Letter from the Dean

Dean Pete Nelson

In this issue of RISE Magazine, we describe how our faculty members are helping to get a new industry off the ground, bridging the gap between novel computer software and hardware technology, and working with other colleges at UIC to give students and teachers practical experience.

Several of our mechanical and industrial engineering faculty have joined forces to improve the fabrication process to unlock the smart textiles industry. This fledgling sector includes textiles that can monitor muscular activity during a workout, help with space exploration, or quickly detect pathogens for medical treatments. Other faculty from the electrical and computer engineering department are hard at work designing the hardware and software behind the next generation of computing technology. Finally, several faculty members from our biomedical engineering department are thinking outside the box to improve the education of local high school teachers and our amazing undergraduate students.

Elsewhere in this issue, we highlight student success stories, career achievement awards for our faculty, how a professor is helping in the aftermath of a natural disaster, and how a group of professors has launched a new center to study and improve freight transportation.

As I write this, we are in the midst of another successful academic year here at UIC, and we were happy to see all of our students, faculty, and staff back on campus! We have had a lot of faces to welcome this year, as we set records for student enrollment, more than 6,000, and number of faculty, more than 215, this semester.

I was also excited to welcome our new chancellor, Dr. Marie Lynn Miranda, to UIC this summer! Dr. Miranda is the former provost of the University of Notre Dame and is widely recognized for her efforts and leadership to make higher education more inclusive.

I hope all our readers get a chance to visit us on campus and see all these innovations and new members of our community in person. We look forward to welcoming you!