McKelvey School of Engineering

Should weather conditions create potentially hazardous travel conditions, Washington University will evaluate the situation and take into consideration the safety of the faculty, staff and students as well as the services that must be provided despite the inclement weather.

The Advanced Coal and Energy Research Facility, an experimental combustion facility on the Danforth Campus of Washington University in St. Louis, was dedicated in October 2010. At the time, the combuster was cold and the bioreactors empty. Now that the facility is up and running, Richard Axelbaum, PhD, professor of energy, environmental & chemical Engineering in the School of Engineering & Applied Science and director of the new facility, gives a video tour of the new laboratory.  

On Nov. 18, Paul C. Paris, PhD, professor emeritus of mechanics in the School of Engineering & Applied Science at Washington University in St. Louis, received an honorary doctorate from the University of Paris West, one of many awards to cap his career in fracture mechanics.

Before Google became a household word, engineers like Anna Patterson (EN ’87, EN ’87) were figuring out how to search the Internet and find the most relevant answers to random queries. The director of Google Research returns to campus at 8 a.m. Thursday, Nov. 18, as guest speaker co-sponsored by Olin Business School and the School of Engineering & Applied Science. She will talk about her experience in Silicon Valley as an entrepreneur and member of the Google team.

Astronaut Walt Cunningham will share his experiences as Lunar Module Pilot for Apollo 7, the first manned Apollo mission, during a 3 p.m. talk Thursday, Oct. 7, in Washington University’s Brookings Hall, Room 300. He also will present Washington University in St. Louis senior Kaitlin E. Burlingame with a $10,000 scholarship from the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation during a public presentation and ceremony.

Stephen F. & Camilla T. Brauer Hall, the second building in a new engineering complex at Washington University in St. Louis, was dedicated in a ceremony held on Friday, Oct. 1. Brauer Hall includes state-of-the-art laboratories, a distance-learning classroom, instrumentation and imaging facilities, and electronically equipped collaboration points in the halls near the labs. The three-story building, which includes many other innovative features, has received LEED Gold certification.

Academic leaders from some of the world’s premier universities will gather at Washington University in St. Louis Oct. 1-5 to discuss the world’s energy future at the “McDonnell International Scholars Academy Symposium: Global Energy Future.”

Washington University Frontiers in Technology and Science, a one-day conference modeled on the Kavli Frontiers of Science conference, hopes to connect WUSTL faculty in the sciences, engineering or mathematics and spur cross-disciplinary collaborations. The conference will be held from 10:30 a.m.-4:30 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 25, in Cupples I, Room 199.

Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon leaves Washington University’s Brauer Hall with his wife, Georganne Wheeler Nixon, Friday, Sept. 17, after outlining his vision for Missouri’s energy future before a group of CEOs and other leaders of major energy producers and industrial and commercial energy consumers at the “Energy Policy Discussion.” The meeting was co-sponsored by the Missouri Chamber of Commerce and the School of Engineering & Applied Science.

This fall, the Department of Computer Science & Engineering  in the School of Engineering & Applied Science at Washington University in St. Louis is holding a five-part lecture series on cyber-physical systems, a topic increasingly recognized as key to the future competitiveness of U.S. industry. The first talk will be Friday, Sept. 24.