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The SAFER Barrier has been saving lives for more than a decade at NASCAR and IndyCar circuits across the United States, as well as in the European circuit. On April 11, SAE International honored the team that created the Steel Foam Energy Reduction Barriers with the 2017 SAE John Melvin Motorsports Safety Award, which includes Dean Sicking, Ph.D.

In March, more than 200 cardiovascular scientists, biomedical engineers and physicians from around the world attended the Fourth Annual NIH Progenitor Cell Translational Consortium (PCTC) 2018 Cardiovascular Bioengineering (CVBE) Symposium at UAB. The event was held over two days at the UAB Hill Student Center.

Alex Plazas, a sophomore in the Department of Biomedical Engineering, is one of four UAB students named University Innovation Fellows by Stanford University’s Hasso Plattner Institute of Design.

Vladimir Vantsevich, a professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, was recently appointed chair of the Technical Committee for Transportation Machinery in the International Federation for the Promotion of Mechanism and Machine Science (IFToMM).

Virginia Sisiopiku, Ph.D., was selected by the Engineering Council of Birmingham (ECOB) as the 2017 Educator of the Year. The award was presented at the 59^th Annual Awards Banquet on February 20, 2018. Sisiopiku is the first UAB engineering faculty member to receive the ECOB Educator of the Year Award.

Many aspiring scientists wonder how they’ll find the right lab to launch their research career. Retta El-Sayed was pulled right in by a giant magnet.

The Construction Engineering Management (CEM) track of study welcomed 39 new students to the graduate track of study. However, due to a blast of Canadian air that blanketed much of the east coast with ice, snow, and artic temperatures, only about 24 students were able to attend the January 5 and 6 boot camp. Students came from as far as Oregon, California, and Washington State for the two day event.

Large, human cardiac-muscle patches created in the lab have been tested, for the first time, on large animals in a heart attack model. This clinically relevant approach showed that the patches significantly improved recovery from heart attack injury.

Karim I. Budhwani will be honored in two commencement ceremonies this spring—once as a graduate from UAB’s Materials Engineering Ph.D. program, and then again on May 6 as the speaker at Coe College in Iowa.

A pair of Materials Science and Engineering students recently won first place in the Failure Analysis Competition at the 42nd Annual International Conference and Expo on Advanced Ceramics and Composites (ICACC) in Daytona Beach, Florida.

Aidan King, a senior materials engineering student, is the featured student in AFS Student Chapter Digest, a quarterly newsletter for AFS student members that was launched earlier this month.

Emily Shedlarski, a 2014 graduate from the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, is featured in the "Industry Voices" feature of the October 2017 issue of Modern Casting.

Earlier this summer, more than 20 high school students got a taste of college and a strong dose of engineering knowledge during the 2017 UAB Materials Camp.

A recent brief in the Wall Street Journal points to a troubling trend in engineering. Even as the computer science and engineering fields are growing, the article states, “men continue to flock to those lucrative positions in significantly larger numbers than women.”

Overexpression of Cell-Cycle Activator Gene Enhances Repair of Dead Heart Muscle

Researchers in the Department of Biomedical Engineering report a significant advance in efforts to repair a damaged heart after a heart attack, using grafted heart-muscle cells to create a repair patch. The key was overexpressing a gene that activates the cell-cycle of the grafted muscle cells, so they grow and divide more than control grafted cells.

The UAB Engineering and Innovative Technology Development (EITD) research group was recently announced as a partner in a $500-million contract issued from NASA’s International Space Station (ISS) Program Office.

SOE Professor Says Drones Have Potential to Find Flaws in Aging Bridges

Nasim Uddin, Ph.D., a professor in the Department of Civil, Construction, and Environmental Engineering, is using a $500,000 grant from the National Science Foundation to explore ways to make America's bridges safer.

$2 Million Grant Seeks to Improve Care of Patients with Kidney Disease

A company cofounded by biomedical engineering professor Ho Wook Jun, Ph.D., is teaming up with UAB physicians and researchers to improve care for patients with end-stage kidney disease, thanks to a $2-million grant from the National institutes of Health.

Mechanical Engineering Professor Vladimir Vantsevich, Ph.D., recently was awarded the Thar Energy Design Award by the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME). The award, presented by the Thar Energy Company, is given annually to honor significant contributions to energy engineering. The award was presented at the 2017 ASME IDETC/CIE Conference in Cleveland Ohio.

The National Cooperative Highway Research Program (NCHRP) recently accepted three proposals as part of a national search for ideas to improve highway safety, including one from UAB mechanical engineering professor Dean Sicking, Ph.D. 

Amber Genau, Ph.D., an associate professor in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, has been selected to receive the President's Award for Excellence in Teaching. She is one of 12 UAB faculty members who will be recognized during the annual Faculty Convocation to be held on Tuesday September 19 at 4 p.m. at the UAB Alumni House.

The Construction Engineering Management (CEM) track of study welcomed a record 54 new students to the graduate track of study. However, due to hurricane Harvey making landfall in the Gulf of Mexico, only about 42 students were able to attend the August 25-26 boot camp. Students came from as far as California and Washington State for the two day event.

Dominique T. Everett was awarded the NSF EPSCoR Scholarship for Ph.D. research, Sharon Uwanyuze presented a paper at AISTech, and Md Mehedi Hasan earned the AIST Training Award this spring.

The Leah McCraney Memorial Endowed Scholarship was established to provide funds to deserving students in the Advanced Safety Engineering and Management (ASEM) concentration. The 2017 award recipient is Nicholas Latham.

Rosalia N. Scripa, Ph.D., professor emerita in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, has been included in Marquis Who’s Who.

Kirsten Pittman and Zebediah Dahlke have received American Foundry Society – Birmingham Chapter Scholarship for the 2017 year.

The Construction Engineering Management (CEM) track of study greeted a total of 42 new students during the January 6 boot camp. Due to winter weather advisories in Birmingham, the CEM team was forced to cancel the on-campus schedule and quickly implement a virtual online orientation event.

In a career that spanned more than 35 years, Dr. Martha Bidez helped make the world safer place. After earning multiple engineering degrees from UAB, Bidez led a distinguished career in both the academic and private sectors that established her as one of the nation’s foremost authorities in safety engineering.