Recent News and Accomplishments

Tissa Illangasekare, Environmental Science and Engineering, has been awarded the distinction of AAAS (American Association for the Advancement of Science) Fellow in the Section on Agriculture, Food, and Renewable Resources. AAAS, the world's largest general scientific society and publisher of the journal "Science," recognized Illangasekare for his "distinguished contributions to improving fundamental understanding of flow and transport processes in soils and groundwater, including snow, through innovative laboratory, field and modeling studies."

Mines was selected as a "best buy" in Barron's ninth (2006) edition of its annual Best Buys in College Education.

Dr. Myles W. (Bill) Scoggins joined the Mines community in June as the School's 16th president.  Scoggins, a retired senior executive of ExxonMobil Corporation, earned his B.S. and Ph.D. in petroleum engineering from the University of Tulsa, and he earned his M.S. in petroleum engineering from the University of Oklahoma. President Scoggins brings a wealth of industry experience and a passion for higher education to his post at Mines.

Mines developed a visionary seven-part strategic plan for the next decade that will optimize, consolidate and align institutional resources in support of key programmatic areas such as earth, energy, materials and environment.  The Plan sets dynamic goals for the future while preserving Mines’ long tradition of excellence.

Dr. Barbara Olds has been appointed Associate Vice President for Educational Innovation in the Office of Academic Affairs at Mines. Her responsibilities in this new position include oversight of the Center for Engineering Education, the McBride Honors Program and the EPICS Program. Dr. Olds will help foster continuous programmatic innovation in accordance with the School’s Strategic Plan. Barbara returns to Mines after three years at the NSF, prior to which she served as Mines’ Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs, Principal Tutor for the McBride Honors Program, Director of EPICS and Professor of Liberal Arts and International Studies.

Khanh Vu BSc CPR ’93 has been appointed Director of the Minority Engineering Program (MEP). Previously employed by Amoco Production Company, he worked in completion, exploration and research concerning tight sand and coal-bed methane wells.

A new research center, the Colorado Fuel Cell Center(CFCC), celebrated its grand opening in May at CSM.  Mines is partnering with the Governor’s Office of Energy Management and Conservation, the Gas Technology Institute, Versa Power Systems, Inc., and the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Lab. The state-of-the-art CFCC laboratory will be home to world class experts and projects focusing on research in the areas of electrochemical technology, materials, and fuel processing, and will collaborate with other national laboratories and with local and national fuel cell industries.

Professor Kevin L. Moore, G.A. Dobelman Distinguished Chair and Professor of Engineering and Director of Mines’ Center for Automation, Robotics, and Distributed Intelligence, is an invited plenary lecturer at the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers International Conference on Mechatronics and Automation in Luoyang, China, this June.

Dr. John Spear, Environmental Science and Engineering Assistant Professor at CSM, has received a $1.1 million grant from the National Science Foundation’s Materials Use, Science, Engineering and Society Program. Spear will work with research partners from industry and the University of Colorado on the project, “Production and use of a novel bacterial protein in aquaculture operations: societal benefits and global ramifications.”

Professor Terry Parker was appointed the new Director of the Engineering Division at Mines and assumed his position May 15th. Dr. Parker joined the Engineering Division in 1994, and has taught three to four courses per year, as well as developed seven new courses and advised twelve graduate students, during his tenure. He has authored or co-authored over 100 papers and technical reports throughout his career, and he was awarded a prestigious NSF Career Award in 1995. With Dr. Parker's appointment, the long and able service of Professor David Munoz as Interim Division Director comes to a close.

Dr. Robert Siegrist, professor and director of the Environmental Science and Engineering Division at Mines, has been invited to speak at two NATO meetings in Athens, Greece, in June. He will make a presentation to representatives from more than 22 countries at the NATO Committee for Challenges to Modern Society meeting, and he will deliver an invited lecture and participate in the NATO Advanced Research Workshop.

Dr. Ramona Graves, a professor in the Petroleum Engineering Department at Mines, was awarded an honorary degree by the Mining University of Leoben in Leoben, Austria, in recognition of her significant scientific achievements. Graves is the first woman to receive this honor in the 166-year history of the university.

Dr. Ronald Miller, Dr. Barbara Olds and Dr. Barbara Moskal have been selected to receive the William Elgin Wickenden Award from the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE) for their article “Assessment in Engineering Education: Evolution, Approaches and Future Collaboration,” which appeared in the January 2005 issue of the Journal of Engineering Education. The Wickenden Award annually recognizes the author or authors whose article reflects the highest standards of scholarly research in engineering education among those published in each volume year.

ConocoPhillips made a $1,000,000 pledge to support several departments and programs on Mines’ campus, with the majority of funds dedicated to the ConocoPhillips SPIRIT Scholars Program. In addition to providing ongoing funding for the SPIRIT Scholars Program, ConocoPhillips’ first pledge payment of $250,000 will help support Mines’ departments of Chemical Engineering, Geology and Geological Engineering, Geophysics and Petroleum Engineering. Funds will also support graduate fellowships in Geology and Geological Engineering and Geophysics, the Minority Engineering Program, the Society of Petroleum Engineers and the CSM Career Center.

Mines now offers a new minor in Energy.  The Energy minor program is an opportunity for undergraduate students to explore the technical and societal dimensions of energy production through a set of multidisciplinary courses that are linked by their importance to global energy.

John Trefny, Mines' 15th president, received the Genesis Award or “Economic Developer of the Year” award at the annual Jefferson County Industry Appreciation Awards breakfast on March 30th. He was recognized for making Mines a significant contributor to the economic strength of Jefferson County. John Trefny began his 29-year career at CSM in 1977 and served as president from 2001-2006.

John Poate, vice president for research and technology transfer at Mines, was recognized at a special Materials Research Society symposium this month for his seminal contributions to materials research over his career. Before coming to CSM in January, he was chief technology officer and vice president of Axcelis Technologies. The bulk of his research career was at Bell Labs where he headed up the silicon processing research department. Poate also served as dean of the College of Science and Liberal Arts at the New Jersey Institute of Technology.

Colorado School of Mines Athletics finished a program best 22nd among more than 290 institutions in the final standings of the 2005-06 U.S. Sports Academy Directors' Cup in Division II. The standings are released annually by the National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics (NACDA), United States Sports Academy and USA Today to recognize the best overall athletic programs in the country. Mines’ earned its position through the high caliber performances of several teams at the NCAA Division II national level, including:

• Women’s cross country, 5^th
• Men’s cross country, 6^th
• Men’s soccer, 9^th
• Women’s indoor track and field, 10^th
• Men’s indoor track and field, 14^th
• Women’s volleyball, 33^rd

Ivar Reimanis, Metallurgical and Materials Engineering professor at CSM, has been selected as a Fulbright Scholar grantee to India for spring 2007. Reimanis will be hosted by the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore, where he will conduct collaborative work on a nanotechnology testing methodology.

Barbara Moskal of the Mathematical and Computer Sciences Department at CSM has received the Burton W. Jones 2006 Award for Distinguished Teaching of Mathematics at the annual meeting of the Rocky Mountain Section of the Mathematical Association of America. Moskal is the 15^th person, and second woman, to receive the honor.

Robert Siegrist, director of the Environmental Science and Engineering Division at Colorado School of Mines, has received a Project of the Year Award from a Department of Defense environmental program for his work in improving the processes used to clean up hazardous waste on military sites.

Mines won a grant worth about $1.5 million over the next five years from the U.S. Department of Energy for research on hydrogen fuel cells.  The engineering school will share the costs of research on polymer membranes to advance hydrogen fuel cell technology and applications for the development of clean, hydrogen-powered automobiles.

Three Mines professors received National Science Foundation CAREER awards for their innovative, early career development work. The prestigious awards support “the activities of those teacher-scholars who most effectively integrate research and education within the context of the mission of their organization,” according to the NSF. The awardees were Jason Liu, assistant professor in the Department of Mathematical and Computer Sciences; Lincoln Carr, assistant professor in the Department of Physics; and Patricio Mendez, assistant professor in the Department of Metallurgical and Materials Engineering.

Timothy and Bernadette Marquez of Denver have pledged $10 million, the largest single gift in Mines’ history, for the construction of a new petroleum engineering building.  Mr. Marquez graduated from Mines in 1980 with a degree in petroleum engineering.  He is now chairman and CEO of Venoco, Inc., an independent energy company with corporate headquarters in Denver.  This generous gift will support a state-of-the-art facility that will further strengthen Mines’ preeminent Department of Petroleum Engineering and elevate its profile among potential students and industry partners.

In the 2004-2005 academic year, Mines was home to five National Merit Scholars, tying with CU-Boulder for the largest number of student scholars among Colorado colleges and topping many of its peer institutions nationwide. The National Merit Scholarship Program is an academic competition for recognition and scholarships that began in 1955. Of the 1.3 million high school student entrants, only about 4% of the best and the brightest students qualify for recognition in the program and for various levels of financial support.

Steve and Gayle Mooney made a generous $1 million gift to Colorado School of Mines to establish an endowment fund for athletic scholarships.  Mr. Mooney graduated from the School in 1956 with a degree in geological engineering and is now chairman of Thompson Creek Metals Company, a privately-owned company and a leading global supplier of molybdenum.

Mines has initiated a unique new degree, entitled Master of International Political Economy of Resources (MIPER), administered through the Division of Liberal Arts and International Studies (LAIS) at the School.  The Colorado Commission on Higher Education approved this program on September 30, 2005.  The multidisciplinary MIPER degree builds upon the existing International Political Economy (IPE) Certificate Program at Mines, and helps prepare students for success in an increasingly globalized business world by focusing on the environmental, socio-political, and cultural complexities surrounding the distribution and use of the world’s natural resources.

John and Erika Lockridge have given $3 million towards the construction of the Recreation Center.  The School will honor their gift, the largest contribution to athletics and recreation made in the School’s 131-year-history, by naming the Center’s 2,500-seat competition gymnasium “Lockridge Arena.”  The Center is also supported by a generous contribution of $2 million from the Adolph Coors Foundation.  The new 96,000 square-foot Center will more than double the School's capacity for indoor sports and athletics.

Mines received a five-year grant totaling $545,646 from the Clare Boothe Luce Program of the Henry Luce Foundation to hire and support a new tenure-track, female professor. Kathryn Johnson joined the Division of Engineering this fall as The Clare Boothe Luce Assistant Professor in Electrical Engineering.  The program was established to encourage women to study and teach science and engineering.  Women comprise 23% of the School’s undergraduate enrollment, 27% of its graduate students, and 17% of Mines’ faculty.  The School now has one of the highest percentages of female students in U.S. colleges of engineering.

The world’s largest diversified natural resource company, BHP Billiton Limited, gave $300,000 to Mines to establish an Indigenous Students Scholarship Fund to encourage minority students to pursue careers in the mining industry.  In addition to the scholarship funds, recipients will have the opportunity to intern at one of BHP Billiton’s operations in the Americas. 

Researchers at the Space Research Partnership Center at Mines have been awarded a $14.6 million contract to work with three NASA centers, five universities and seven industry partners to meet challenges posed by dust for space exploration missions.  Masami Nakagawa, associate professor in the Mining Engineering Department, heads the project, focusing on special technology for spacesuits, vehicles and manufacturing plants in space.

Construction began this fall on a new addition to the state-of-the-art Center for Technology and Learning Media (CTLM) building on Mines campus. The addition will include new computer labs, computer classrooms, offices and meeting rooms.