John Lach is the dean of the School of Engineering and Applied Science. He began the role on August 15. Dr. Lach joined SEAS from the University of Virginia, where he served most recently as the director of cross-cutting initiatives at the university’s School of Engineering and Applied Science and as a professor of electrical and computer engineering in the Charles L. Brown Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. He previously served as the chair of the department. Throughout his career, Dr. Lach has worked extensively with departments, schools, and initiatives to foster cross-disciplinary collaboration that supports strategic priorities. As a researcher, he focuses on wireless technologies in health. Dr. Lach received his Ph.D. in electrical engineering from UCLA. See Dean Lach’s full profile. Email Dean Lach.
Rumana Riffat is the school's associate dean for academic affairs and a professor of civil engineering in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering. She has been a member of the SEAS faculty since 1994, and served most recently as the school's interim dean. Dr. Riffat received her Ph.D. from Iowa State University. Her research centers on sustainable water and wastewater treatment, advanced processes for nutrient removal, and anaerobic digestion. Dr. Riffat has been involved in a number of national and international research projects with Water Environment and Reuse Foundation, DC Water, and USAID. She is the author of “Fundamentals of Wastewater Treatment and Engineering,” which is used as a textbook at various universities in the United States and other countries.
Can E. Korman is the school's associate dean for research and graduate studies and a professor of engineering and applied science in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. Dr. Korman received his Ph.D. in electrical Engineering from the University of Maryland, College Park. His research centers on semiconductor device noise modeling, micro- and nano-electronics, magnetics, numerical modeling, and stochastic modeling. He has been a member of the SEAS faculty since 1991 and has served previously as the chair of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE).
Bhagirath Narahari is the school's associate dean for undergraduate programs and student affairs and a professor of engineering and applied science in the Department of Computer Science. Dr. Narahari received his Ph.D. in computer science from the University of Pennsylvania. He has been on the faculty of the School of Engineering and Applied Science since 1987, and previously served as the chairman of the Department of Computer Science. He has been active in undergraduate education, advising, and curriculum development. Dr. Narahari's research interests are in the areas of software security, architecture support for trustworthy computing, embedded systems, computer architecture, compiler optimization, pervasive computing, and parallel computing.
Murray Loew is the chair of the Department of Biomedical Engineering. Dr. Loew received his Ph.D. degree from Purdue University. His Laboratory for Medical Imaging and Image Analysis develops new methods for acquiring—and extracting useful information from—medical images. The disciplines involved include pattern recognition, biomedical image and signal processing, and computer vision, with occasional bits of psychophysics and statistics.
Majid Manzari is a professor of civil engineering and the chair of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering. Dr. Manzari received his Ph.D. in civil engineering from the University of California, Davis. His research centers on experimental and computational geomechanics, earthquake-resistant infrastructure systems, and constitutive modeling of engineering materials. He has been a member of the SEAS faculty since 1994.
Robert Pless is the chair of the Department of Computer Science. Dr. Pless received his Ph.D. from the University of Maryland. He conducts research on developing computer vision algorithms for geometric inference with applications to biomedical imaging, remote sensing, robotics, and social justice.
Suresh Subramaniam is chair of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. Dr. Subramaniam received his Ph.D. in electrical engineering from the University of Washington in 1997. His research centers on developing novel network architectures and control algorithms for networks. He has been a member of the SEAS faculty since 1997. Professor Subramaniam is a Fellow of the IEEE.
Zoe Szajnfarber is the chair of the Department of Engineering Management and Systems Engineering. Dr. Szajnfarber received her Ph.D. from Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Her research group seeks to understand the fundamental dynamics of innovation in the monopsony market that characterizes government space and defense activities, as a basis for decision making.
Michael Plesniak is a professor of engineering and applied science and the chair of the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering. Dr. Plesniak received his Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from Stanford University. He is a Fellow of ASME, AIAA, APS and AAAS. His research interests include: fluid dynamics, turbulence and complex flows, mixing phenomena, and biofluid dynamics—cardiovascular flows and human speech production. He has been a member of the SEAS faculty since 2008 and was formerly a professor of mechanical engineering at Purdue University and a program director at the National Science Foundation.
