MAE Highlights

Endowed Chairs

September 5, 2023

Celebrating Excellence: Endowed Chairs in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering

The Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering takes pride in its exceptional faculty, which features three esteemed endowed chairs: Professor Carlos Coimbra, Professor Farhat Beg, and Professor Jorge Cortes, each with over a decade of dedicated service.


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June 15, 2023

In Memoriam: Professor Emeritus Alan M. Schneider

University of California, San Diego engineering professor emeritus Alan M. Schneider passed away on February 23rd, 2022, five days short of his 97th birthday.


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March 17, 2023

In Memoriam: Professor Emeritus Robert E. Skelton

It is with sorrow that we announce the passing of Professor Emeritus Robert (Bob) Eugene Skelton, a member of the National Academy of Engineering and recognized as the principal pioneer in the field of tensegrity, on Feb. 15, 2023, in Fairhope, Alabama. He was 84. 

The breadth and depth of Skelton’s impact and his contributions in the field of tensegrity are extensive, ranging from art, to architecture, to biology, physics and medicine, as well as to the building of bridges, large telescopes, space structures, and efficient-wave energy conversion systems in the ocean.


James Friend

September 14, 2022

Jacobs School faculty, lecturers named Distinguished Teachers

James Friend, a professor in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, and Joe Gibbs Politz, an assistant teaching professor in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering, received Distinguished Teaching Awards for Senate Members. Katya Evdokimenko, a lecturer in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, received a Barbara and Paul Saltman Distinguished Teaching Award, Non-Senate Members.


Markenscoff

June 30, 2022

Distinguished Professor Emerita and Recalled Professor Xanthippi Markenscoff is awarded a Doctor honoris causa degree from the National Technical University of Athens, Greece

Distinguished Professor Emerita and Recalled Professor Xanthippi Markenscoff is awarded on June 30, 2022, a Doctor honoris causa degree and the Gold Medal from the National Technical University of Athens, Greece, her alma mater. This is the first honorary degree awarded in the field of Mechanics by the NTUA. In the photograph she is with the Rector of the NTUA and the Dean of the School of Applied Mathematics, Physics and Mechanics.


March 4, 2022

New Undergraduate Program Video

Please check out our new MAE Undergraduate Program video!


6 UCSD Experts elected AAAS Fellows

January 26, 2022

Six UC San Diego Experts Elected AAAS Fellows in 2021

Six researchers and leaders at the University of California San Diego have been named Fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the largest general science organization in the world and publisher of the journal Science.

Dr. Gary Firestein, Olivia Graeve, Michael Kalichman, Y. Shirley Meng, Dr. Victor Nizet and Brian Palenik will join 564 other scientists and physicians across the country recognized this year for work deemed scientifically or socially distinguished, advancing science or its applications.


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January 24, 2022

In Memoriam: Professor Emeritus Paul A. Libby

It is with great sadness that we announce the passing of Professor Emeritus Paul A. Libby, from the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at the University of California San Diego, passed away on Nov. 2, 2021, at the age of 100 in La Jolla, Calif. An international expert in turbulence and combustion, Libby was recruited in 1964 by Professor Stanford “Sol” Penner as one of 10 founding faculty members of the Department of Applied Mechanics and Engineering Science (AMES) at the newly formed campus in La Jolla.