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Richard Buckius
Assistant Director, Directorate for Engineering. National Science Foundation
Engineering and National Priorities
Thursday, April 12, 20072:00 PM
Engineering 2 Building, room 180
Announcement:
Distinguished Lecture - Jack Baskin School of Engineering Tenth Anniversary Celebration
Abstract:
The National Science Foundation's Directorate for Engineering (ENG), through its support of education and fundamental research, plays a major role in addressing national priorities. Engineering's contributions are critical to ensuring the robust competitiveness of the nation, pushing the research frontier, and preparing a technologically enabled workforce. Within this context, there are a number of internal and external forces that have and will continue to affect ENG's success in achieving these goals. The forces include the nation's priorities - such as the American Competitiveness Initiative (ACI), the balance between proposals and awards, and the impact on the engineering research and education. Trends in ENG's activities and programs will shine light on the current and future demands on engineering and NSF.
Biography:
Dr. Buckius joined the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) in 1975 and, since 1984, is a professor of mechanical engineering. He was associate head (1985-87) and head (1988-2005) of the department of mechanical and industrial engineering, as well as associate vice chancellor for research (1988-91).
Buckius serves as the National Science Foundation's (NSF) assistant director for engineering and since September 2006. Previously he was the acting Assistant Director for Engineering (2005-06), director for the Engineering Directorate's Division of Chemical and Transport Systems (2004 -05), and program director of the Thermal Systems and Engineering Program (1987-88).
Throughout his professional career, Buckius has gained an international reputation for leadership in the field of thermal sciences. Much of his research is fundamental in nature, but it has vital implications for the engineering profession and society. This research covers radiative heat transfer, Monte Carlo methods in scattering media and scattering from rough interfaces.
Buckius is author/co-author of over 100 publications, books and invited talks and articles. He co-authored a textbook titled Fundamentals of Engineering Thermodynamics (Mc-Graw-Hill). Published in English, Spanish and international versions (1987), and the expanded second edition versions followed in 1992. He is a member of the editorial board of Nanoscale and Microscale Thermophysical Engineering, Heat Transfer Research, and Heat Transfer-Japanese Research.
A Fellow of ASME, Buckius has served as the technical group leader of Basic Engineering; he previously served as vice president (2004-05) and was a member of the Basic Engineering Technical Operating Board (1999-2001). For the Heat Transfer Division, he was on the Executive Committee (1998-96) and served as chair (1995-96); and was a member of the Energy Systems Committee (1998-96) and served as chair (1995-96); and was a member of the Energy Systems Committee (1982-2000). He was associate technical editor for the Journal of Heat Transfer (1992-98) and member of the ASME NSF Task Force (1993-2004), and served on the Nominating Committee (1997).
Buckius is an Associate Fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics; and a member of the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE), the Combustion Institute and Pi Tau Sigma.
Among his honors are ASME's Potter Gold Medal (2006), ASEE's Ralph Coats Roe Award (2003), Western Electric Fund Award (1981) and Dow Outstanding Young Faculty award from the Illinois-Indiana Section (1978); and numerous UIUC teaching awards, ranging from the Stanley H. Pierce Faculty Award from the College of Engineering (1979) and Campus Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching (1980) to six Alumni Teaching awards, the most recent from the department of mechanical and industrial engineering in 2000.
Buckius received his bachelor's and master's degrees and his PhD in mechanical engineering at the University of California, Berkeley, in 1972, 1973 and 1975, respectively.