Department of Mechanical Engineering

Assistant professor of mechanical engineering Jason Rabinovitch has been selected as one of six scientists to serve on the newly established Venus Science Coordination group (VeSCoor).

A joint committee of both the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and the European Space Agency (ESA), VeSCoor will identify and recommend novel scientific approaches and investigations that might occur over the course of multiple future missions to Venus, thereby enhancing their overall scientific return.

The three missions to Venus in development — VERITAS, DAVINCI, and EnVision — will investigate the topography, geology, atmosphere, climate, activity and history of the planet. These missions are scheduled to launch between 2029 and 2032.

An independent entity, the five-year coordination group will support these missions and foster dialogue within the broader Venus scientific community. Group members were nominated and selected based on individual expertise, subject matter knowledge, and current and past professional contributions.

An expert in aeronautics and fluid mechanics, Rabinovitch served as a mechanical engineer and faculty fellow at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, where he contributed to recent missions to Mars and to future exploration of Saturn’s moon Enceladus.

Associate professor of mechanical engineering Nick Parziale has been awarded a four-year, $952,915 grant through the Office of Naval Research (ONR) to study “Turbulence Quantities in Supersonic and Hypersonic Flows.”

The ONR grant focuses on the chaos of the turbulent boundary layer, the 0.040-inch flow of gas near a high-speed vehicle. Parziale and his team will be making high-quality measurements of the turbulence in air flows surrounding vehicles traveling at supersonic and hypersonic speeds, using a hollow-cylinder flare and a flat plate in the ONR-funded, 60-foot hypersonic Mach 6 shock tunnel that they designed several years ago. These simple objects will be measured at various angles and at various speeds as the team measures pressure, heat transfer, friction drag and current velocity. This data will serve as a comprehensive reference for high-speed turbulence computations.

Two Ph.D. students will participate as research assistants, and undergraduate students will be invited to participate through the department’s summer undergraduate research fellowship, the Stevens Pinnacle Scholars program and the National Science Foundation Research Experiences for Undergraduates program.

Professor Eui-Hyeok Yang was recently named Distinguished Lecturer of the IEEE Sensors Council for the period of 2023-2025. Among several outstanding candidates, Yang was selected based upon his academic reputation, expertise, and insights into the future of sensor technology.

Yang’s experience with the world-renowned engineering organization is extensive. It includes his work as an editor of the IEEE Sensors Journal, his service on professional committees and as chair of several professional events. For his technical contributions to the scientific and engineering communities, he was awarded, among other honors, the Lew Allen Award for Excellence at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in 2003, and the IEEE Technical Achievement Award (Advanced Career) from the IEEE Sensors Council in 2020. Yang is a Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors, and a Fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers.

Yang is a prolific researcher who has brought $10 million in grant funding to Stevens. He has authored seven book chapters and served as editor-in-chief of an entire book, and has published more than 100 research articles in peer-reviewed journals. Additionally, he has given more than 150 conference presentations, and another 100 keynote and invited conference/workshop and seminar presentations.

Yang’s current research focuses on advanced quantum materials and sensing, which find critical applications in nanoscale sensors, spintronic memories, and spin photovoltaics.

Brendan Englot, Associate Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, was recently appointed as Director of the Stevens Institute for Artificial Intelligence (SIAI). The Stevens Institute for Artificial Intelligence (SIAI) is an interdisciplinary, tech-driven collaboration of engineering, business, systems and design experts working toward solving pressing global problems in industry and the world. As director, Englot will, in coordination with SIAI’s steering committee, set the agenda and vision for SIAI, and further develop and grow the research enterprise as well as its educational programs.

Englot's research through the Robust Field Autonomy Lab focuses on designing perception and decision-making algorithms, optimization methods, and control systems that help mobile robots achieve robust autonomy in complex physical environments.

Englot has received several prestigious young investigator awards, including the NSF CAREER (2017) and ONR YIP (2020). He has also been serving as Geoffrey S. Inman Junior Professor since August 2018, an appointment that recognizes the excellence in his scholarly activities and quality of teaching, as well as his significant contributions to Stevens and his field of expertise.