New Faculty — Year 2017-18

Assistant Professor
Ph.D. (2017), University of Florida

Research Interests: Using analytics and integrated models to inform agriculture, aquaculture, water and coastal resources management; estimating estuarine system futures as a function of local and global change; quantifying ecological impacts of cultural eutrophication; linking data mining and mechanistic modeling approaches; investigating spatial and temporal dynamics of socio-environmental systems

Nelson received her B.S. in agricultural and biological engineering from the University of Florida. She also received a Ph.D. in agricultural and biological engineering with a concentration in hydrologic sciences from the University of Florida. During her graduate studies, she was awarded an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship, and conducted research at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center as a research affiliate and NSF Graduate Research Intern.

Her research takes a data-intensive, management-focused, and interdisciplinary approach to the study of complex biological system dynamics. Projects within Nelson’s program seek to identify drivers underlying biological system behaviors to inform the development of sustainable management strategies.

• Nelson, N. G., Muñoz-Carpena, R., Neale, P. J., Tzortziou, M. and Megonigal, J. P. (2017), Temporal variability in the importance of hydrologic, biotic, and climatic descriptors of dissolved oxygen dynamics in a shallow tidal-marsh creek. Water Resources Research, doi:10.1002/2016WR020196.
• Nelson, N. G., Muñoz-Carpena, R., and Phlips, E. J. (2017), A novel quantile method reveals spatiotemporal shifts in phytoplankton descriptors between bloom and non-bloom conditions in a subtropical estuary. Marine Ecology Progress Series, doi:10.3354/meps12054.

Assistant Professor
Ph.D. (2012), Oregon State University

Research Interests: Quantifying physical processes that control energy and water movement through the soil-plant-atmosphere continuum; development of distributed environmental sensing systems; design and management optimization of irrigation systems; development of physically based agricultural water management models

Sayde earned his B.S. in agricultural engineering from the University of Holy Spirit, Lebanon and M.S. in land and water resources management from the Mediterranean Agricultural Institute of Bari, Italy. He received his Ph.D. in water resources engineering from Oregon State University (OSU). He was advised by Dr. Marshall English, a pioneer in optimum irrigation management, as well as Dr. John Selker, one of the world leaders in vadose zone hydrology and environmental monitoring.

In his Ph.D. and post-doctoral work at OSU, he focused on developing cutting edge tools that allow the interrogation of our environment at a range of temporal and spatial scales never attempted before. He demonstrated the feasibility of using actively heated fiber optics (soil-AHFO) method in conjunction with distributed temperature sensing to quantify soil water content and fluxes at spatial scales spanning over 4 orders of magnitude (0.1m to 1,000m) and temporal scale well below 1h. He also developed a novel approach to continuously measure wind speed simultaneously at thousands of points using actively heated fiber optics.

• Cheng, Y., C. Sayde, Q. Li, J. Basara, J. Selker, E. Tanner, and P. Gentine, 2017. Failure of Taylor’s hypothesis in the atmospheric surface layer and its correction for eddy-covariance measurements, Geophys. Res. Lett., 44, 4287–4295, doi:10.1002/2017GL073499.
• Sayde, C., C. K. Thomas, J. Wagner, and J. Selker, 2015. High-resolution wind speed measurements using actively heated fiber optics, Geophys. Res. Lett., 42, 10,064–10,073, doi:10.1002/2015GL066729.
• Sayde, C., J. Benitez-Buelga, J., L. Rodriguez-Sinobas, L. El Khoury, M. English, N.van de Giesen, and J. Selker, 2014. Mapping Variability of Soil Water Content and Flux across 1-1,000 m scales using the Actively Heated Fiber Optic Method. Water Resour. Res., 50,7302–7317, doi:10.1002/2013WR014983.

Assistant Professor
Ph.D. (2010), Harvard University

Research Interests: Exploiting cutting-edge chemical, biomaterial and nanomedicine technologies to understand physiological responses during disease and regeneration and fulfill critical unmet needs in the clinic; chemical prodrug therapy, controlled drug delivery and nanotechnology to enable new forms of cancer chemotherapy and immunotherapy

Brudno received his B.S. in chemistry and biophysics from the University of Pennsylvania and a Ph.D. in chemistry from Harvard University. As a Ph.D. student with Dr. David Liu, he developed methods to rapidly synthesize and screen sequence-defined synthetic polymers for biological and medical application. His postdoctoral work with Dr. David Mooney at Harvard centered on identifying optimal presentation kinetics for pro-angiogenic and pro-vascular maturation growth factors. Controlled release of these factors led to improved vascularization, stromal cell recruitment and vascular remodeling.

As a Fellow of the Wyss Institute at Harvard, Brudno developed the first technology allowing for non-invasive replenishment of drug- and growth factor-releasing hydrogels and surfaces. This widely applicable method allows for repeated, local and controlled release of therapeutic factors in a wide range of diseases, with wide applicability in drug and cell delivery and regenerative medicine. He has also been actively involved in commercializing the refillable depot technology for medical applications.

• Brudno Y, Mooney DJ. “On-Demand Drug Delivery from Local Depots.” Journal of Controlled Release. 219: 8-17 (2015).
• Brudno Y, Desai R, Kwee B, Aizenberg M, Mooney DJ. “In Vivo Targeting through Click Chemistry” ChemMedChem. 10(4): 617-620 (2015).
• Brudno Y*, Silva EA*, Kearney CJ, Lewin S, Aizenberg M, Mooney DJ. “Refilling Drug Delivery Depots Through the Blood” Proceedings of the National Academy of Science 111(35): 12722-7 (2014).
• Brudno Y, Ennett AB, Chen R, Aizenberg M, Mooney DJ. “Enhancing microvascular formation and vessel maturation through temporal control over multiple pro-angiogenic and pro-maturation factors.” Biomaterials 34(36): 9201-9209 (2013).

Assistant Professor
Ph.D. (2012), Purdue University

Research Interests: Point-of-care diagnostics; imaging/sensing devices; lab on a chip; nanoplasmonics; molecular assays; DNA detection; telemedicine; global health; bionanotechnology

Wei received his B.S. and M.S. in polymer materials and engineering from Zhejiang University, China. He received his Ph.D. in chemistry from Purdue University. Prior to joining the NC State faculty, he was a postdoctoral scholar in the Bioengineering Department and Electrical Engineering Department at the University of California, Los Angeles.

His current research is focused on developing next-generation field-deployable molecular imaging, sensing, and point-of-care diagnostic tools based on cost-effective and portable consumer devices such as mobile phones. He studies how nanostructured substrates can enhance optical detection on mobile phone devices through surface-generated plasmonic enhancement effect. He also works on fully automated on-chip sample preparation technologies for rapid DNA extraction, purification, and amplification to improve accessibility of genetic testing for monitoring of emerging human and plant diseases, especially in the resource-limited settings.

• M. Kühnemund†, Q. Wei†, E. Darai, Y. Wang, I. Hernandez-Neuta, Z. Yang, D. Tseng, A. Ahlford, L. Mathot, T. Sjöblom, A. Ozcan, and M. Nilsson. Targeted DNA Sequencing and in situ Mutation Analysis Using Mobile Phone Microscopy. Nature Commun. 2017, 8, 13913 † co-first authors.
• Q. Wei, W. Luo, S. Chiang, T. Kappel, C. Mejia, D. Tseng, R. Y. L. Chan, E. Yan, H. Qi, F. Shabbir, H. Ozkan, S. Feng, and A. Ozcan. Imaging and Sizing of Single DNA Molecules on a Mobile Phone. ACS Nano, 2014, 8, 12725-12733.
• Q. Wei, R. Nagi, K. Sadeghi, S. Feng, E. Yan, S. J. Ki, R. Caire, D. Tseng, and A. Ozcan. Detection and Spatial Mapping of Mercury Contamination in Water Samples using a Smart Phone. ACS Nano, 2014, 8, 1121-1129.

Assistant Professor
Ph.D. (2016), Purdue University

Research Interests: Transit systems and neighborhood dynamics; integrated affordable solutions across transportation and housing; wider economic impacts of transportation systems; highway cost allocation and revenue attribution; congestion pricing; transportation equity; rural transportation and access to health care; food deserts

Bardaka received her B.S. in civil engineering from the National Technical University of Athens in Greece. She received her M.S. in civil engineering and her Ph.D. in civil engineering with an emphasis in transportation engineering from Purdue University. She also received an M.S. in economics from Purdue University. During summer 2016, she was a visiting student in the Department of Spatial Economics at Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam. In 2017, she received the Best Paper Award by a Junior Researcher at the Annual Conference of the International Transportation Economics Association for her work on transit-induced gentrification.

Her research focuses on transportation economics and planning. Specifically, she studies the interdependencies between the spatial patterns of urban development and transportation interventions. Presently, she studies the socioeconomic impacts of transit investments, including the gentrification and economic displacement of lower-income households, as well as affordable housing schemes close to transit systems, using quasi-experimental spatial econometric techniques. She also conducts research on the wider economic impacts of transportation systems, investigating how transportation interventions induce economic activity.

• Thompson KA, Shimabuku KK, Kearns JP, Knappe DRU, Summers RS. 2016. “Environmental comparison of biochar and activated carbon for tertiary wastewater treatment.” Environmental Science & Technology, 2016, 50, 11253-11262.
• Shimabuku KK, Kearns JP, Martinez J, Mahoney RB, Moreno-Vasquez L, Summers RS. 2016. “Biochar sorbents for sulfamethoxazole removal from surface water, stormwater, and wastewater effluent.” Water Research, Vol. 96, pp. 236-245.
• Kearns J, Knappe DRU, Summers RS. 2015. “Feasibility of using traditional kiln charcoals in low-cost water treatment: The role of pyrolysis conditions on 2,4-D herbicide adsorption.” Environmental Engineering Science, Vol 32, No. 11, pp. 912-921.

Associate Professor
Ph.D. (2007), Yale University

Research Interests: Energy systems analysis; renewable energy integration; industrial ecology; life cycle assessment; material flow analysis

Johnson received his B.S. in chemical engineering from Clarkson University, and M.S. and Ph.D. in environmental engineering from Yale University. Prior to joining the faculty at NC State, he was an assistant professor of sustainable systems at the University of Michigan’s School of Natural Resources and Environment.

His current research investigates the environmental impacts of changes to the power system, including integration of variable renewables and energy storage technologies. He serves as the PI for an NSF grant examining the life cycle impacts of using lithium ion batteries for power system reserves. In addition, research projects include renewable energy policy analysis and experimental studies to determine the drivers for roundtrip efficiency losses when using building heating and cooling systems to provide ancillary services to the power system. Johnson has also been extensively involved in the use and evaluation of case-based teaching for sustainability education.

• Lin, Y., Mathieu, J., Johnson, J.X., Hiskens, I.A., Backhaus, S., Explaining Inefficiencies in Commercial Buildings Providing Power System Ancillary Services, Energy and Buildings, 152: 216-226, 2017.
• Johnson, J.X., Location or Insolation: the importance of siting in emissions mitigation from solar photovoltaics, WIREs Energy and Environment, in press (DOI: 10.1002/wene.249), 2017.
• Ryan, N., Keoleian, G.A., Johnson, J.X., Comparative Assessment of Models and Methods to Calculate Grid Electricity Emissions, Environmental Science & Technology, 50(17): 8937–8953, 2016.

Assistant Professor
Ph.D. (2016), University of Colorado-Boulder

Research Interests: Exploring the applicability of locally produced biomass char (biochar) as a low-cost adsorbent for drinking water treatment in developing communities

Kearns earned his B.S. in chemistry from Clemson University, his M.S. in environmental biogeochemistry from the University of California-Berkeley, and Ph.D. in environmental engineering from the University of Colorado-Boulder. Prior to joining the NC State faculty, Kearns became the director of Science for Aqueous Solutions, a NGO based in Thailand and the U.S. that promotes livelihood security, environmental and economic sustainability, and local self-reliance through appropriate technologies in water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH).

Currently, his research interests intersect the fields of appropriate technologies in water and sanitation, valorization and creative application of “waste” biomaterials, and adsorption processes for control of hazardous substances in air, water, and soil. Through fieldwork in southeast Asia, Kearns has developed a method for generating biochar adsorbent that is affordable and technologically accessible to rural and resource-constrained village communities. His laboratory research demonstrates that biochar can be effective for controlling a variety of persistent organic trace pollutants – such as pesticides, pharmaceutical residues, and industrial effluents – in drinking water and wastewater.

• Thompson KA, Shimabuku KK, Kearns JP, Knappe DRU, Summers RS. 2016. “Environmental comparison of biochar and activated carbon for tertiary wastewater treatment.” Environmental Science & Technology, 2016, 50, 11253-11262.
• Shimabuku KK, Kearns JP, Martinez J, Mahoney RB, Moreno-Vasquez L, Summers RS. 2016. “Biochar sorbents for sulfamethoxazole removal from surface water, stormwater, and wastewater effluent.” Water Research, Vol. 96, pp. 236-245.
• Kearns J, Knappe DRU, Summers RS. 2015. “Feasibility of using traditional kiln charcoals in low-cost water treatment: The role of pyrolysis conditions on 2,4-D herbicide adsorption.” Environmental Engineering Science, Vol 32, No. 11, pp. 912-921.

Assistant Professor
Ph.D. (2015), Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution

Research Interests: Coastal geomorphology; understanding coastal evolution with climate change using numerical modeling, physical modeling, remote sensing, and field work

Ortiz earned her B.A. in geosciences at Wellesley College with a double major in classical civilizations. She earned her M.S. in civil and environmental engineering in 2012 and her Ph.D. in marine geology from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Joint Program in 2015. Ortiz recently completed a Synthesis Postdoctoral Fellowship funded through the National Center for Earth Surface Dynamics 2 at Indiana University Bloomington, working closely with Dr. Douglas Edmonds.

Her research is focused on coastal geomorphology and understanding the evolution of coasts with rising sea levels. Utilizing a mix of modeling, remote sensing, and field validation, Ortiz focuses on improving our predictions of coastal systems in the next 100 years. Recent projects have looked at the impact of pond expansion on the Mississippi Delta coast resulting in large-scale land loss and the role of vegetation in delta resiliency with rising seas. Moreover, she plans to continue research into predicting the response of atolls to climate change.

• Ortiz, A. C. and A. D. Ashton, Exploring carbonate reef flat hydrodynamics and formation mechanisms of sub-aerial land, Marine Geology. (In prep.).
• Ortiz, A. C. and A. D. Ashton, Understanding the Timescales of Morphologic Evolution in the Cross-shore and Long-shore of Sandy Wave-Dominated Coasts, Geology. (Submitted).
• Ortiz, A. C., S. Roy, and D. A. Edmonds (2017), Land loss by pond expansion on the Mississippi River Delta Plain, Geophysical Research Letters, 44, 3635–3642.
• Ortiz, A. C., and A. D. Ashton (2016), Exploring shoreface dynamics and a mechanistic explanation for a morphodynamic depth of closure, Journal of Geophysical Research: Earth Surface, 121(2), 442–462.

Assistant Professor
Ph.D. (2014), University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Research Interests: Multidisciplinary including structural/fluid mechanics; polymer chemistry; materials science; composite manufacturing; heat transfer; optics/electronics

Patrick received both his B.S. and M.S. in civil engineering at North Carolina State University and a Ph.D. in structural engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He was a postdoctoral Fellow at the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology on the Illinois campus before returning to NC State as a faculty member.

He develops next-generation structural composites that can sense, respond and adapt to their environment. Motivated by natural phenomena, his research is focused on creating “active” materials that achieve biomimetic, regulating functions such as self-healing. Patrick has created novel fiber-composites containing 3D microvasculature that exhibit multifunctional performance (e.g. thermal regulation, electromagnetic modulation) via fluid circulation/substitution within the vascular networks. He employs the latest in materials fabrication techniques such as 3D printing to produce increasingly complex fiber-composite architectures.

• Patrick, J.F., Krull, B.P., Garg, M., Mangun, C.L., Moore, J.S., Sottos, N.R., and White, S.R., Robust Sacrificial Polymer Templates for 3D Interconnected Microvasculature in Fiber-Reinforced Composites, Composites Part A, 100, 361-370 (2017).
• Patrick, J.F., Robb, M.R., Sottos, N.R., Moore, J.S., and White, S.R., Polymers with Autonomous Life-Cycle Control, Nature, 540, 363-370 (2016).
• Krull, B.P, Patrick, J.F., Hart, K.R., White, S.R., and Sottos, N.R., Automatic Optical Crack Tracking for Double Cantilever Beam Specimens, Experimental Techniques, 40(3), 937-945 (2015).

Associate Professor
Ph.D. (2011), North Carolina State University

Research Interests: Application of experimental mechanical characterization; modeling of infrastructure materials; identification and development of sustainable and resilient pavement strategies

Underwood received his B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. in civil engineering from North Carolina State University. Prior to joining the NC State faculty, he was an assistant professor of civil engineering in the School of Sustainable Engineering and the Built Environment at Arizona State University. His research focuses on infrastructure materials and their interaction with society and the natural and built environments. Specifically, he is pursuing knowledge that will improve the understanding and subsequent development of infrastructure materials that reduce energy consumption, maximize limited material resources, reduce overall environmental impacts, and increase societal productivity.

He applies a multi-scale approach first using top-down multidisciplinary studies to broadly consider how future uncertainties (climate, freight movement, urbanization, etc.) will affect the sustainability, robustness, and resilience of infrastructure systems. His work also applies bottom-up investigations to experiment on and then mathematically describe the engineering and fundamental properties of infrastructure materials, principally asphalt concrete. Collectively these studies seek to identify future challenges and develop fundamentally founded engineering solutions to meet these challenges.

• Underwood, B.S., Z. Guido, P. Gudipudi, and Y. Feinberg Medina (2017). “Economic Impacts to United States Pavement Infrastructure from Future Temperature Rise,” Nature Climate Change. In Press.
• Medina, J., B.S. Underwood, and K.E. Kaloush (2017). “Properties of Activated Crumb Rubber Modified Binders,” Construction and Building Materials. In Press.
• Noorvand, H., G. Sai, and B.S. Underwood (2017). “Autonomous Vehicles: Assessment of the Implications of Truck Positioning on Flexible Pavement Performance and Design,” Transportation Research Record: Journal of the Transportation Research Board, 2640. pp. 21-28. doi: 10.3141/2640-03.

Assistant Professor
Ph.D. (2017), University of Florida

Research Interests: Security and privacy of cellular networks, especially detecting abuse and developing strong authentication mechanisms for the global telephone phone network; security of mobile applications, including applying automated and manual analysis techniques to measure application security at scale

Reaves received a B.S. and M.S. in computer engineering from Mississippi State University in 2010 and 2011, respectively, followed by a M.S. in computer science from Georgia Institute of Technology in 2015. He received a Ph.D. in computer engineering from the University of Florida in 2017.

His research is dedicated to measuring and improving the security of computer systems, with a particular emphasis on telephone networks and software for mobile platforms. His work on the global telephone network has identified security risks and abuse of popular text-messaging-based authentication systems as well as developed techniques to provide strong, end-to-end authentication for phones to eliminate fraudulent calls. His work on mobile application security has addressed detection and measurement of mobile malware in the wild and identified systemic risks in developing world mobile money systems used by millions for critically important financial services.

• Bradley Reaves, Logan Blue, Hadi Abdullah, Luis Vargas, Patrick Traynor, and Tom Shrimpton. AuthentiCall: Efficient Identity and Content Authentication for Phone Calls. In Proceedings of the 26th USENIX Security Symposium, 2017.
• Bradley Reaves, Logan Blue, and Patrick Traynor. Authloop: Practical End-to-End Cryptographic Authentication for Telephony over Voice Channels. In Proceedings of 25th USENIX Security Symposium, Austin, TX, August 2016. (Acceptance Rate: 15.5 percent).
• Bradley Reaves, Nolen Scaife, Dave Tian, Logan Blue, Patrick Traynor, and Kevin Butler. Sending Out an SMS: Characterizing the Security of the SMS Ecosystem with Public Gateways. In Proceedings of the 37th IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy, San Jose, CA, May 2016. (Acceptance Rate: 13.0 percent).
• Bradley Reaves, Ethan Shernan, Adam Bates, Henry Carter, and Patrick Traynor. Boxed Out: Blocking Cellular Interconnect Bypass Fraud at the Network Edge. In Proceedings of the 24th USENIX Security Symposium, 2015. (Acceptance Rate: 15.7 percent).

Associate Professor
Ph.D. (2009), Washington University in St. Louis

Research Interests: Parallel computing; heterogeneous computing; emerging computing technologies; runtime systems; networking systems; algorithm acceleration

Becchi received her laurea degree in computer engineering from Politecnico di Milano, Italy, and her M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in computer engineering from Washington University in St. Louis. Prior to joining the NC State faculty, she was an associate professor of electrical and computer engineering at the University of Missouri.

Her research interests lie broadly at the intersection between computer architecture, systems software, and applications. In particular, her current research activities spawn different directions: design of programming models, compiler and runtime techniques for heterogeneous systems containing coprocessor devices, acceleration of bioinformatics, pattern recognition, and data analytics algorithms on parallel architectures, and high-speed implementation of networking applications (e.g., deep packet inspection).

• M. Nourian, X. Wang, X. Yu, W.-C. Feng and M. Becchi, Demystifying Automata Processing: GPUs, FPGAs or Micron’s AP? In Proc. of the International Conference on Supercomputing (ICS 2017), Chicago, IL, June 2017.
• H. Wu , D. Li and M. Becchi, Compiler-Assisted Workload Consolidation For Efficient Dynamic Parallelism on GPU. In Proc. of the 30th IEEE International Parallel and Distributed Processing Symposium submitted (IPDPS 2016), Chicago, IL, May 2016.

Assistant Professor
Ph.D. (2017), Georgia Institute of Technology

Research Interests: Wireless communication and networking, specifically wireless software-defined networking, network function virtualization, and cloudification solutions for 5G&B systems; cognitive cyber-physical systems; wireless communication in challenged environments (underground and underwater); Internet of things; ad-hoc; sensor networks

Lin received his B.S. in electrical engineering and M.S. in communication engineering from National Taiwan University, Taiwan, respectively, and Ph.D. in electrical and computer engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology. He received the BWN Lab Researcher of the Year Award at the Georgia Institute of Technology in 2015. He received the Best Student Paper Award Runner-up of the IEEE SCC 2016.

Currently, Lin conducts research on wireless software-defined networking systems, including next-generation cellular and underwater networks, Internet of things, and cyber-physical systems, along with network function virtualization and cloudification. He also conducts research on wireless communication in challenged underground and underwater environments. All of these studies are investigated through both rigid theoretical analysis and practical implementations.

• Lin, S.-C. Lin, Alshehri, A. A., Wang, P., and Akyildiz, I. F., “Magnetic Induction-Based Localization in Randomly-Deployed Wireless Underground Sensor Networks,” accepted by IEEE Internet of Things Journal, July 2017.
• Lin, S.-C., Wang, P., Akyildiz, I. F., and Luo, M., “Delay-Based Maximum Power-Weight Scheduling in Queueing Networks with Heavy-Tailed Traffic,” IEEE/ACM Transactions on Networking, vol. 25, no. 4, pp. 1-16, August 2017.
• Akyildiz, I. F., Wang, P., and Lin, S.-C., “SoftAir: A Software Defined Networking Architecture for 5G Wireless Systems,” Computer Networks (Elsevier) Journal, vol. 85, pp. 1-18, July 2015.
• Lin, S.-C., Akyildiz, I. F., Wang, P., and Sun, Z., “Distributed Cross-layer Protocol Design for Magnetic Induction Communication in Wireless Underground Sensor Networks,” IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications, vol. 14, no. 7, pp. 4006-4019, July 2015.

Assistant Professor
Ph.D. (2015), University of Southern California

Research Interests: Power system operation; energy economics; data analytics for smart grids

Tang received his B.Eng. degree in electrical engineering from Tsinghua University, Beijing, China, in 2008. He received his M.S. in electrical engineering, M.A. in applied mathematics, and Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering from the University of Southern California, in 2010, 2014, and 2015, respectively. Prior to joining NC State’s faculty, he was a postdoctoral scholar at the University of California, Berkeley and Stanford University.

The goal of his research is to understand the interactions between power systems and electricity markets, and to improve the system efficiency through innovative market design. His previous research contributes to a set of methodologies that employ game theory in the theoretical analysis and design of market mechanisms. He is currently utilizing data and data analytics methods including machine learning to develop new approaches to power system optimization, and to gain deeper insights into electricity market design.

• Wenyuan Tang and Rahul Jain, “Aggregating correlated wind power with full surplus extraction”, IEEE Transactions on Smart Grid, May 2017.
• Wenyuan Tang, Ram Rajagopal, Kameshwar Poolla and Pravin Varaiya, “Model and data analysis of two-settlement electricity market with virtual bidding”, 55th IEEE Conference on Decision and Control, December 2016.
• Wenyuan Tang and Rahul Jain, “Dynamic economic dispatch game: the value of storage”, IEEE Transactions on Smart Grid, September 2016.
• Wenyuan Tang and Rahul Jain, “Market mechanisms for buying random wind”, IEEE Transactions on Sustainable Energy, October 2015.
• Wenyuan Tang and Rahul Jain, “Hierarchical auction mechanisms for network resource allocation”, IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications, December 2012.

Head and A. Doug Allison Distinguished Professor
Ph.D. (2001), Northwestern University

Research Interests: Analytics; health systems; societal impact; supply chain management

Swann joins the Edward P. Fitts Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering as department head and the A. Doug Allison Distinguished Professor. She is an adjunct professor in the UNC/NC State Joint Department of Biomedical Engineering. Prior to joining NC State, she was the Harold R. and Mary Anne Nash Professor in the Stewart School of Industrial and Systems Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology, where she co-founded and co-directed the Center for Health and Humanitarian Systems, one of the first interdisciplinary research centers on the Georgia Tech campus. Swann received her B.S. in industrial systems engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology and her M.S. and Ph.D. in industrial engineering and management science from Northwestern University. In 2004, she received an NSF Career Award, and in 2009 she was on loan as a science advisor for the H1N1 pandemic response at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

She is a research leader in using mathematical modeling to enable supply chain systems and health care to become more efficient, effective or equitable. Recent collaborations have been to quantify the return from public investments to improve pediatric asthma, plan for infectious disease outbreaks, analyze administrative claims data from Medicaid patients across the U.S., and design systems with decentralized decision makers.

• Gentili, M., N. Serban, J. O’Connor, J. Swann (2017), “Quantifying Disparities in Accessibility and Availability of Pediatric Primary Care across Multiple States with Implications for Targeted Interventions”. Forthcoming in Health Services Research.
• Smalley, H., P. Keskinocak, J. Swann, and A. Hinman (2015), “Optimized Oral Cholera Vaccine Distribution Strategies to Minimize Disease Incidence: A Mixed Integer Programming Model and Analysis of a Bangladesh Scenario”. Vaccine. Vol 33:46, 17 Nov 2015, Pg 6218–6223.

Head and Professor
Ph.D. (1995), Texas A&M University

Research Interests: Experimental heat transfer methods; enhanced heat transfer for turbine blade cooling; advanced system diagnostics; energy harvesting; micro-channel heat exchangers; electronic cooling; clean coal energy

Ekkad earned his B.Tech in mechanical engineering from Jawaharal Nehru Technological University in India in 1989, his M.S. in mechanical engineering from Arizona State University in 1991 and his Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from Texas A&M University in 1995. Prior to joining NC State, Ekkad was the Rolls-Royce Commonwealth Professor for Aerospace Propulsion Systems in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Virginia Tech, the associate vice president for research programs and the director of the Rolls-Royce University Technology Center for Advanced Diagnostics.

His research focuses on thermal management, energy concepts, propulsion, and advanced system diagnostics and has been supported by multiple federal and industrial sources including National Science Foundation, Department of Energy, Rolls-Royce, Siemens and GE.

• Gomez-Ramirez, D., Kedukodi, S., Ekkad, S.V., Moon, H.-K., Kim, Y., Srinivasan, R., 2017, Investigation of Isothermal Convective Heat Transfer in an Optical Combustor with a Low-Emission Swirl Fuel Nozzle, Applied Thermal Engineering, Vol. 114, March, pp. 65-76, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.applthermaleng.2016.11.154.
• Singh, P., Li, W., Ekkad, S.V., Ren, J., 2017, “Experimental and numerical investigation of heat transfer inside two-pass rib roughened duct (AR=1:2) under rotating and stationary conditions”, Int. J. Heat Mass Transfer, Vol. 113, pp. 384-398, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijheatmasstransfer.2017.05.085.

Assistant Professor
Ph.D. (2016), University of California

Research Interests: Deformation processing in metals and the associated crystalline defect evolution; advanced electron microscopy techniques; deformation mechanism determination; crystallographic texture development

Miller received her B.S.E. in materials science and engineering from the University of Michigan in 2011 and completed her Ph.D. in the Materials Department at the University of California Santa Barbara in 2016. After graduate school, she worked at UES, Inc. as a research scientist onsite in the Materials and Manufacturing Directorate of the Air Force Research Laboratory in Dayton, Ohio.

Her interests include defect and structural evolution in crystalline material and experimental characterization via advanced electron microscopy techniques. She is particularly focused on deformation processing of metals and the associated microstructural evolution, texture evolution, recovery, and recrystallization. Miller’s group’s primary focus is on linking macroscopic processing phenomena to micro- and nanoscale mechanisms, enabling the development of predictive material models for engineering applications. The group’s work has been in thermomechanical processing of low-symmetry metals including titanium alloys for aerospace and magnesium alloys for automotive and consumer electronic applications.

• V.M. Miller, E.J. Payton, and A.L. Pilchak. “Reduction in the thermodynamic nucleation barrier via the heteroepitaxial recrystallization mechanism,” Scripta Materialia. 136C, 128-131 (2017).
• V.M. Miller, T.D. Berman, I.J. Beyerlein, and T.M. Pollock. “Polycrystal plasticity simulation for the prediction of forming behavior in magnesium alloys,” Materials Science and Engineering: A. 675, 345-360 (2016).
• V.M. Miller and T.M. Pollock, “Texture Modifcation in a Magnesium-Aluminum-Calcium Alloy During Uniaxial Compression,” Metallurgical and Materials Transactions A. 47(4), 1854-1864 (2016).
• V.M. Miller, A.E. Johnson, C.J. Torbet, and T.M. Pollock. “Recrystallization and the development of abnormally large grains after small strain deformation in a polycrystalline nickel-based superalloy,” Metallurgical and Materials Transactions A. 47(4), 1566-1574 (2016).

Assistant Professor
Ph.D. (2013), Ruhr University Bochum, Germany

Research Interests: Non-equilibrium atmospheric pressure plasmas and low-pressure plasmas; heating mechanisms; plasma diagnostics; plasma-liquid interaction; interaction of biological material with plasmas; plasma medicine

Stapelmann received her Dipl.-Ing in electrical engineering from the Ruhr University Bochum in Germany. During her studies she conducted a research stay at the Joint Research Center of the European Commission in Ispra, Italy from 2007-08. She received her Ph.D. in electrical engineering from Ruhr University Bochum. Prior to joining the NC State faculty, she was an assistant professor of biomedical applications of plasma technology at Ruhr University Bochum.

Presently, she studies the interactions of technical plasmas with biological systems on a macromolecular level. Her focus is on the characterization and optimization of plasma discharges used for biomedical applications and the understanding and improvement of plasmas used e.g. in medicine. The applications range from wound healing to air purification, sterilization of medical instruments as well as for planetary protection purposes. Furthermore, plasma-liquid interactions and plasma discharges in liquids belong to the repertoire.

• K Stapelmann, M Fiebrandt, M Raguse, P Awakowicz, G Reitz, and R Moeller “Utilization of low-pressure plasma to inactivate bacterial spores on stainless steel screws”, Astrobiology, 13 (7), 597-606, 2013.
• K Stapelmann, J-W Lackmann, I Bürger, JE Bandow, and P Awakowicz “An H2 very high frequency capacitively coupled plasma inactivates glyceraldehyde 3-phosphate dehydrogenase (GapDH) more efficiently than UV photons and heat combined”, Journal of Physics D: Applied Physics, 47 (8), 085402, 2014.
• K Stapelmann, M Fiebrandt, T Styrnoll, S Baldus, N Bibinov, and P Awakowicz “Implications of electron heating and non-uniformities in a VHF-CCP for sterilization of medical instruments” Plasma Sources Science and Technology 24(3), 034014, 2015.

Assistant Professor
Ph.D. (2007), Northwestern Polytechnical University

Research Interests: Radiation detection materials and devices; effects of radiation on electronic and structural materials; nuclear imaging and measurement; sustainable energies; compound semiconductors

Yang received his B.S., M.S. and Ph.D. in materials science and engineering from Northwestern Polytechnical University. Prior to joining the NC State faculty, he spent ten years at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Brookhaven National Laboratory, working in Advanced Radiation Detector R&D Group. During that time, he was promoted through the ranks (research associate, assistant scientist, associate scientist and scientist) because of his outstanding performance. Yang is a two-time recipient of the prestigious R&D 100 Award, in 2009 and 2014, together with his collaborators for developing various compact sensors to detect and image radiation.

His research interests have revolved around the opportunities at the intersection of nuclear engineering, materials science and engineering and electrical engineering. Special emphasis is placed on developing new materials and devices for improving radiation detection and imaging technologies, which are widely needed in medical imaging, nonproliferation, nuclear security, industrial process monitoring, environmental safety survey and remediation, astronomical observation instrumentation and high energy physics R&D. Yang is also interested in investigating radiation effects in electronic, optical and structural materials and developing radiation-resistant materials. All of these topics are investigated using both theory and experimental techniques.

• G. Yang, G. Gu, A. E. Bolotnikov, Y. Cui, G. S. Camarda, A. Hossain, U. N. Roy, N. Kivi, T. Liu, and R. B. James, “Structural, Electrical and Optical Properties of CdMnTe Crystals Grown by the Modified Floating-zone Technique,” Electronic Materials Letters, 11, 500-504 (2015).
• G. Yang, A. E. Bolotnikov, P. M. Fochuk, G. S. Camarda, A. Hossain, U. N. Roy, Y. Cui, R. Pinder, J. Gray, and R. B. James, Thermo-migration of Te inclusions in CdZnTe during post-growth annealing in a temperature-gradient field, Phys. Status Solidi (c), 11, 1328 (2014). (Invited Article).