Professor Emeritus Curtis O. PedersenCurtis Oneal Pedersen, Professor Emeritus in Mechanical Science and Engineering, passed away in his sleep on Tuesday morning, July 10, at his home in Hastings, Minn. He was 77 years old.
Written by By Chad Garland
Professor Emeritus Curtis O. Pedersen
Curtis Oneal Pedersen, Professor Emeritus in Mechanical Science and Engineering, passed away in his sleep on Tuesday morning, July 10, at his home in Hastings, Minn. He was 77 years old.
Professor Pedersen joined the department as an assistant professor in 1967 and became an associate professor in 1972. His research areas included building simulation, heat transfer, energy systems, and thermodynamics. He became a full professor in 1988 and a professor emeritus in 1993.
In 1956, Professor Pedersen received a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from South Dakota State University, followed by an M.S. degree in 1958 from the University of Minnesota and a Ph.D. in 1968 from Carnegie Mellon University, both in Mechanical Engineering.
In addition to his academic career, Professor Pedersen consulted with Salem Corporation in Carnegie, Pennsylvania for many years and did work for General Electric Company and Honeywell, Inc., among others. He was a NASA-ASEE summer faculty fellow at NASA’s Johnson Spacecraft Center from 1971-1972.
He was a member of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers and Sigma Xi, and a fellow of the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating, and Air Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE). In 1992, Professor Pedersen was awarded the Commander’s Award for Distinguished Public Service from the U.S. Army Construction Engineering Research Laboratory.
Professor Pedersen directed the “BLAST” program (Building Loads and System Thermodynamics), the predecessor to today’s “Energy Plus” building modeling program used throughout the world. One cannot attend an ASHRAE meeting without running into several of Professor Pedersen's many graduates who continue to work in the HVAC&R industry.