Multidisciplinary research is something to which schools and departments everywhere pay lip service, but UCLA's Department of Materials Science and Engineering is showing that it takes that goal seriously. The department sought out and enlisted seven professors from the departments of chemistry, mathematics and mechanical and aerospace engineering to become joint appointment faculty. The appointments were approved in July.

King-Ning Tu, chair of the department, believes that the seven joint appointments will strengthen the department's teaching and research efforts.

"Materials science and engineering is by nature a field that attracts multi-disciplinary study," Tu said. "I am delighted that we are able to attract other faculty on the campus who are working on materials-related research to join us."

Russel Caflisch

Professor Russel Caflisch

Russel Caflisch is a Professor in the Mathematics department at UCLA. He received his PhD in Mathematics from the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences at New York University in 1978. He was an Assistant Professor at Stanford and a Professor at Courant before moving to Los Angeles in 1989, to work at UCLA.

As a member of the California NanoSystems Institute, he is currently concentrating on nanoscale systems. In addition, Caflisch has worked on a wide range of topics in applied mathematics, including kinetic theory of rarefied gas dynamics, multiphase fluid flows and computational finance.

Currently, he leads a group of applied mathematicians and materials scientists working on modeling and simulation for epitaxial growth and device properties.

"My group is particularly focused on multi-scale analysis, combining models and simulation methods at different length scales from the atomistic to the macroscopic," said Caflisch.

Much of this work is in collaboration with HRL Laboratories in Malibu. Russel was awarded a Hertz Foundation Graduate Fellowship and a Sloan Foundation Research Fellowship.

Professor Russel Caflisch's web page: http://www.math.ucla.edu/~caflisch/

Emily Ann Carter

Professor Emily Ann Carter

Emily Ann Carter is a Professor of Chemistry and Materials Science and Engineering. She received her B.S. in Chemistry at UC Berkeley in 1982 and Ph.D. in Chemistry at Caltech in 1987. She ventured eastward for a one-year postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Colorado, Boulder, before returning to her native California as an Assistant Professor of Physical Chemistry at UCLA in 1988. Carter was promoted to tenure in 1992, to full Professor in 1994, and to her current joint appointment in 2002

Carter's research group combines chemistry, solid state physics, materials science, and mechanical engineering to understand how materials fail due to chemical and mechanical effects and how to optimally protect these materials.

"An entirely new area in which we are beginning to work involves collaboration with engineers to bridge length scales from the atomistic to the macroscopic, so that one can include chemistry at a fundamental level into models for the simulation of corrosion and fracture of materials," said Carter.

Carter and her research group aim for a comprehensive understanding of the energetics, kinetics, and dynamics of chemical processes, primarily those occurring at surfaces and interfaces-although also of interest are gas phase combustion processes.

"We are interested in how metal-ceramic and ceramic-ceramic interfaces form and degrade, how to optimize interfacial adhesion, chemisorption, and reaction of molecules on metals and metal oxides, and how to prevent the degradation of metals via corrosion and embrittlement," Carter explained.

Her work has garnered a number of national and international awards including Fellowships of the American Vacuum Society, the American Physical Society, and the AAAS.

Professor Emily Carter's Web page: http://www.chem.ucla.edu/carter

Nasr M. Ghoniem

Professor Nasr M. Ghoniem

Nasr M. Ghoniem is a Professor in the department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at UCLA. He earned his B.Sc. in nuclear engineering at Alexandria University in Egypt in 1971. He received an M.Eng. in engineering physics at McMaster University in Canada in 1974, followed by M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in nuclear engineering from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1975 and 1977 respectively.

Ghoniem is a Fellow of the American Nuclear Society and a 1998 recipient of that organization's Outstanding Achievement Award. This year, Ghoniem was one of two UCLA professors awarded the Faculty/Staff Partnership Award by the UCLA Staff Assembly for his commitment to collegiality with staff.

Ghoniem is an authority on the mechanics and physics of material defects, such as dislocations, voids and cracks. He studies material degradation in severe environments, as well as radiation interaction with materials.

Professor Nasr Ghoniem's web page: http://www.mae.ucla.edu/academics/faculty/ghoniem.htm

Vijay Gupta

Professor Vijay Gupta

Vijay Gupta is a Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering. He received his Bachelor of Technology degree in civil engineering in 1985 from the Indian Institute of Technology in Bombay. He earned his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from MIT in 1987 and 1990 respectively. He joined the faculty as a professor at UCLA in 1995.

Gupta is an expert in characterizing deformation and fracture in solids such as composites, ice, ceramics and thin film interfaces, using special diagnostic tools involving optics and lasers. In fact, Gupta holds a U.S. patent on a laser spallation experiment for measuring the tensile strength of thin film interfaces.

For many years, Gupta has examined the reliability of aerospace components made from composite materials and those employing corrosion-resistant and thermal barrier coatings, like those used in jet aircraft engines. More recently, he has studied the use of laser-generated stress waves for the cavitation of human fat and tattoo removal, cellular adhesion to implant surfaces, and construction of electronic circuits to flexible substrates.

Professor Vijay Gupta's web page: http://www.mae.ucla.edu/academics/faculty/gupta.htm

Thomas Hahn

Professor H. Thomas Hahn

Thomas Hahn is the Hughes Professor in the mechanical and aerospace engineering department and serves as editor-in-chief of the Journal of Composite Materials. Hahn earned a B.S. degree in Mechanical Engineering from Seoul National University, Korea, in 1964. In 1968, he earned an M.S. degree and in 1971 he earned a Ph.D. degree in Engineering Mechanics from Penn State University.

Hahn was a professor at Washington University in St.Louis and he held research positions at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and the Air Force Materials Laboratory. He joined the UCLA faculty in 1992 from Penn State University where he was the Harry and Arlene Schell Professor. Hahn has served as chair of the mechanical and aerospace engineering department at UCLA since 2002.

Hahn is a fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, a fellow of the American Society for Composites, and a member of the National Academy of Engineering of Korea. He was president of the American Society for Composites, 1996-1997, and president of the Korean-American Scientists and Engineers Association, 1999-2000. He served as an IPA/Program Manager of the Mechanics of Materials and Devices Program at the Air Force Office of Scientific Research from 1999 until 2001.

Hahn's research interests cover a wide spectrum of composites technology ranging from design and analysis to processing and manufacturing. His current research focus is on multifunctional polymer nanocomposites.

"The ability to add functionality to a composite benefits a host of industries," said Hahn, whose work in composites started in 1972 when he was with the Air Force Materials Laboratory. "In the aerospace industry in particular there is a strong incentive to use high-performance materials. Space applications, satellites and stealth aircraft all require high precision, temperature control, stiffness control, stability and radar absorption."

Hahn's web page: http://ime.ucla.edu/~hahn/

Richard B. Kaner

Professor Richard B. Kaner

Richard B. Kaner is a Professor of Chemistry at UCLA. He received his Ph.D. in inorganic chemistry in 1984 at the University of Pennsylvania. He was a postdoctoral fellow at UC Berkeley until 1986, before joining UCLA the following year as an assistant professor. He has been a professor since 1993.

Kaner is the current recipient of the Gold Shield Faculty Prize for academic excellence along with several other teaching awards. He is also a Packard Fellow in Science and Engineering, an Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellow, and a John Simon Guggenheim Fellow.

Kaner's solid state research group concentrates on the synthesis and characterization of new materials.

"Many useful materials, such as ceramics, are produced from high temperature reactions which often take days due to slow solid-solid diffusion," said Kaner. "We are developing new methods such as reactions between metal halides and alkali compounds which enable high quality refractory materials to be synthesized in seconds".

Kaner is also exploring the use of conducting polymers as separation membranes for gases, liquids and enantiomers, and his group continues to be at the forefront of activity in carbon chemistry including the recent synthesis of carbon nanoscrolls.

Professor Richard Kaner's web page: http://www.chem.ucla.edu/dept/Faculty/kaner/

Fred Wudl

Professor Fred Wudl

Fred Wudl is the Courtaulds Professor of Chemistry and Materials and Director of the Exotic Materials Institute at the UCLA. He received a B.S. in 1964 and a Ph.D. in 1967 from UCLA, where his dissertation work was done with nobel laureate and chemist Professor Donald J. Cram. After completing postdoctoral research at Harvard, he joined the faculty of the State University of New York at Buffalo. In 1972 he moved to AT&T Bell Laboratories and ten years later he moved to UCSB, where he served as Professor of Chemistry and Materials and Associate Director of the Institute for Polymers and Organic Solids. In 1997 he moved to UCLA to occupy the Courtaulds Chair of Chemistry and become director of the Exotic Materials Institute.

Wudl's research group explores several research areas, including organic metals/superconductors, organic ferromagnets, ultrahard organic materials, and conjugated polymers.

Professor Fred Wudl's web page: http://www.chem.ucla.edu/dept/Organic/wudl.html

-Chris Sutton
03/15/03