DETROIT (Feb. 28, 2014) – Maria Guido, a mechanical engineering junior and president of the Engineering Student Faculty Board (ESFB), is interested in pursuing a career in hybrid vehicles. She’s also interested in aviation. And architecture. With her education in mechanical engineering, Guido is preparing for all three and keeping her options open.

	Guido poses with Associate Dean of Academic Affairs and Student Services Darin Ellis at the College of Engineering's 2013 Honors Convocation. Guido received the Dean's List award, Tau Beta Pi's Outstanding Freshman/Sophomore Award, and the W.F. Letts Memorial Endowed Scholarship.

“I first became interested in mechanical engineering when I saw the jet engines at the Henry Ford Museum,” says Guido. “I thought the machinery looked amazing and I wanted to know how they worked.”

Fueled by this interest, Guido decided to pursue a degree in mechanical engineering. She is currently getting hands-on engineering experience through a work study program at Ford Motor Company. Guido is working on hybrid vehicles as an electrified powertrain systems engineer, an area she says she can see herself working in someday. In addition to engineering, Guido is also minoring in art and might incorporate that into her career.

“I took fine arts classes all throughout high school and went to a life drawing camp at the University of Michigan Ann Arbor,” says Guido. “I might go the route of industrial design or architecture once I graduate.”

Adding to her work and academic schedule, Guido also choreographs contemporary dance and practices pointe, ballet, jazz and tap. Additionally, she belongs to Tau Beta Pi and the Society of Women Engineers. This busy schedule may sound daunting, but Guido says she embraces the challenges as important learning experiences.

Whatever Guido chooses to pursue, she says her experiences at the Wayne State College of Engineering have prepared her.

“My most valuable experience at the College of Engineering has been working as hard as I can in a class but not getting the grade I wanted,” says Guido. “This reinforced the idea that as long as you work as hard as you can, that's all that matters. This is what I do in all aspects of my life. I do the best I can and am satisfied with the outcome. As long as you do what you can and are completely honest about it, that's the most important lesson you can learn.”

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Wayne State University is a premier urban research institution of higher education offering 370 academic programs through 13 schools and colleges to nearly 28,000 students. For more information about engineering at Wayne State University, visit engineering.wayne.edu.

DETROIT (March 7, 2014) — While Mother Nature continues to challenge drivers across the country, a team of traffic engineers is working hard on a new way to make rush-hour commutes safer and faster in any weather.

“We can’t do much about snow falling, but we can do something about road capacity and congestion,” said Joseph Hummer, traffic engineering expert and Wayne State University College of Engineering chair of civil and environmental engineering.

Hummer and a team of traffic engineers at the Regional Transportation Alliance and North Carolina State University believe metered roundabouts, or “super circles,” could help safety and ease traffic congestion across the United States. According to the team’s research, explained in a paper titled “The Potential for Metering to Help Roundabouts Manage Peak Period Demands in the U.S.,” super circles are common in Australia and England, but have yet to be researched or implemented in the U.S. The research team built and tested a mathematical model of traffic flow through super circles.

Roundabouts — such as those at 25 Mile Road at Hayes Road in Macomb County and M-5 at Pontiac Trail in Oakland County — have been implemented in the United States for some time. Hummer says when built correctly they are 30 to 40 percent safer than traditional signalized intersections and offer a 60 percent injury savings. 

“The one classic dilemma with roundabouts, though, is that some have capacity issues during peak hours. Once they break down, they get ugly and lock up. Our research was trying to find a way to get the safety benefits of a traditional roundabout while creating a capacity treatment for the peak hours of the day,” he says. 

A "super circle" involves adding a stop light to one approach of a roundabout to control the number of vehicles entering during rush hours. "The meter would only operate during peak hours and would free up space in the circle for the busiest traffic streams to enter,” he says.  The rest of the day, with the meter turned off, the roundabout would do its job saving collisions.
Here in Michigan, Hummer can envision utilizing super circles in a number of places.

“Michigan is really well suited to metered roundabouts. I could find hundreds of places of these in Metro Detroit alone at the junctions of the mile roads,” says Hummer. “They aren’t suitable for the huge arterials like Woodward, Gratiot or 8 Mile, but would work almost anywhere you have two, two-lane roads meet at a traffic signal.”

According to Hummer, a modern roundabout costs, on average, $250,000 while the cost to society for a fatal collision or injury collision averages around $4 million and $100,000, respectively. 

“The super circles wouldn’t have to be out there too long to justify costs, at least on a societal basis. But the biggest benefit from all would be the lives and injuries saved,” he says.

Hummer and the team members, who now aim for field studies and a more microscopic analysis, presented their research at the Transportation Research Board (TRB) Annual Meeting, held Jan. 12 to 16 in Washington, D.C. The team’s paper has been accepted for publication in Transportation Research Record. 

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Wayne State University is a premier urban research institution of higher education offering 370 academic programs through 13 schools and colleges to nearly 28,000 students. For more information about engineering at Wayne State University, visit engineering.wayne.edu.

DETROIT (March 7, 2014) – Wayne State University College of Engineering alumnae Kesho Leach, BS ChE ’02, and Frenae Smith, BS ChE ’05, MS ChE ’10, are encouraging young women to pursue careers in STEM through their involvement in the Society of Women Engineers (SWE) Detroit Section and its Girls Engineering Exploration (GEE) event, to be held March 8 on Wayne State’s campus.

	Frenae Smith
	Kesho Leach

“The purpose of GEE is to expose middle school-aged, inner city girls to engineering and science,” says Smith, who works at DTE Energy Gas Operations as a supervisor in Codes and Standards and is co-chair of the parent/teacher session at GEE.

During the free, day-long event, girls will participate in interactive demonstrations and hands-on activities while their parents and teachers receive information about educational opportunities available for students, such as STEM summer programs. The girls — who are nominated by their teachers for outstanding achievement in the classroom and leadership — will each be given a T-shirt and backpack full of school supplies.

“Studies have shown that the STEM areas are underrepresented by women and minorities,” says Leach, who work as a chemist at Axalta Coating Systems (formerly DuPont) and is chair of the Food Planning Committee for GEE. “The goal of the GEE program is to shift these studies in a positive direction by incorporating hands-on experiments, live demonstrations and team building activities."

Smith and Leach say their own experiences with female mentors inspired them to pursue careers in engineering and drove them to encourage other young women to pursue STEM careers. Many of their relationships with mentors were forged at Wayne State.

“I found female mentorship through my high school biology and chemistry teachers; the Wayne State co-op program; college professors; and student organizations such as SWE, the American Institute of Chemical Engineers and the National Society of Black Engineers,” says Smith.

Leach also has several female mentors in her life, including her mother and her eighth grade science teacher. She is currently pursuing a master’s in material science at Wayne State and counts Michele Grimm, interim director of Wayne State University’s Transfer Student Success Center and associate professor of biomedical engineering, and Guangzhao Mao, professor of chemical engineering and materials science, as mentors.

“I truly believe the education and faculty at Wayne State have made a great difference in where I am today,” says Leach.

Through SWE-Detroit and the GEE event, Leach and Smith hope to continue the tradition of inspiring other young women to explore careers in STEM.

“I believe it is important for practicing engineers to encourage young women to explore STEM careers,” says Leach. “The position that you hold at your company is a beacon to others who are wondering if they can pursue this career. You are showing them that it’s possible to reach goals and make your dreams come true. I have been privileged to speak with children at various outreach programs about my career path and explain the chemistries behind the hands-on activities; you can see their eyes light up and they become empowered. I encourage other professionals to become part of outreach programs and make a difference in a child’s life.”

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Wayne State University is a premier urban research institution of higher education offering 370 academic programs through 13 schools and colleges to nearly 28,000 students. For more information about engineering at Wayne State University, visit engineering.wayne.edu.

DETROIT (Jan. 29, 2014) – Big data is the key enabler for the next wave of innovation and growth across all sectors, and Wayne State University’s Big Data and Business Analytics Group is ready to help business and information technology executives, decision makers and marketing professionals learn how to use big data to take action, seize new growth opportunities and make their organizations more efficient.

The group—made up of renowned experts dedicated to solving real-life business problems in collaboration with regional industry—will host its Big Data and Business Analytics Symposium: From Analytics to Action on Wednesday, March 26 at Wayne State’s McGregor Memorial Conference Center.

The symposium will focus on pragmatic issues faced while deploying big data strategies to drive business success. It will have a special focus on managing and analyzing the data captured through product development, manufacturing, distribution, marketing, sales and service in a global setting.

“Early adopters have demonstrated the transformative potential of big data, but extracting value from big data is no ordinary task,” says Satyendra Rana, visiting professor and one of the founding directors of Big Data & Business Analytics Group at Wayne State. “Companies have to overcome entrenched cultural barriers and must foster close collaboration among an interdisciplinary team of experts.”

“Big data management and analytics require a slew of advanced concepts, tools and technologies, and the required skills are hard to come by,” says Ratna Babu Chinnam, Wayne State industrial and systems engineering professor and also a founding director of the Big Data & Business Analytics Group. 

According to Chinnam, symposium attendees will learn how to identify big data opportunities, develop business cases and use analytics to drive business success. The symposium also seeks to provide a clear distinction between legacy analytics pervasive in industry and the emerging next generation tools, technologies and processes that will form the foundation for a new wave of innovation and growth.

In addition to Wayne State experts, the symposium will feature keynotes speeches, panel discussions and case studies featuring a number of leading industry experts who have successfully put analytics into action at their respective companies. Confirmed speakers and panelists include:

• Jim Anderson, president and CEO, Urban Science
• Steven Ambrose, vice president and CIO, DTE Energy
• Devavrat Bapat, director of supply chain reliability, Johnson & Johnson 
• Rob Bigini, vice president of operations, Comrise
• Michael Cavaretta, technical leader of predictive analytics/data science, Ford Motor Company
• Kevin Cooper, manager of risk analytics, Ford Motor Credit Company
• Bryan Goodman, technical leader of data science and optimization, Ford Motor Company
• Rohit Jain, database chief and distinguished technologist, HP
• Jack Jordan, director of quality initiatives and advanced analytics, Henry Ford Health System
• Arijit Sengupta, CEO, BeyondCore
• Radhika Subramanian, CEO, Emcien
• Kevin VanHowe, director of global financials and EDW, General Motors
• Joseph Vermette, director of enterprise data management, General Motors
• Flavio Vilanustre, vice president of technology architecture and product, LexusNexis
• Heather Woodward-Hagg, director of the Center for Applied Systems Engineering, Veterans Administration

The symposium is open to all business and information technology executives, decision makers, marketing professionals and others interested in learning how to put analytics into action. To register, visit http://specialevents.wayne.edu/2014bigdata/.

More information about the speakers, program, sponsors, lodging and more is available at http://engineering.wayne.edu/big-data-analytics/symposium/index.php.

The Big Data and Business Analytics Group includes more than 30 faculty members and 50+ research students from various university departments who collaborate on big data and business analytics projects. The team is structured by six focus areas that cover the entire big data and analytics life cycle from acquiring big data to extracting business value from it: big data value management, methods and techniques, integration and management, automotive and defense analytics, healthcare analytics, and service analytics. To express interest in collaborating with Wayne State’s Big Data and Business Analytics Group, contact Ratna Chinnam at ratna.chinnam@wayne.edu or 313-577-4846 or any one of the directors of the Big Data & Business Analytics Group.

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Wayne State University is a premier urban research institution of higher education offering 370 academic programs through 13 schools and colleges to nearly 28,000 students. For more information about engineering at Wayne State University, visit engineering.wayne.edu.

DETROIT (March 10, 2014) – Wayne State University’s interdisciplinary Automotive Safety Group is pleased to announce its Integrated Automotive Safety Workshop, to be held from 8:50 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. on April 7, 2014, at Wayne State’s McGregor Memorial Conference Center, 495 Gilmour Mall in Detroit. The workshop is free to all automotive industry professionals; registration is required.

The Automotive Safety Group consists of faculty members from Wayne State’s College of Engineering, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, School of Medicine, and College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences, who are working toward the common goal of saving lives. Specifically, researchers are committed to developing ideas that either lead to gross reduction of automotive-related crashes or keep the risk of injury to a minimum if a crash cannot be avoided. 

The workshop will address growing technologies in sensor development, control algorithms, electronic-mechanical control systems, driver distraction and crash avoidance technologies. It will highlight the integration of new active safety innovations to traditional passive safety systems, as well as set new directions for future safety research.

“More than 1.2 million fatalities still occur each year on roadways worldwide,” says King H. Yang, professor and director of Wayne State’s Bioengineering Center. “This workshop will bring together some of the industry’s most dynamic leaders and experts to discuss and identify solutions to minimize crashes and fatalities around the world.”

Confirmed keynote speakers are:

• Stephen Ridella, director of Office of Vehicle Crashworthiness Research, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
• Walton Fehr, Research and Innovative Technology Administration, U.S. Department of Transportation
• E. Charles (Chuck) Gulash, senior executive engineer, Toyota Engineering & Manufacturing North America, Inc. (TEMA), executive director, CSRC
• Priya Prasad, fellow, Ford Motor Company (retired), member of the National Academy of Engineering

Afternoon workshop sessions featuring industry and academic experts include:

• Active and Passive Safety   
• Advanced Material for Crashworthiness  
• Driver Behaviors        
• Vehicle Communication and Automated Driving      

To register, visit http://events.wayne.edu/rsvp/integrated-automotive-safety-workshop/#rsvp. Parking is available in Structure No. 1, across from the Law School, for $6.50. For more information, visit http://engineering.wayne.edu/automotive-safety/conference.php.

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Wayne State University is a premier urban research institution of higher education offering 370 academic programs through 13 schools and colleges to nearly 28,000 students. For more information about engineering at Wayne State University, visit engineering.wayne.edu.

DETROIT (March 17, 2014) – Satyendra Rana, Wayne State University computer science research professor and big data expert, joined the College of Engineering faculty in 2013 to help enhance the university’s collaboration with a growing big data industry. An accomplished IT executive and entrepreneur who worked for over a decade in academia, Rana brought with him years of experience in big data.

“I have been involved in IT and computer science since the early 1980s,” says Rana. “Big data processing is, in many ways, a special case of distributed computing, which was the research topic of my Ph.D. work that I completed in 1980. Since then, I have been engaged with academia, industry, entrepreneurs and professional groups in various capacities. The constant theme, however, has always been innovation — applying the latest ideas in distributed computing and allied areas to solve topical issues.”

Rana is continuing this theme of innovation at Wayne State as he co-spearheads big data efforts and facilitates dialogue between industry and academia around big data.

“I have taken the assignment at Wayne State primarily for the purpose of consolidating and enhancing big data research activities that are dispersed among various departments,” says Rana. “The launch of Wayne State’s Big Data & Business Analytics Group is a culmination of that effort. Besides fundamental research in big data, a core focus of this group is to enhance industry-university interaction, as the promise of big data lies in solving real-life problems, which are invariably owned by industry. Industry is looking for strong expertise in big data, which is hard to come by and cannot be acquired overnight.”

Rana is working to provide this type of expertise through his own research in developing methodologies and frameworks to extract value from big data and to manage big data initiatives.

“Most of the existing effort in big data is directed toward solving engineering challenges when handling complex and large volumes of data,” says Rana. “However, the promise of data lies in surfacing the hidden value of data, which I call 'sensing the invisible.’”

Rana’s research is based on two main concepts. The first is the concept of information value, or developing a conceptual framework for assigning concrete value to an information item. The second is the concept of information flow, or developing a system for understanding how information flows within a target environment (such as an enterprise) and determining how the dynamics of these flows and interactions affect information value. Rana’s research seeks to determine how these flows could be transformed to maximize the retained value (as information assets) and value realization (through the monetization of information assets).

“The applications for this type of research are ubiquitous and in every enterprise where information becomes a key to provide a better service or deliver better products,” says Rana. “For example, you can design a better car if you understand what features are most desired by customers and at a lower cost if you know where the inefficiencies are in the supply chain.”

In addition to co-leading the efforts of the Big Data & Business Analytics Group and conducting his own research, Rana is working with industry to formulate an executive-level comprehensive and practical program in big data analytics and is pursuing the development of a core set of graduate level big data courses at Wayne State that are essential for students who wish to pursue a research or industry career in big data.

Rana’s dedication to leading these big data efforts at Wayne State partially stems from his past with the university. When Rana migrated to the United States in 1985, his first stop was Wayne State. He had left his position as a computer science faculty member at the Indian Institute of Technology, New Delhi, to join the Wayne State Department of Computer Science as a visiting member of the faculty.

Rana says that what most compelled him to return to the College of Engineering was his excitement for the future.

“What really brought me here is the commitment and vision of Dean Farshad Fotouhi to make a difference through innovation and thinking outside of the box,” says Rana. “There is a huge untapped potential and unfulfilled need in this part of the United States when it comes to university-industry collaboration.”

The Big Data & Analytics Group is hosting its Big Data & Business Analytics Symposium: From Analytics to Action on March 26 at Wayne State. For more information and to register, visit specialevents.wayne.edu/2014bigdata.

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Wayne State University is a premier urban research institution of higher education offering 370 academic programs through 13 schools and colleges to nearly 28,000 students. For more information about engineering at Wayne State University, visit engineering.wayne.edu.

DETROIT (March 31, 2014) – Sustainability expert Yinlun Huang, professor of chemical engineering and materials science in Wayne State University’s College of Engineering, has been elected a Fellow of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE).

AIChE is the world’s leading organization for chemical engineering professionals, with more than 45,000 members worldwide. Fellows are elite members who have practiced chemical engineering for more than 25 years and made significant contributions to the profession. Typically, the Board of Directors elects five to eight AIChE members to the rank of Fellow each year.

AIChE recognized Huang — who has been a member of the organization for 25 years — for his significant contributions to the field of chemical engineering sustainability and for his leadership roles at AIChE.

“On behalf of the entire Wayne State University College of Engineering community, I congratulate Dr. Huang on this highest distinction,” said College of Engineering Dean Farshad Fotouhi. “He is a remarkable educator and innovator, and is well deserving of such an honor. Our students, college, city and state are fortunate to learn and benefit from his innovative work and expertise.”

Huang has received many honors, including the AIChE Research Excellence in Sustainable Engineering Award in 2010, which recognized him for his “long-standing and sustained record of research activities and leadership that advanced the development, practice and human recourses in the field of sustainable engineering in the United States and other nations.”

He received the AIChE Sustainable Engineering Forum (SEF) Service Recognition Award from the AIChE Institute for Sustainability in 2010. He also was awarded the National Association for Surface Furnishing’s (NASF) Scientific Achievement Award in 2013 for his key theoretical contributions to the surface finishing industry and the Michigan Green Chemistry Governor’s Award in 2009, which honored his research on engineering sustainability with successful industrial applications. In 2008, Huang was designated a Fulbright Scholar by the U.S. Department of State.

He has published extensively in the field of engineering sustainability and has delivered numerous plenary and keynote speeches and invited seminars on engineering sustainability at international and national conferences and in academic institutions and industries.

He has also served in a number of leadership roles at AIChE. He chaired the AIChE Sustainable Engineering Forum from 2007-09 and has worked as technical advisor of the forum since 2011. Within the forum, he created the Sustainability Education for Chemical Engineers (SEChE) committee, which is aimed at developing educational materials for the chemical engineering core course sequence of the U.S. chemical engineering undergraduate curriculum. In addition, he was chair of process research and innovation for AIChE. Currently, he is chair-elect of the AIChE International Committee, which is responsible for developing and implementing strategic and tactical activities related to the international component of AIChE’s mission.

Huang also serves as director for the National Science Foundation RCN-SEES project on sustainable manufacturing, which involves 21 domestic and foreign universities and 11 national organizations and university centers. Recently, the NSF designated him as the U.S. principal investigator and chair, responsible for organizing the U.S. NSF-China NSF Workshop on Sustainable Manufacturing. He also is founder and chair of the conference series International Conferences on Sustainable Chemical Product and Process Engineering and has co-organized and co-chaired another conference series, International Congress on Sustainability Science and Engineering.

Huang obtained his bachelor’s in chemical engineering from Zhejiang University, China, in 1982, and his master’s and doctorate in chemical engineering from Kansas State University in 1988 and 1992, respectively. He joined Wayne State in 1993 following a postdoctoral study at the University of Texas at Austin.

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Wayne State University is a premier urban research institution of higher education offering 370 academic programs through 13 schools and colleges to nearly 28,000 students. For more information about engineering at Wayne State University, visit engineering.wayne.edu.