3/18/2022
Written by
This year’s department alumni awards honor an impressive group that includes engineers in both academia and industry.
The MechSE Distinguished Alumni Award recognizes alumni who have established careers and have served in a professional and technical capacity to honor the department and the university. Any individual with a degree in engineering mechanics, mechanical engineering, or theoretical and applied mechanics from the University of Illinois, who is not a current MechSE faculty member or alumni board member, is eligible for nomination. The 2022 recipients include William Bahnfleth, Kenneth Christensen, and Wendy Crone.
The MechSE Outstanding Young Alumni Award recognizes alumni who have graduated from the department fewer than 10 years ago and who have embodied the department and university’s values in their professional careers. This year’s recipients are Kye Draper and Brittany Miriki.
The five alumni will be honored at MechSE’s Spring Awards Banquet on April 15.
William Bahnfleth (BSME ’79, MSME ’80, BMus ’88, PhD ’89) is a Professor of Architectural Engineering at Pennsylvania State University. His research is in the areas of thermal storage, district heating and cooling, indoor air quality, building energy modeling and analysis, applications of thermal sciences to buildings, and sampling protocols for indoor bioaerosol contaminants.
Ken Christensen (PhD TAM ’01) is the Carol and Ed Kaplan Dean of the Armour College of Engineering at the Illinois Institute of Technology, with a joint appointment in Mechanical, Materials & Aerospace Engineering and Civil, Architectural & Environmental Engineering. His research expertise is in experimental fluid mechanics, with an emphasis on flows central to a range of energy, environmental and geophysical applications.
Wendy Crone (BSEM ’90), is a Professor of Engineering Physics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, leading a research program in solid mechanics, with connections to nanotechnology and biotechnology.
Kye Draper (BSME ’15) is Head of Engineering at thyssenkrupp Dynamic Components, at the company’s Danville, Illinois, plant, leading 30 engineers in Manufacturing Engineering, Process Engineering, and Energy Management, serving the international automotive industry as the world market leader for assembled powertrain solutions for both internal combustion engines and electric motors.
Brittany Miriki (BSME ’16) is a Systems Engineer (Solution Architect) at Dell, where she builds solutions to transform the datacenter infrastructure of clients to meet their business and technical needs. She is also the founder of Sistas in STEM, an online community that features and supports women of color in STEM.