Susan Burns

Susan Burns

Susan Burns

Professor, School of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Associate Chair for Finance & Administration; School of Civil & Environmental Engineering

Susan E. Burns, Ph.D., P.E., F.ASCE is a professor in the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering and associate chair for administration and finance at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, Georgia, USA. Burns earned a B.C.E. in civil engineering (1990), an M.S. in civil engineering (1996), an M.S. in environmental engineering (1996), and Ph.D. in civil engineering (1997), all from Georgia Tech. After completing her Ph.D., Professor Burns joined the faculty at the University of Virginia where she served for over seven years. In 2004, she joined the faculty at Georgia Tech as an associate professor. 

Burns' research focuses on applications in geoenvironmental engineering, with particular emphasis on the productive reuse of waste materials including dredged sediments, fly ash, and biomass fly ash, treatment of highway stormwater runoff using engineered materials, erosion control of soils on highway rights-of-way, interfacial behavior of organic- and inorganic-coated soils, the transport and behavior of microbubbles in otherwise saturated porous media, and the hydraulic conductivity and consolidation properties of fine-grained soils using seismic piezocone penetration testing (SPCPT). Funding for her research group has come from federal, state, and industry sources, including a CAREER Award from the National Science Foundation in 2000. Burns has also received major funding from the US Department of Energy, the US Army Corps of Engineers, the US Department of Education, the Virginia Transportation Research Council, the Georgia Department of Transportation, Southern Company, and other industrial sources. 

Burns is a recipient of the National Science Foundation CAREER award, the Arthur Casagrande Professional Development Award (ASCE), the Edmund Friedman Young Engineer Award (ASCE), the Alumni Board of Trustees Teaching Award (University of Virginia), and the David Harrison III Award for Undergraduate Advising (University of Virginia). She was awarded a University Teaching Fellowship (University of Virginia), and was named a Class of 1969 Teaching Scholar (Georgia Tech) and a Class of 1969 Teaching Fellow (Georgia Tech). Most recently, she was selected as the recipient of the 2012 CEE appreciation award (CEE, Georgia Tech) and a 2012 Class of 1934 Teaching Effectiveness Award. She was elected Fellow of the American Society of Civil Engineers in 2013. 

Burns has served as the president of the United States Universities Council on Geotechnical Education and Research (USUCGER), an organization of approximately 400 professors of geotechnical engineering in the US and abroad (www.usucger.org). She is a past member of the National Research Council's (NRC) Standing Committee on Geological and Geotechnical Engineering, and a past member of the NRC's Committee on Assessment of the Performance of Engineered Waste Containment Barriers. She has chaired the American Society of Civil Engineers/GeoInstitute Geoenvironmental Engineering Committee, and is a past member of the GeoInstitute Awards Committee, and the Transportation Research Board's Committee on Physicochemical Phenomena in Soils. Additionally, she served as an editorial board member for ASCE's Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering. She served on the organizing committee for the International Symposium on Deformational Characteristics of Geomaterials (IS Atlanta 2008) and the Fifth International Conference on Scour and Erosion, and served as the editor for proceedings at both conferences. 

At Georgia Tech, Burns has chaired the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering's graduate committee, served on the School's statutory advisory committee, served as the graduate coordinator for the Geosystems Group, and served as the group leader for the geosystems group in the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering. She was the School's associate chair for undergraduate programs for five years before taking over as associate chair for finance and administration in 2018. At the Institute level, she has served as a member of the Academic Senate and General Faculty Assembly and the Student Academic and Financial Affairs Committee.

susan.burns@ce.gatech.edu

404.894.2285

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University, College, and School/Department
Georgia Institute of Technology > College of Engineering > School of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Research Focus Areas:
  • Energy Generation, Storage, and Distribution
  • Materials and Nanotechnology
Additional Research:
Geosystems; Geomaterials; Materials Design; Nanocomposites; Transport of Microbubbles

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Ronald Rousseau

Ronald Rousseau

Ronald Rousseau

Professor
Cecil J. "Pete" Silas Chair Emeritus

ronald.rousseau@chbe.gatech.edu

(404) 894-2868

Departmental Bio

  • Personal Website
    • University, College, and School/Department
    Georgia Institute of Technology > College of Engineering
    Research Focus Areas:
    • Biobased Materials
    • Biochemicals
    • Biorefining
    • Biotechnology
    • Fuels & Chemical Processing
    • Pulp Paper Packaging & Tissue
    • Renewable Energy
    • Sustainable Manufacturing
    Additional Research:
    Separations Technology; Biofuels; Energy & Water; Separation Technologies

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    Satish Kumar

    Satish Kumar

    Satish Kumar

    Professor Emeritus, George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering
    Professor Emeritus, School of Materials Science and Engineering

    Satish Kumar is currently an Associate professor in the George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering at Georgia Tech. He joined Georgia Tech in 2009 as an Assistant Professor. Prior, he worked at IBM Corporation where he was responsible for the thermal management of electronic devices. Kumar received his Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering and M.S. degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Purdue University, West Lafayette in 2007. He received his M.S. degree in Mechanical Engineering from Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge in 2003 and B.Tech. degree in Mechanical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Guwahati in 2001. His research interests are in electro-thermal transport in carbon nanotube, graphene, and 2D materials based electronic devices, AlGaN/GaN transistors, thermal management, and thermo-electric coolers. He is author or co-author of over 70 journal or conference publications. His contributions to his research field have been recognized by Purdue Research Foundation Fellowship in 2005, 1969 Teaching Fellow from Center for the Enhancement of Teaching and Learning Center at Georgia Tech, 2012 Summer Faculty Fellow from Air Force Research Lab, 2014 Sigma Xi Young Faculty Award, and 2014 DARPA Young Faculty Award.

    satish.kumar@me.gatech.edu

    404.385.6640

    Office Location:
    Love 123

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    University, College, and School/Department
    Georgia Institute of Technology > College of Engineering > Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering
    Research Focus Areas:
    • Advanced Composites
    • Bioengineering
    • Biotechnology
    • Combustion
    • Electronic Materials
    • Electronics
    • Micro and Nano Device Engineering
    • Miniaturization & Integration
    • Semiconductors
    • Thermal Systems
    Additional Research:
    Compund SemiconductorsComputational mechanicsCarbon NanotubesBio-Devices

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    Rosario Gerhardt

    Rosario Gerhardt

    Rosario Gerhardt

    Professor and Goizueta Foundation Faculty Chair, School of Materials Science and Engineering

    Rosario A. Gerhardt joined the faculty of Georgia Tech as associate professor in January 1991.  She was promoted to full professor in 2001.  Prior to coming to Georgia Tech she worked as an assistant research professor at the Center for Ceramics Research at Rutgers University from 1986-1990 and as a post-doctoral research associate at Rutgers for two years and at Columbia University in New York City for one year.  She also worked as an ASEE/NASA Faculty Fellow at the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, AL during summer 1995 and as a visiting professor at the Center for Nanomaterials Science (CNMS) at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Oak Ridge, TN during the 2007-2008 academic year. She regularly interacts with researchers at various industrial companies and national laboratories. Her research work has been funded by the National Science Foundation, the U.S. Department of Energy, NASA and various industrial companies.

    Gerhardt's research focuses on determining structure-property-processing relationships in a wide range of materials. Most recently, her research group has focused on making and characterizing polymer and ceramic composites containing conducting and semiconducting nanofillers and on the synthesis and assembly of nanoparticles into thin films useful for use as transparent electrodes, solar cell components, microwave heatable inserts, conductive paper, etc. Over the years, she has worked with a variety of ceramic materials such as dielectric insulators, ionic conductors and ceramic superconductors in bulk and thin film form, as well as with intrinsic conducting polymers. Her work also extends onto non-electronics related materials such as fiber and particulate reinforced composites and metallic alloys that are used for wear applications and as components in the hot-sections of gas turbine engines. Most of her work has dealt with the electrical and microstructural characterization of materials using impedance and dielectric spectroscopy, resistivity measurements, and structural characterization via microscopic techniques such as optical, SEM, TEM and AFM, and x-ray and neutron scattering methods. More recently, her group has also added various optical spectroscopy techniques to their repertoire of characterization methods (FTIR, UV-Vis and Raman).

    Gerhardt is a fellow of the American Ceramic Society (ACeRS) and a member of the Materials Research Society(MRS), the IEEE/Dielectrics Division and Instrument and Measurement Division, the Metallurgical Society(TMS), the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the American Society for Non-Destructive Testing (ASNT), the International Microelectronics and Packaging Society(IMAPS) and the Microscopy Society of America(MSA). She is also a member of Sigma Xi, Keramos and Tau Beta Pi. She has been active as an executive officer of the Electronics Division of the American Ceramic Society, having served as Chair of that division during the 2000-2001 year and on other capacities since then. She also serves as the faculty advisor for the Student Chapter of ACeRS and MRS at Georgia Tech and has been co-organizer of numerous symposia both at ACerS, MRS and other societies. She is a member of the National Research Council Associateship Panel Review Program. She is the author or co-author of over 200 refereed publications and has served as research advisor to more than 40 graduate students. Gerhardt and one of her students recently received one of the 2011 ASNT fellowship awards. 

    One of Gerhardt’s long term research goals is to establish that electrical measurements can be used as a non-destructive method for microstructural characterization at all length scales. She was the leading organizer of a symposium series on the same subject at the Materials Research Society Meetings during the 1995, 1997 and 2001 Fall Meetings from which three proceedings books were published (MRS Proc. Vols. 411, 500 and 699). In addition, she teaches a graduate course at Georgia Tech (MSE7140) where she covers the theory and applications of impedance spectroscopy from the microstructural point of view.  She is currently writing a textbook on this subject, which is due to be published in 2013.  She is also the editor of a recent book entitled “Properties and Applications of Silicon Carbide” that was published by In-Tech publications in 2011

    rosario.gerhardt@mse.gatech.edu

    404.894.6886

    Office Location:
    Love 168

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    University, College, and School/Department
    Georgia Institute of Technology > College of Engineering > School of Materials Science Engineering
    Research Focus Areas:
    • Biobased Materials
    • Biochemicals
    • Biorefining
    • Biotechnology
    • Electronic Materials
    • Pulp Paper Packaging & Tissue
    • Sustainable Manufacturing
    Additional Research:
    Advanced Characterization; Ceramics; Conducting Polymers; Plasmonics; Nanostructured Materials; Printing Technology; Nanocellulose Applications; Films & Coatings; Biomaterials

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    Akanksha Menon

    Akanksha Menon

    Akanksha Menon

    Assistant Professor

    Dr. Akanksha Menon is an Assistant Professor in the Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering at Georgia Tech. Prior to this, she was a Rosenfeld Postdoctoral Fellow at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, where she performed research on hybrid membrane-thermal desalination processes using solar energy, and she also contributed to the development of thermal energy storage materials. Dr. Menon completed her Ph.D. at Georgia Tech, where she focused on developing semiconducting polymers and new device architectures for thermoelectric energy harvesting. She holds a bachelor's degree from Texas A&M University at Qatar, as well as a master’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from Georgia Tech.

    Her research group at Georgia Tech is working on technologies for the water-energy nexus.

    akanksha.menon@me.gatech.edu

    Akanksha Menon Profile

    University, College, and School/Department
    Georgia Institute of Technology > College of Engineering > Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering
    Research Focus Areas:
    • Combustion
    • Energy
    • Renewable Energy

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    Lauren Garten

    Lauren Garten

    Lauren Garten

    Assistant Professor

    Lauren Garten joined the School of Material Science and Engineering as an assistant professor in Fall 2021. Her group focuses on developing new materials for energy and electronic applications, particularly at the nexus between ferroelectricity, ferromagnetism, electronics, and photovoltaics. 

    Lauren received her B.S. in ceramic engineering from the Missouri University of Science and Technology. She then went on to earn a Ph.D. in material science from the Pennsylvania State University for her work on ferroelectric, piezoelectric, and dielectric synthesis and characterization with Prof. Susan Trolier-McKinstry. She then became a post-doc at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory working on metastable materials for energy applications. After a very short stint as a material scientist at Sandia National Laboratory, she won the NRC Research Associateship from the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Math which was hosted at the U.S. Naval Research Lab (NRL). She then received the Jerome and Isabella Karle Distinguished Scholar Fellowship from NRL to work on lead-free multiferroic materials and devices.

    lauren.garten@mse.gatech.edu

    404-894-5748

    Office Location:
    Pettit 210

  • Departmental Bio
    • University, College, and School/Department
    Georgia Institute of Technology
    Research Focus Areas:
    • Advanced Materials
    • Electronics
    • Energy Harvesting
    • Energy Storage
    • Nanomaterials
    • Solar
    Additional Research:
    Electronics, Energy Harvesting, Energy Storage, Solar

    IRI Connections:
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    Scott Sinquefield

    Scott Sinquefield

    Scott Sinquefield

    Senior Research Engineer

    Scott Sinquefield completed his Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering in 1998 at Oregon State University. He spent three years working with the Multi-Fuel Combustion Group at the Combustion Research Facility at Sandia National Labs (Livermore); where he performed the experimental portion of his thesis research. He joined the Chemical Recovery group at IPST in 1998 and was lead.engineer in the construction and operation of the Pressurize Entrained Flow Reactor facility. He now leads the research program on black liquor gasification. He has extensive experience in the design and construction of pilot research reactors and control systems. He also has expertise in boiler fire-side fouling and thermodynamic modeling of aqueous electrolyte systems.

    Scott.Sinquefield@rbi.gatech.edu

    (404) 385-0241

    Website

    University, College, and School/Department
    Georgia Institute of Technology
    Research Focus Areas:
    • Biobased Materials
    • Biochemicals
    • Biorefining
    • Biotechnology
    • Pulp Paper Packaging & Tissue
    • Renewable Energy
    • Sustainable Manufacturing
    Additional Research:
    Gasification; Biofuels; Chemical Recovery; Environmental Processes; Separation Technologies

    IRI Connections:
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    Renewable Bioproducts > Faculty
    Energy > Research Community
    Renewable Bioproducts
    Energy
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