News
Mechanical Engineering MS

To build understanding of faculty compensation systems and improve conversations around salary, several RIT faculty members are sharing their experiences with a National Science Foundation-funded multidisciplinary research team. The team’s goal is to significantly expand knowledge of best practices for faculty compensation to a broader community in higher education and provide insights to guide compensation practices.  

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.

RIT honored its 2020 class of Distinguished Faculty—Manuela Campanelli, Satish Kandlikar and James Perkins. The Distinguished Professor designation is given to tenured faculty who have shown continued excellence over their careers in teaching, scholarly contributions, lasting contributions in creative and professional work and service to both the university and community.

Ke Du and Blanca Lapizco-Encinas, both faculty-researchers in RIT’s Kate Gleason College of Engineering, worked with an international team to collaborate on the design of a next-generation miniature lab device that uses magnetic nano-beads to isolate minute bacterial particles that cause diseases. This new technology improves how clinicians isolate drug-resistant strains of bacterial infections and difficult-to-detect micro-particles such as those making up Ebola and coronaviruses.

ASME.org features David Swerzenski '17 (mechanical engineering) and talks to Tim Landschoot, principal lecturer in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, and Catherine Osadciw, fifth-year software engineering major.

The American Society of Mechanical Engineers features Risa Robinson, department head, mechanical engineering.

WROC-TV talks to Risa Robinson, department head and professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, about her research on vaping and e-cigarettes.

Intersections: The RIT Podcast, Ep. 21: Are electronic cigarettes really a healthier alternative to tobacco products? Risa Robinson, head of RIT’s Department of Mechanical Engineering, talks with Edward Hensel, associate dean, about their unique research methods into how these devices are used and how they affect users’ health.

Faculty and student researchers at RIT, and physicians from the Rochester Regional Health System (RRHS), developed a non-invasive process using infrared imaging to better detect cancerous tumors.

Michael Mandina, president of Optimax, and Richard Plympton, CEO of Optimax, have been named the 2019 recipients of the Herbert W. Vanden Brul Entrepreneurial Award, presented by Saunders College of Business. The award is given to entrepreneurial leaders in the greater Rochester region who have developed a business that has improved the local or regional economy or whose innovative management skills have changed the course of an existing business.

A faculty-researcher at Rochester Institute of technology has developed a prototype micro device with bio-sensors that can detect the deadly Ebola virus. With this type of device, those infected can be treated earlier, and the early detection process can potentially decrease the spread of infections.

Risa Robinson has taken a different approach to assessing e-cigarette usage, and it’s turned up some attention-getting results. Robinson studies users in their own environments, puffing on their own e-cigarettes, rather than on test machines in lab settings. And what she’s found is that they are puffing as much, if not more, than traditional cigarette users, resulting in potentially higher exposure to harmful substances.