The next time you adjust the thermostat in your home, car, office, or refrigerator, thank an air-conditioning engineer! This field is vital for the future of energy, sustainability, and human comfort. Purdue has graduated so many of these engineers through the decades, that they have their own student organization on campus: American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE).

Purdue University researchers are using machine learning to train a robot to recognize a jumbled pile of items, locate the one item it needs, and retrieve it in the most efficient way. It’s one small step to creating resilient and versatile robots that can assist astronauts in maintaining future extraterrestrial habitats on the Moon, on Mars, or in deep space.

Purdue ME faculty and staff were recently recognized for milestone anniversaries, celebrating 10, 15, 20, or more years of service to Purdue.

Teams of Purdue mechanical engineering students have developed novel prototype projects involving hydroponic farming, spacecraft fairings, and roofing nails. The teams competed for the Malott Innovation Awards, given to the best senior design project of the fall 2023 semester.

Ajay Malshe, the R. Eugene and Susie E. Goodson Distinguished Professor of Mechanical Engineering, has been appointed as a President's Fellow by Purdue University.

The future of transportation may be above us, with electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) vehicles. These aircraft combine the speed and convenience of helicopters with the electric power of drones — and the potential of sustainable carbon-free aviation. But achieving this future requires scrutiny of the vehicle’s most important component: the batteries. Purdue University researchers have conducted one of the first lithium-ion battery investigations specific to the demands of eVTOL vehicles.

He invented the PIN number, and the silicon MOSFET (metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistor). Now John Atalla (MSME '47, PhD '49) is the namesake of the new Atalla Institute for Advanced System Integration and Packaging (ASIP).

The School of Mechanical Engineering has announced recipients for several graduate-level departmental fellowships and scholarships for the 2023-2024 academic year.

Graphene, a material which consists of a single layer of carbon atoms, has been celebrated by many as the “next big thing” in material science. But according to Purdue University researchers, its thermal properties may not be as revolutionary as previously thought.

On the highway of heat transfer, thermal energy is moved by way of quantum particles called phonons. But at the nanoscale of today’s most cutting-edge semiconductors, those phonons don’t remove enough heat. That’s why Purdue University researchers are focused on opening a new nanoscale lane on the heat transfer highway by using hybrid quasiparticles called “polaritons.”