Three NC State industrial engineers honored by IIE

Three industrial engineers at the College of Engineering at North Carolina State University will be honored with some of the loftiest professional recognitions awarded by the Institute of Industrial Engineers (IIE).

Dr. Louis A. Martin-Vega, dean of the College of Engineering; Dr. Jerome Lavelle, associate dean of academic affairs in the College; and Dr. Ola Harrysson, associate professor in the Edward P. Fitts Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, will receive their awards at IIE’s annual conference in May.

Martin-Vega will be honored with IIE’s highest honor, the Frank and Lillian Gilbreth Industrial Engineering Award. Recipients of the Gilbreth award are recognized for their valuable contributions in the areas of management, technical achievement, innovation, and patents and research. Martin-Vega, an IIE Fellow, has been dean of engineering at NC State since 2006. He serves on several national engineering leadership boards and was named the Outstanding Engineer in North Carolina in 2008 by the North Carolina Society of Engineers.

Lavelle will be given IIE’s Fellow Award, which recognizes outstanding leaders who have made significant, nationally recognized contributions to industrial engineering. A Fellow is the highest classification of IIE membership; no more than 20 can be named each year. Lavelle has been associate dean in the College since 2010. He has played a significant role in the development, implementation and growth of various programs including the First-Year Engineering Program, the Engineering Transition Program and the Ben Franklin Scholars Program.

Harrysson will receive the institute’s award for Technical Innovation in Industrial Engineering, which honors pioneering technical contributions to the field. His groundbreaking health care work in osseointegration, a process that fuses a prosthetic limb directly to bone, has drawn international attention. He partners with NC State veterinary surgeons to custom-design prosthetics that behave much like natural limbs. The prosthetics have been successfully implanted in cats and dogs, and the goal is to bring the revolutionary process to humans.

Founded in 1948, IIE is an international, nonprofit association that provides leadership for the application, education, training, research, and development of industrial engineering. It is the largest industrial engineering professional society.