• Batill Named Department Chair • Corke Publishes Book on Aircraft Design • Mueller Named RAeS Fellow • Nelson Receives Fulbright Scholar Award • Schmid Named Kaneb Fellow • Automated Wheelchair Offers New Freedom for Disabled People Batill Named Department Chair Professor Stephen M. Batill, a faculty member since 1978, has been named chair of the Department of Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering. He replaces Robert C. Nelson, professor of aerospace and mechanical engineering, who had served as department chair since 1996. Long recognized by fellow faculty and students for his innovative approach to engineering education, Batill most recently served as associate dean of educational programs in the College of Engineering. During his three-year term as associate dean, he was actively involved in the development of EG111/112, the first-year engineering course sequence, and the creation of the Engineering Learning Center, a prototype facility that promotes multidisciplinary, hands-on activities. Batill received his bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees -- all in aerospace engineering -- from Notre Dame. He began his career as an aeronautical engineer at the Air Force Dynamics Laboratory at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. In addition to his duties as department chair, course instructor, and researcher, Batill conducts a National Science Foundation sponsored workshop for faculty from other universities to study his team-based design methodologies. [back to top] Corke Publishes Book on Aircraft Design Thomas C. Corke, the Clark Equipment Professor of Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering and director of the Hessert Laboratory for Aerospace Research and the Center for Flow Physics and Control, has published a textbook on aircraft design. The book, released by Prentice Hall in November 2002, divides the conceptualization and design process into 14 elements, demonstrating how the historical aspects of aircraft systems provide the necessary parameters for the design of a supersonic business jet. Corke has been a faculty member since 1999. His research interests focus on fluid mechanics, specifically hydrodynamic stability; transition of laminar flow to turbulent flow; computational fluid dynamics; aeroacoustics; turbulence; and applications of flow control related to these topics. [back to top] Mueller Named RAeS Fellow Roth-Gibson Professor of Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering Thomas J. Mueller has been elected to the grade of fellow in the Royal Aeronautical Society of London (RAeS). Cited for his “outstanding contributions to the aeronautical sciences,” Mueller is the first member of the Notre Dame faculty to be elected a fellow in the RAeS. A leading researcher in the area of the aerodynamics of micro-air-vehicles and the complex flow phenomena present at low Reynolds numbers, Mueller has been a member of the Notre Dame faculty since 1965. [back to top] Nelson Receives Fulbright Scholar Award The U.S. Department of State and the J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board have awarded Robert C. Nelson, professor of aerospace and mechanical engineering, a Fulbright Scholar grant for the 2002-03 academic year. Nelson is one of approximately 800 U.S. faculty and industry professionals who will travel to some 140 countries during the year. He will be conducting research and lecturing on aviation safety in Göttingen, Germany. A member of the Notre Dame faculty since 1975, Nelson’s research interests include aircraft stability and control, fluid mechanics, and aerodynamics. [back to top] Schmid Named Kaneb Fellow Steven R. Schmid, associate professor of aerospace and mechanical engineering, has been named a faculty fellow for the 2002-03 academic year by the University’s Kaneb Center for Teaching and Learning. Throughout the year Kaneb faculty fellows, who are selected for their accomplishments in discipline-specific areas, share their teaching expertise and experiences via workshops, discussion groups, research, and individual consultation. Co-author of three books and various journal and conference papers, Schmid specializes in tribology; manufacturing process simulation and optimization; surface generation, measurement, and modeling; and the tribo-characteristics and wear of tool materials and machinery elements. He joined the University in 1993. [back to top] Automated Wheelchair Offers New Freedom for Disabled People Steven B. Skaar, professor of aerospace and mechanical engineering, and Linda Fehr, an electrical engineer in rehabilitation research at the Edward Hines Jr. Veterans Administration Hospital, have developed a prototype wheelchair that follows pre-programmed paths with little physical direction from the user. For example, a chair “rider” could steer the device by blowing through a straw, using a bite switch, or actually speaking the commands. Funded by the Department of Veterans’ Affairs and Rehabilitation Research and Development Service, Skaar and associates are halfway through their two-year plan. But the idea was born in 1990, when a company asked him to develop an automatic floor sweeper. From that original concept he continued to refine the navigational technologies that now automate the “smart” wheelchair. Although the prototype chair has some limitations -- only able to move along pre-programmed paths and unable to function accurately out of doors -- Skaar compares the chair’s potential to that of the early computer. “It can be an incredible tool, enabling users to travel beyond their immediate physical abilities,” he says, “but its users will be the ones to chart its ultimate success. There are other ‘automatic’ chairs available, but we’re offering a different approach to the navigational capabilities of the chair along with command flexibility for the user.” Other automated wheelchair projects are under way throughout the world, but very few of them are based in the United States. Many of those already on the market are called “power wheelchairs” with a base price of $4,000. Veterans’ Affairs has applied for a patent on Skaar’s smart chair, and their researchers are talking with several manufacturers who have exhibited an interest in producing the smart chair. For more information on Skaar’s smart wheelchair project, visit http://www.nd.edu/~ame/facultystaff/Skaar,Steven.html. [back to top]