Honors and Awards
A summary of recent honors, awards and other accomplishments from the UB CSEE community.
- Kerem Gulec (MS '05, PhD '09) named one of California's 2019 Top Young Professionals by Engineering News Record. Learn about Gulec's honor here.
- Environmental engineering students Novin Mehrabi and Brianna Scharf earned the SNO student Award at Sustainable Nanotechnology Organization Conference. Learn about the honors at this link.
- SUNY Distinguished Professor Michel Bruneau earns lifetime achievement from American Institute of Steel Construction. Learn about the honor from AISC here.
- Environmental engineering PhD student wins Department poster competition. Review the competition at this link.
- Environmental engineering students win UB's World Challenge Challenge with their insect-based burgers. Learn about their initiative here.
- UB's Engineers for a Sustainable World Student Club earned the oustanding chapter award, and the club's president, environmental engineering senior, Austin Izzo, received the outstanding member award. Learn about the awards here.
- UB CSEE students Paolo Bourdeau and Abdulrahman Hassaballah earned three total awards at the Celebration of Student Academic Excellence. Learn about their awards at this link.
- Molly Dreyer, an MS environmental engineering student, Austin Izzo, a senior environmental engineering student and James Jensen, an evironmental engineering professor all received honors from UB Sustainability. Learn about Dreyer's accomplishments here.
- UB's American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) student club finished in first place overall at the Upstate New York steel bridge competition. Learn about the team's experience at this link.
- Kennedy Colon, CSEE student and president of UB's chapter of the National Society of Black Engineers was honored by the Big Brother Big Sisters of Erie, Niagara and the Southern Teer. Learn about Colon's honor here.
- Team featuring two UB students takes third place at the World's Challenge Challenge finals.
- Research assistant professor Kang Sun at UB Renew Institute awarded $528,000 grant by NASA to map air pollution
- PhD candidate Reda Snaiki won the Engineering Mechanics Institute Fluid Dynamics Student Paper Competition
- Wind engineering faculty member Teng Wu's paper was featured in the Editor's Choice section of the Journal of Engineering Mechanics.
- Faculty member Ravi Ranade earned a grant worth over $500,000 from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
- Assistant professor Nirupam Aich received the 2019 Emerging Investigator Award from the Sustainable Nanotechnology Organization.
- Associate Professor Pangiotois Ch. Anastasopoulos was named a 2019 Highly Cited Researcher by Clarivate Analytics.
- SUNY Distinguished Professor Michel Bruneau recognized as Structural Engineering Institute Fellow. Learn about Bruneau's distinction at this link.
- Lisa Anderson (BS '05, MS '06) named 2019 Fellow of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE). Learn about Anderson's appointment here.
- Michel Bruneau named SUNY Distinguished Professor.
- UB's civil engineering program ranks in the top five among U.S. schools; 12th worldwide. Learn about the rankings here
- Associate Director for UB's Great Lakes Program, Helen Domske received the John R. Vallentyne Award from the International Association for Great Lakes Research. Learn about Domske's award at this link
- Assistant professor Teng Wu receives bridge and structural engineering award from international organization. Read more about Wu's award here
- UB ASCE finishes in 12th place in the national competition. Learn about how they finished here
- Reda Snaiki, a PhD structural engineering student won the Dean's Graduate Achievement Award. Read about his honor here
- UB's ASCE student club finished in third place overall for its performance at the ASCE Upstate New York regional conference. Read about the conference here
- Abdulrahman Hassaballah, a PhD environmental engineering student wins the UB School of Engineering and Applied Sciences Graduate Student Poster Competition. Learn about his poster and research here
- Kristina Macro, a master's student in the environmental and water resources engineering program won third place in the Graduate Collegiate competition at WeLocal Providence. Learn about her presentation here
- Andrew S. Whittaker has been appointed to the rank of SUNY DIstinguished Professor, the highest faculty achievement in the SUNY system. Learn about this distinction here.
- Ramla Qureshi wins the Civil, Structural and Environmental Engineering Department's poster compeition. Read about the competition here
- UB's ASCE student chapter was recognized as the national organization as an Outstanding Student Chapter, a distinction earned by just the top 5% of all ASCE student organizations. Read about the club's accomplishment here.
- Ramla Qureshi, a PhD candidate, received the Mark Diamond Research Fund Award for her research on fire engineering. Read about her research here.
- Ketan Ragalwar, a PhD candidate, was awarded a grant from the Structural Engineers Association of Illinois. Read about his award here.
UB's civil engineering program ranked No. 7 in the U.S., 16th worldwide. Read more about the ranking here
- Assistant professors John Atkinson and Anthony Tessari received the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences 2017 Early Career Teacher of the Year Award.
- Éva McGovern, the Department's undergraduate academic coordinator received the 2017 Customer Service Award from the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences.
- Madeleine Dewey, a senior environmental engineering student received the "Leader in Excellence" award during the fourth annual School of Engineering and Applied Sciences Awards Night.
- Ning Dai, assistant professor received an NSF CAREER award for her proposal titled: CAREER: Impacts of Marine Algal Blooms on Disinfection By-Product Formation in Seawater Desalination. Click Here to learn more about her award and abstract. Follow this link to read more about the NSF CAREER Awards
- Teng Wu receives Robert Scanlan Award from the American Association for Wind Engineering. Read More about Wu's AAWE award
- Professor Michel Bruneau has been named Fellow at the Candian Academy of Engineering. Read More about Bruneau's Fellowship
- Assistant professor Teng Wu receives the IAWE Junior Award. Read More about Wu's IAWE Award
- Professor Andrew Whittaker recieves ASCE Stephen D. Bechtel, Jr. Energy Award. Read More about Whittaker's ASCE Award
- Professor Michel Bruneau receives the SUNY Chancellor's Award for Excellence in Scholarship and Creative Activities. Read More about the SUNY Chancellor's Award
- Professor Andre Filitrault received Most Influential Paper Award from international journal. Read More about Filitrault's Award
- Jack Kennedy and Maria Lopez Ruiz received the 2017 Chair’s Undergraduate Recognition Award.
- Three Graduate students, Greg Congdon, Alexander Niederbuhl and Adulrahman Hassaballah received the 2017 Award for Outstanding Teaching Assistant service to the CSEE Department.
- Anandharam Mourougassamy received the R.R. Rumer Award as an outstanding junior in fluid mechanics.
- The Richard P. Shaw Award for superior achievement in engineering and computational mechanics went to Damian Andreani.
- Utkarsh Kode received the LPCiminelli Scholar of Distinction Award as a civil engineering undergraduate student.
- Madeline Marsack and Julie Powers received the Robert P. Apmann Award, for being outstanding seniors in the area of water resources and environmental engineering.
- The S.P. Prawel Award for superior achievement in structural engineering was presented to Adrianne Richardson.
- Seyedsina Yousefianmoghadam received the Chair’s Graduate Recognition Award.
- The UB Seismic Design team finished in 10th place at the EERI National Competition.
- The UB ASCE Student Chapter earned a 2017 Letter of Honorable Mention for outstanding activities in 2016, a recogniotion received by just the top third of all Student Organizations. Read More about how UB's ASCE student chapter finished
- Mohsen Ghafari, PhD candidate in CSEE, was part of team that received the Jeffrey J. Sama Award and took first place in the New York State Pollution Prevention Institute. Read More about Ghafari and the award
- Assistant Professor Ravi Ranade received the UBCSTEP Distinguished Mentor Award. Read More about Ranade and the UBCSTEP Award
- Three CSEE students, Maria C. Lopez, Wil Nagengast and Jessica Cobti receive awards and scholarships. Read More about the awards and scholarships
- Professor Andrew S. Whittaker was awarded the 2017 Walter P. Moore, Jr. Award, given annually by the Structural Engineering Institute to a structural engineer who has demonstrated technical expertise in and dedication to the development of structural codes and standards. Read More about Whittaker's Walter P. Moore Jr. Award
- Assistant Professor Pinar Okumus received the 2016 Outstanding Reviewer award for the American Society of Civil Engineers. Read More about Okumus' ASCE Award
- Professor Michel Bruneau honored along with his co-authors with the 2017 Moisseiff Award from the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE). Read more about Bruneau's Moisseif Award
- Assistant Professor Andreas Stavridis has been chosen as the 2017 Engineering Educator of the Year by the Erie-Niagara Chapter of the New York State Society of Professional Engineers.
- Assistant Professor Jongmin Shim, along with collaborator Jin Young Song (Assistant Professor, Department of Architecture), received first prize in the Laka Competition, "Architecture that Reacts!" for their Snapping Facade design.
- In the 2016 SEAS Faculty Awards, Assistant Professor Panagiotis Ch. Anastasopoulos received the Early Career Researcher of the Year Award and Professor Andrew S. Whittaker received the Senior Researcher of the Year Award.
- The School of Engineering and Applied Sciences recognized several outstanding CSEE alumni and volunteers at the school's annual awards night. Honorees for 2016-2017 include Frank Puskar, BS '79, and Mary Puskar, who received the Delta Award; Lawrence Mathews, BS '69, who received the Mentor of the Year Award; Stephen Buechi, BS '92, who received the Volunteer Recognition Award; and Jorge Cueto, MS '13, PhD '16, who received the Outstanding Young Alumnus Award. CSEE MS student Wil Nagengast was recognized with a Student Award.
- PhD Student Seyedsina Yousefianmoghadam is a recipient of the 2016 O.H. Ammann Research Fellowship in Structural Engineering from the American Society of Civil Engineers.
- Teng Wu, Assistant Professor, received the 2016 Alfred Noble prize from the American Society of Civil Engineers, which recognizes a technical paper of exceptional merit whose first author is younger than 35. Read more
- A team of students from UB’s Department of Civil, Structural, and Environmental Engineering won first place in the International Ultra High Performance Concrete Beam Competition. Read more
- SUNY Distinguished Professor Michael C. Constantinou has been named Samuel Capen Professor of Civil Engineering.
- The University at Buffalo American Society of Civil Engineers Student Chapter placed fifth overall at the 2016 National Student Steel Bridge Competition (read more) and 19th overall at the 2016 National Concrete Canoe Competition.
- Amjad Aref, professor, and Teng Wu, assistant professor, have been appointed as associate editors for ASCE's Journal of Bridge Engineering.
- Mohsen Ghafari, PhD student in environmental engineering, has been awarded the 2016 Air & Waste Management Association Air Quality Research Scholarship. He also received the 2016 Air & Waste Management Association 1st Place Paper Award at the Annual Conference and Exhibition in New Orleans.
- The University at Buffalo American Society of Civil Engineers Student Chapter received a Letter of Honorable Mention from the society for its outstanding activities as recorded in the 2015 chapter annual report.
- Zhenhua Zhang, PhD student in transportation engineering, was selected as the winner of the Intelligent Transportation Society (ITS) of New York 2016 Best Student Paper Competition. Zhang will receive a scholarship and a stipend to attend the 2016 ITS-NY Annual Meeting.
- Alumni Scott Stevens, BS ’79 and Coleen Stevens, BS ’79 received the 2015-2016 Delta Award from the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences.
- Alumnus and CSEE Adjunct Adjunct Instructor Jason Havens, BS ’05 was chosen as the 2015-2016 Mentor of the Year by the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences.
- Three undergraduate students have been awarded 2016 scholarships from member firms of the American Council of Engineering Companies of New York (ACEC New York): Jacob Dominesey (civil engineering/business Administration), Derek Johnson (civil engineering), and Hailie Suk (environmental engineering). Read more
- In the 2016 CSEE Graduate Student Poster Competition, Cancan Yang received first place, Reda Snaiki received second place, and Siddharth Parida received third place.
- Dr. Michel Bruneau and former PhD student Dr. Ronny Purba received the 2016 ASCE Raymond Reese Research Prize for their paper on guiding applications of steel-plate shear walls.
- Undergraduate student Matthew Falcone, a double major in civil engineering and environmental engineering, was invited to present his research at the SUNY Undergraduate Student Research and Creative Activities Forum, held Feb. 24, 2016 in Albany. Read more
- Graduate student Timothy Van Oss received the 2016 SUNY Chancellor's Award for Student Excellence.
- Undergraduate students Mohamed Diaby and Valeria Prieto have been selected to be fellows of the 2015-2016 NASA/New York Space Grant Consortium: National Space Grant College and Fellowship Program.
- Professor and Chair Andrew S. Whittaker has been chosen as the 2016 Engineering Educator of the Year by the Erie-Niagara Chapter of the New York State Society of Professional Engineers.
- Cancan Yang, a civil engineering graduate student, has been awarded a fellowship from the Precast/Prestressed Institute (PCI) to travel to the 2016 PCI Convention and National Bridge Conference in Tennessee where she will present a poster on her research.
- Jennifer Merckel, an undergraduate student double major in civil engineering and aerospace engineering, is the recipient of the 2016 Virgin Galactic Unite Team Flying Tigresses Scholarship. Read more
- Civil engineering alumnus Dr. Diego Lopez-Garcia (MS '99, PhD '04) has been named Chairman of the Department of Structural and Geotechnical Engineering at the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile. Read more
- Civil engineering undergraduate students Adrianne Richardson and Ryan O'Malley received 2016 scholarships from the Association for Bridge Construction and Design of Western New York.
- Assistant Professor Teng Wu was selected to serve on the Scientific Committee for the 8th International Colloquium on Bluff Body Aerodynamics and Applications.
- Professor Michel Bruneau received the 2015 School of Engineering and Applied Sciences Senior Researcher of the Year Award, which recognizes an outstanding senior researcher in the school whose recent work (last 4-6 years) has made significant contributions to his or her field. Read more
- Kevin Gallagher, an undergraduate student in environmental engineering, attended the Naval Academy Science and Engineering Conference in Annapolis, Maryland on November 8-10, 2015.
- Assistant Professor Panagiotis Ch. Anastasopoulos has received an Outstanding Reviewer Award for the ASCE Journal of Infrastructure Systems.
- PhD student Zahra Loftian received the O. H. Ammann Research Fellowship in Structural Engineering from the American Society of Civil Engineers.
- Alumna Maria Koliou (PhD '14) received the Best Poster Award at the 2015 Structures Congress, held on April 25, 2015 in Portland, Oregon, for her poster titled "Evaluation of Wall Anchorage Force Provisions in Rigid Wall – Flexible Diaphragm Buildings."
- Alumna Sissy Nikolaou, PhD, PE, is a newly appointed Director of the Board of the Earthquake Engineering Research Institute (EERI).
- Civil engineering alumnus J. Michael Colyer (MBA ’96, BS ’96) has been selected to receive the UB Distinguished Alumni Award. Read more
- The University at Buffalo’s American Society of Civil Engineers (UB ASCE) Student Chapter Steel Bridge Team placed 4th overall in the National Steel Bridge Competition, held on May 22-23 at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. Read more
- SUNY Distinguished Professor Michael C. Constantinou was named the recipient of the 2015 ASCE Newmark Medal. Read more
- The UB Confucius Institute recognized SUNY Distinguished Professor Emeritus George C. Lee with the Confucius Educator Award. Read more
- The University at Buffalo’s American Society of Civil Engineers (UB ASCE) Student Chapter placed second overall in the 2015 ASCE Upstate New York Regional Student Conference. Read more
- The New York State Society of Professional Engineers, Inc. has named alumnus Dennis M. Kelleher, PE, the NYSSPE Engineer of the Year.
- Alumnus Tenzin Nyandak (BS '14) received the 2015-2016 Robert Silman Fellow for Preservation Engineering.
- MS student Timothy Van Oss received a 2015-2016 WNY Prosperity Fellowship.
- Professor Alan J. Rabideau received the SLICE (Sustainability, Leadership, Innovation and Collaboration) Award from UB Sustainability.
- The UB ASCE Student Chapter received the 2015 Distinguished Chapter Award for Region 1 from ASCE, and the 2014 Outstanding Student Chapter Award from the ASCE New York State Council. Read more
- Four undergraduate students have been awarded scholarships from member firms of the American Council of Engineering Companies of New York (ACEC New York): Alexandra Leader (environmental engineering), Wil Nagengast (civil engineering), Adrianne Richardson (civil engineering), and Mary Beth Toukatly (civil engineering). Read more
- The following CSEE students were recognized at the 2015 UB Celebration of Academic Excellence: Hailie Suk (sophomore, environmental engineering) - Udall Scholarship nominee; Robert Swick (junior, environmental engineering) - poster on fabric filtration; Philip Chan (junior, environmental engineering) and Rebecca Oaks (senior, environmental engineering) - poster on sustainable food production; Hillary Chiarella (junior, environmental engineering) - poster on WNY Environmental Alliance; Alanna Olear (senior, environmental engineering) - Design of "GRoW Home" - UB's Entry in the U.S. Department of Energy's 2015 Solar Decathlon; and Brian Terranova (PhD student, civil engineering) - Ford Foundation Fellowship Program nominee.
- Undergraduate student in environmental engineering Alexandra Leader was awarded the 2015 Neptune Technology Group Scholarship from the American Water Works Association (AWWA) and the Board of Governors Scholarship from the New York Section of the American Water Works Association (NYSAWWA). Read more
- In the 2015 CSEE Graduate Student Poster Competition, Arvin Ebrahimkhanlou received first place, Aikaterini Stefanaki received second place, and Seyedsina Yousefianmoghadam received third place. Read more
- Professor Joseph F. Atkinson has been recognized as an exemplary mentor in the professional development of junior colleagues by the Quality of Life Research Center at Claremont Graduate University.
- Civil engineering undergraduate students Edward Almeter, Wil Nagengast and Caitlin O'Leary received the 2015 Scholarship from the Association for Bridge Construction and Design of Western New York. Read more
- Alumnus Dr. Alejandro Rivera Becerra (ME 1998) received the UBAA International Distinguished Alumni Award. Read more
- Mauricio Diaz Arancibia, a graduate student in Structural and Earthquake Engineering, was selected as a recipient of the 2015 Post-Tensioning Institute (PTI) Scholarship. Read more
- SUNY Distinguished Professor Michael C. Constantinou, Professor Emeritus Andrei Reinhorn, and former PhD student Apostolos Sarlis were selected to receive the 2015 ASCE Moisseiff Award for their paper “Simulated Bilinear-Elastic Behavior in a SDOF Elastic Structure Using Negative Stiffness Device: Experimental and Analytical Study.” Read more
- Structural and Earthquake Engineering PhD student Jorge Cueto Baiz, a participant in UB's Entrepreneurship Lab (eLab), was one of four winners selected to receive seed funding for his startup business, Smart Walls, which develops deployable, precast concrete walls used to protect buildings or entire neighborhoods from flooding. Read more
- Faculty member Michael C. Constantinou was appointed SUNY Distinguished Professor, the highest faculty rank in the SUNY system, at the SUNY Board of Trustees’ meeting on November 6. Read more
- Laura Pavone, an undergraduate student in civil engineering, won the 2014 EERI Student Paper Competition for her paper "Effect of Window Openings on Reinforced Concrete Frames with Masonry Infill."
- Teng Wu, assistant professor, was recognized by the American Association for Wind Engineering for his contributions in a paper titled "Bridge aerodynamics and aeroelasticity: A comparison of modeling schemes," which was published in the Journal of Fluids and Structures.
- Salvatore Salamone, assistant professor, was named the recipient of the 2014 Achenbach Medal, an international award that recognizes an individual, within 10 years of PhD, who has made an outstanding contribution to the advancement of the field of structural health monitoring.
- PhD students Maria Koliou and Alireza Farhidzadeh were among the recipients of the 2014 Liu Huixian Earthquake Engineering Scholarship Award.
- PhD student Lei Lin’s paper titled “Android Smartphone Application for Collecting, Sharing and Predicting the Niagara Frontier Border Crossings Waiting Time" was selected as the winner of the Intelligent Transportation Society of New York’s (ITS-NY) 2014 Best Student Paper Competition.
- The University at Buffalo’s American Society of Civil Engineers (UB ASCE) Student Chapter Steel Bridge Team took home 10th place overall in 2014 National Student Steel Bridge Competition (NSSBC). Read more
- Alan Rabideau, professor, received the 2014 NYSSPE Contribution to Education Award, a state-wide award from the New York State Society of Professional Engineers.
- Tresor Mavinga, undergraduate student in civil engineering, received the Robert B. Oliver Scholarship from the American Society for Nondestructive Testing for his paper "Guided Ultrasonic Waves for Corrosion Monitoring of Civil Infrastructure."
- PhD student Hosein Kerdar led a team that took first place in UB's Henry A. Panasci Jr. Technology Entrepreneurship Competition. The team received funding for their startup company EMVISS (Electromagnetic Vibration Isolation and Stabilization System). Read more
- Undergraduate students Paul Holsberger, William Martorana, Tenzin Nyandak and Greg Phattanachitchon were named recipients of the 2014 ACEC New York Scholarship.
- PhD student Alireza Farhidzadeh earned third place in the 2014 SEAS Poster Competition. PhD student Maria Koliou earned Honorable Mention.
- Four undergraduate students received the WNY Prosperity Scholarship: Thomas Brown (BS, Civil Engineering), Emily Nuding (MS, Civil Engineering), Alanna Olear (BS, Environmental Engineering), and Abigail Prior (BS, Environmental Engineering). Read more about the scholarships here
- Undergraduate students Ian Bick, Jaclyn Bronner and Kevin Stevens were named recipients of the 2013 ACEC New York Scholarship.
- The University at Buffalo’s American Society of Civil Engineers (UB ASCE) Student Chapter Steel Bridge Team took home 11th place overall in 2013 National Student Steel Bridge Competition (NSSBC).
- Undergraduate students Kevin Stevens and Tim Van Oss competed and took first place in the ASCE/Construction Institute's Student Day's Competition.
- PhD student Mahish Kumar took second place in the 2013 SEAS Graduate Student Poster Competition. PhD student Afsoon Nicknam received Honorable Mention.