News
Mechanical and Industrial Engineering Ph.D.

RIT will begin offering two new Ph.D. programs beginning in the fall of 2023: business administration and cognitive science. Today, RIT enrolls 300 students in 11 Ph.D. programs.

RIT’s strategic plan calls for adding six to 12 new Ph.D. programs and conferring 50 doctoral degrees every year by 2025. The university already reached the latter goal with 51 Ph.D. degrees conferred in the 2020-2021 academic year.

As one of the leading causes of death in hospitals, sepsis becomes more complicated with the rise in bacteria most resistant to some of today’s antibiotics. If physicians can detect onset earlier, treatments could begin sooner. Ke Du, a mechanical engineering faculty-researcher, will be developing a microfluidic device to improve detection of drug resistant bacteria in blood.

As part of new faculty orientation, RIT’s College of Engineering Technology and Kate Gleason College of Engineering hosted a pilot workshop to introduce KEEN: Engineering Unleashed and its entrepreneurial mindset—a national initiative to advance engineering education.

RIT faculty-researchers will develop a game-design training system that could help astronauts maintain balance, motor skills, and other cognitive functions while in space. NASA, in partnership with the National Space Grant Foundation, has selected six university teams, including RIT, to develop innovative design ideas that will help NASA advance and execute its Moon to Mars exploration objectives.

Undergraduates aren’t the only students taking advantage of RIT’s co-op and internship program. Across the university, Ph.D. students are securing prestigious work experiences to provide important gateways to careers in industry, foundations, and government.

The Institute of Industrial and Systems Engineers has named Nabil Nasr, associate provost and founding director of RIT’s Golisano Institute for Sustainability, and Iris Rivero, head of RIT’s Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, as Fellows, an honor that recognizes outstanding leaders of the profession who have made significant, nationally recognized contributions to industrial and systems engineering.

Researchers at RIT are using augmented and virtual reality as part of a modern training platform to help address the skilled labor shortage in manufacturing. Using artificial intelligence and augmented or virtual reality applications as a training strategy can support novice trainees and retain the knowledge of master machinists and manufacturing engineers.

RIT graduate programs are among the best in the nation, according to the U.S. News & World Report annual statistical survey of graduate programs.

Three new engineering doctoral degree programs at RIT were approved by the New York State Department of Education and are focused on using multidisciplinary approaches to solving today’s global challenges.

While the pandemic touched RIT locally, Ruben Proano, associate professor of industrial engineering, saw it from a global perspective, as part of a year-long sabbatical at UNICEF in Copenhagen, Denmark. His work extended ongoing research on making the vaccine market more affordable and profitable.