Smith Part of "Best Paper" Team James MacGregor Smith of the Mechanical and Industrial Engineering Department was part of a research team that just won this year’s “Best Paper Award,” as chosen by the Computational Optimization and Applications (COAP) editorial board from the journal’s previous year’s (2008) articles. Smith shares the honor with co-authors Peter Hahn, Bum-Jin Kim, Monique Guignard-Spielberg, and Yi-Rong Zhu at the University of Pennsylvania for their paper "An algorithm for the generalized quadratic assignment problem," published in Volume 40, Issue 3, pages 351-372, of 2008. COAP is a peer reviewed journal that is committed to timely publication of research and tutorial papers on the analysis and development of computational algorithms and modeling technology for optimization. It examines algorithms either for general classes of optimization problems or for more specific applied problems, stochastic algorithms, as well as deterministic algorithms. Read More

MIE Researchers Featured in Physics Today The October 2009 Physics Today cover story looks at the work on superhydrophobic surfaces being done by several researchers in the Mechanical and Industrial Engineering Department. As the story notes, “Researchers led by Jonathan Rothstein at the University of Massachusetts Amherst now offer a proof-of-principle demonstration of a new, passive option for reducing drag in a turbulent flow. They tailored the microscale structure of a hydrophobic material—polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS), akin to the rubbery polymer used to caulk bathtubs—to create air pockets that allow the flow to “slip” (shear free) at the liquid–air interface. The greater the area covered by air pockets, the greater the overall reduction in shear stress—up to 50%, the researchers estimate.” Besides Rothstein, the other researches cited in the article were Blair Perot, R. J. Daniello, N. E. Waterhouse,  J. Ou, and Michael Martell. Read the article. Read More

Breaking the Bottleneck in Hydrogen Storage Hydrogen fuel, because its only byproduct is steam, should be the ultimate in green alternatives to fossil fuels, but it hasn’t delivered on its promise yet because of one enormous stumbling block, storage. Now a team of chemical engineers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst has developed a computational model which shows that carbon nanotubes may offer a surprising solution. Results are presented in the current issue of the journal, Applied Physics Letters. “If this works as we expect, it’s perhaps no longer science fiction to hope for a briefcase-sized hydrogen battery to run a bus or car,” says UMass Amherst chemical engineering professor Dimitrios Maroudas. Read More