Engineering Welcomes New Dean

An accomplished teacher and researcher who has served as chair of the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at North Carolina State University since 1999, Peter K. Kilpatrick has been appointed the dean of the College of Engineering. He will join the University in January 2008.

Kilpatrick earned his doctorate in chemical engineering from the University of Minnesota and his bachelor’s degree in chemistry from Occidental College in Los Angeles. He has been a member of the North Carolina State faculty for 25 years. His research focuses on colloidal and interfacial science, with particular emphasis on the colloidal and molecular properties of crude oil and on biological membranes. His work, which promotes more energy-efficient and environmentally responsible oil production and refining, led to the development of the Biomanufacturing Training and Education Center at North Carolina State, a unique facility that focuses on protein manufacturing.

He succeeds Frank P. Incropera, the Brosey Professor of Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering, who had served as dean since 1998, and James L. Merz, the Frank M. Freimann Professor of Electrical Engineering, who will continue his tenure as interim dean until Kilpatrick begins in January. “Notre Dame has a tremendous and well-deserved reputation for excellence in undergraduate education that I am committed to maintaining and enhancing,” says Kilpatrick. “I am also excited about building upon the graduate research component of the college and continuing to create distinctive engineers who are morally grounded in a mission such as the University’s. Such engineers can truly make an impact on our world.”

Historically speaking, Kilpatrick will be the 16th dean of the college, which was officially established as a college with its own dean in 1920. Each dean has served the University and the college well, often during exciting times. For example, the original Engineering Hall was destroyed and a new hall (the current Cushing Hall of Engineering) constructed during the tenure of Rev. Thomas A. Steiner, C.S.C. Under Donald C. Jackson, the fourth dean of engineering, Notre Dame received its first accreditations for its engineering programs. The first supersonic smoke tunnel in the United States was constructed on campus in 1959. Fitzpatrick Hall of Engineering was dedicated in 1979 and the Hessert Laboratory for Aerospace Research in 1991. There have also been numerous innovations over the years, such as the development of Quantum-dot Cellular Automata, the design of novel technologies to address the nationwide problem of combined sewer overflow, the demonstration of magnetic logic, the discovery of a new class of materials (actinyl peroxide compounds), and the design of a number of ionic liquids that dissolve carbon dioxide (applications for clean coal technologies). All testify to a forward-thinking administration and dedicated faculty in the College of Engineering. All point to a future as exciting as the past.