to UNM in creating the internationally recognized research at the Center for High Technology Materials in the areas of photonics, nanotechnology, and microelectronics. He has more than 400 refereed publications, has presented more than 230 invited papers and seminars, and holds 49 U.S. patents. Moler has had a distinguished career in both academia and the private sector. He created MATLAB as an aid for his students at UNM and then developed it into the main product for MathWorks, a company that now employs more than 2,800 people around the world. MATLAB was considered revolutionary because it made computational experiments so much easier than prior software.____________________________________________________________________________________________________

Plamen B. Atanassov received the 2014 STC.UNM Innovation Fellow Award in recognition of his achievements as one of the University of New Mexico’s leading innovators. Atanassov is a professor of chemical and biological engineering and director of the Center for Emerging Energy Technologies. This award is presented each year by the STC.UNM Board of Directors to a university faculty inventor whose body of technologies has made a significant social and economic impact on society and the marketplace.

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Abhaya K. Datye, Distinguished Professor of Chemical and Nuclear Engineering and chair of the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, has been elected a fellow of the Microscopy Society of America. The designation of fellow is intended to recognize distinguished members of the society who have made significant contributions to the advancement of the science and practice of microscopy imaging, analysis, and diffraction techniques.

StudentsAlan Kuntz, who received a bachelor of science degree in computer science in May, received a finalist award (third place) in the 2014 Computing Research Association Undergraduate Researcher Award competition. In 2013, Kuntz received an Honorable Mention from the same competition. While at UNM, he worked with Assistant Professor of Computer Science Lydia Tapia on molecular aggregation simulation and analysis. Kuntz was the undergraduate student speaker at the Spring 2014 School of Engineering Convocation. He is now pursuing a Ph.D. in computer science at the University of North Carolina.____________________________________________________________________________________________________

Dorca Lee, a Ph.D. student in Rafael Fierro’s robotics lab in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, won a graduate research fellowship from the New Mexico Space Grant Consortium. The awards are made to graduate students to work with faculty on funded research at the level of $10,000 for two academic semesters. Scholarships are competitively awarded based on the student’s research project, its alignment to NASA, faculty recommendation, and the student’s GPA. Awarded students are required to present their research results, either at a research colloquium, conference, or journal paper.

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Tye Martin, a research assistant and doctoral student at the Center for Biomedical Engineering, and Michael Workman, a master’s student in chemical and biological engineering, received National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowships. They were among four total recipients at UNM.

Martin is in the BME program, and Michael Workman is in the nanoscience and microsystems program. The program recognizes and supports outstanding graduate students in NSF-supported science, technology, engineering, and mathematics disciplines who are pursuing research-based master’s and doctoral degrees at accredited U.S. institutions. Recipients receive three years of support, a $32,000 yearly stipend and a $12,000 cost-of-education allowance to the institution.

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U N M E n g i n e e r i n g 2 0 1 4

Achievements Giving kudos to our faculty and students

By Kim Delker

The University of New Mexico and PNM are in the final implementation stage of an innovative pilot project designed to help businesses that own distributed energy resources — like solar panels or fossil fuel plants — optimize their energy usage and save money.

The project works through a scheduling system that increases or decreases energy usage automatically using complex data including weather, time of day and many other factors. The research team estimates that participating businesses will save between 10 and 20 percent on utility costs.

Under the guidance of Andrea Mammoli, director of the UNM Center for Emerging Energy Technologies, three master’s degree students in engineering — Matthew Robinson, Sloan Pearsall and Leila Ghanbari —  are directing the Cloud-based Energy Resource Scheduling (CERES) initiative, funded by a $250,000 PNM grant to the UNM Foundation.

The funds are enabling the students to set up and monitor the Distributed Energy Resource – Customer Adoption Model (DER-CAM) cloud-based service in several New Mexico businesses. DER-CAM was developed at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and is designed to optimize

energy management at advanced business facilities that own distributed energy resources while still connected to the public utility grid. Examples of distributed generation include solar panels, fossil fuel plants, or other resources to produce power or store energy for individual homes or businesses while connected to the grid.

“This project addresses opportunities that are critically important to PNM and the community as a whole — expanding the use of renewable energy resources, promoting energy efficiency, and preparing students for the high-tech jobs of the future,” said Pat Vincent-Collawn, PNM chairman, president and CEO. “It is another great example of how the business community can and should partner with the state’s research universities to support student success and help build sustainable economic growth.”

Beginning in spring 2013, the UNM research team and PNM worked together to recruit a variety of businesses that use power at different times of the day and in different ways to ensure collection of data to assess energy use patterns that form part of the input for the operations optimization procedure.

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U N M E N G I N E E R S , P N M H E L P B U S I N E S S E S M A N A G E E N E R G Y U S E

“The impact is to show

a system like this —

a scheduling service —

is an inexpensive way

to schedule distributed

resources,” Mammoli

said. “We’re actually

solving a very complex

mathematical problem.

Our contribution has

been to streamline

delivery of the

optimization from the

central site to the client.

We’re putting in the

technology that allows a

business model to work.”

a winning team

ArduinoMicrocontroller

505-277-0664

Ways to give backThe School of Engineering is changing the world every day through breakthrough research and discoveries. But it’s not just us making an impact. You play a vital part, too, in helping us continue our innovation.

Here are just a few ways your support matters: Undergraduate scholarships Named endowments that live on in perpetuity Special giving opportunities focusing on academic excellence Estate gifts

A gift to the School of Engineering Fund for Academic Excellence is a great way to ensure that your support goes where it is needed the most in the school. Giving directly to a specific department or to a specific need — such as the Formula SAE Team — is also another good option that helps students.

Giving online is easyYou can explore the various funds in Engineering at www.unmfund.org/fund-category/school-of-engineering

Contact the School of EngineeringDevelopment Office to learn more abouthow you can make a lasting impact.

The 2014 FSAE team placed 11th overall in international competition.

The Run Nerds Run! 5K in September 2014 raised funds for student scholarships

An important component of the project is obtaining better data concerning distributed energy resources — electric generation located on-site rather than at large, centralized locations. Solar energy is the most common type of distributed energy for businesses. Currently, only a small number of businesses use distributed energy resources for electricity and still rely primarily on utility-supplied power. However, this is predicted to change rapidly over the next several years as the cost of distributed energy resources such as solar generation declines.

The CERES program is a cloud-based service linked to buildings and facilities using distributed energy resources. The system schedules the operation of these resources to achieve the maximum benefit, minimizing costs and emissions and optimizing the benefits of heating and cooling.

Although data are yet to be analyzed, Mammoli said he is pleased with the progress the team has made on the project, which includes saving a significant amount of money through the use of $30 microcontrollers known as Raspberry Pi and Arduino instead of pricey prepackaged software as had been done on previous pilots.

“The thing that I’m most happy about is how far the students have come,” he said. “They basically turned a system that when we did it here at UNM cost $20,000 to implement and cut the cost for the same thing to less than $1,000.”

And the impact goes far beyond this project —  hopefully directly to customers.

U N M E n g i n e e r i n g 2 0 1 4

With four UNM degrees under his belt, Scott Lovald is far from finished learning. In fact, with entrepreneurial fire in his belly and curiosityin his bones, he’s just getting started.

C r e a t i n g S t r o n g e r C o n n e c t i o n s

a rising star

By Kim Delker

Growing up in Pierre, South Dakota, Scott Lovald thought of himself as a bit unfocused.

“I would say I was lost in my youth,” he said. “I didn’t know what I wanted to do.”

However, he always enjoyed fixing things and wanting to know how things work. When he found out about the Amigo Scholarship (which offers qualified out-of-state students an in-state tuition rate) he jumped at the chance to attend the University of New Mexico and try his hand at engineering.

After completing his bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering, Lovald was still a bit adrift, not knowing what his future held. As an undergraduate, he met Tariq Khraishi, an associate professor of mechanical engineering. Sensing that Lovald needed to be challenged, Khraishi offered him a chance to do a master’s degree under his supervision.

It was in graduate school that Lovald began to thrive. Lovald worked with Khraishi in the manufacturing engineering program, funded by a graduate fellowship from Stryker Leibinger, a medical implant manufacturer.

His experience was eye-opening. He discovered not just a true love for engineering, but also for business. Enjoying his work in researching and developing medical products, he decided to simultaneously pursue an MBA to learn more about the business side. He earned both degrees in 2006.

He was able to put that business knowledge to work right away. In spring 2006, he and a partner entered the UNM Business Plan Competition with an idea for a company that would design and market more stable, less intrusive orthopedic implants. They won the competition and more than $40,000 from UNM and other competitions around the country, which they used to start their company, Satryne Medical. They eventually developed multiple products, some of which were patented, cleared with the FDA, and brought to market in the U.S.

Lovald continued on to earn his Ph.D. in mechanical engineering in 2008, then joined Exponent, a scientific and engineering consulting firm with multiple offices internationally.

Lovald describes what he does succinctly: “I help companies make better medical devices, make sure they perform well and are FDA-compliant.”

Lovald enjoys his work at Exponent because it requires him to continually research new industries and applications. That often involves a lot of homework on how different body parts or processes work.

He said he could see himself making a change in the future — one that could involve either restarting something similar to his old business (he maintains ownership of a patented orthopaedic trauma product line) or moving in a new direction. He recently co-authored his first textbook, Orthopaedic Biomaterials in Research and Practice.

It seems the more Lovald does, the more he’s inspired to do.

“There’s always more to learn,” he said.

B O O K

P U B L I S H E D A B S T R AC T S A N D PRESENTATIONS

A R T I C L E S

DE G R E E S

U.S. PAT E N T NO.

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In August 2013, Jane Lehr became chair of the Department of Electrical and Computer

Engineering at UNM — the first woman to head that department in its history. The New York City

native worked in industry and then at the Air Force Research Laboratory before joining Sandia National Laboratories, where she was a researcher for 12 years. In addition to being chair, she is continuing her research in pulsed power and high-powered electromagnetics. Here, she reflects on the state of women in STEM fields and her goals for the department.

F I V E F O R Jane Lehr

What attracted you to the field of engineering?When I was in high school, I really liked physics. I worked in an office in Manhattan at the music publisher ASCAP as an accounts receivable clerk. I’d already mastered the job as a summer hire, and knew I would need a more challenging job. For college, I did not want an education as much as I wanted a profession. Since I don’t like blood and don’t like to argue, I decided to become an engineer.

Switching from industry/government to academia, what have been some of the biggest differences you’ve seen?In academia, it’s a lot more personal, and if you have the time and can get funding, you can research it. When you work for a place like Sandia, even though they are doing research and the problems are very interesting, you’re told which problems need to be solved. In academia, it’s very student-centric. I find that very appealing.

As a new department chair, what are some of your goals for ECE?A big goal is to get the word out on all the wonderful things going on now. But then there’s a whole other part of looking toward strategic hiring and how we want to advance our program. One of the big things we’ve been focused on is undergraduate education and making sure we’re meeting the needs of the students and the community.

What do you think is needed to attract more females into STEM careers?There needs to be a major change in the way we market engineering. Women are a lot less motivated by money than they are by taking care of people. I think if we can start marketing that, ‘Hey, engineering creates a better world,’ that is something that appeals to women. Another aspect is the perception of the ‘geeky-looking woman in a lab coat with no social skills and no personal life’ as the engineer. No matter how old or how young, women want to be attractive.

What are you most proud of in your career?I’m most proud of the way I’ve integrated my personal life with my professional life. I homeschooled my son (now 19) for five years, and I ran six experiments simultaneously while telecommuting at Sandia. Whenever there was an obstacle, I found a way to overcome it and keep going. But I haven’t sacrificed my personal life to get there. I think the ability to solve problems is something I really bring to the chair position.

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NO TA B L E S

Fellow of the Institute for Electrical and

Electronic Engineers

Air Force Basic Research Award

IEEE Region 6 Award for Leadership of the Albuquerque Chapter

Outstanding Woman of New Mexico

New Mexico Hall of Fame

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2014

2004A Decade and CountingSince our first issue in Spring 2004, UNM Engineering has highlighted some of our greatest achievements. From microfluidics, computer security, technology commercialization, economic development, and water research, the decade has seen an evolution of technology — and our magazine look has evolved as well. Thanks for reading, and here’s to another great decade!

School of EngineeringMSC01-11401 University of New MexicoAlbuquerque, NM 87131-0001

T H E U N I V E R S I T Y O F N E W M E X I C O

School of EngineeringMSC01-11401 University of New MexicoAlbuquerque, NM 87131-0001

C E L E B R A T I N G 1 0 Y E A R S O F U N M E N G I N E E R I N G