University of Utah College of Engineering

University of Utah College of Engineering
The John and Marva Warnock Engineering Building.
Established	1896
Type	Public
Dean	Richard B. Brown
Faculty	141
Undergraduates	3,000
Postgraduates	600
Location	Salt Lake City, Utah, USA
Campus	Map
Website	www.coe.utah.edu

The University of Utah College of Engineering is an academic college of the University of Utah in Salt Lake City, Utah. The college offers undergraduate and graduate degrees in engineering and computer science.^[1]

History

The University of Utah College of Engineering had its roots in the State School of Mines, which was established in the 1890s. The first modern four-year engineering degree at the school was introduced in 1895 with Joseph F. Merrill as the first principal. The first department of engineering was organized in 1896.^[2]

Rankings

The American Society of Engineering Education (ASEE) ranks the University of Utah's College of Engineering:^[3]

• 53rd out of 331 schools for undergraduate enrollment
• Among the top 50 schools for the number of PhDs
• Among the top 50 schools for BS degrees in computer science, civil engineering, chemical engineering and electrical engineering
• 44th out of 200 schools in research expenditures
• 44th out of 323 schools for the number of teaching personnel

Departments

The College of Engineering is made up of seven departments: bioengineering, chemical engineering, civil and environmental engineering, electrical engineering, materials science and engineering, mechanical engineering, and the school of computing.

School of Computing

The Utah teapot, a model by Martin Newell (1975).

The University of Utah was one of the original four nodes of ARPANET, the world's first packet-switching computer network and embryo of the current worldwide Internet.^[4] In late 1969, the U's computer graphics department was linked into the node at Stanford Research Institute in Menlo Park, California to complete the initial 4-node network.

The School of Computing has made several important contributions to computer graphics and computer animation. These contributions include: Gouraud shading, the Phong reflection model, the Phong shading method, and the rendering equation.^[5]

The Scientific Computing and Imaging Institute continues to make advances in visualization, scientific computing, and image analysis. The institute currently has over 100 faculty and staff, most of which are from the School of Computing or Bioengineering departments.^[6]

Buildings

The John and Marva Warnock Engineering Building from the side

Warnock Engineering Building

The John and Marva Warnock Engineering building (referred to as the WEB) houses the offices of the College of Engineering. It also is the home of the Scientific Computing and Imaging Institute and numerous classrooms and study rooms. The building was named after John Warnock and his wife Marva Warnock, both of whom graduated from the University of Utah, after he generously donated almost 6 million dollars for its construction in 2003^[7]. Some additional funding for the project came from the George S. and Dolores Dore Eccles Foundation. Construction on the building was completed in 2007.

The Scientific Computing and Imaging Institute is located in the WEB.

Merrill Engineering Building

The Merrill Engineering building (referred to as the MEB) is named after Joseph F. Merrill who became the first principal of the College of Engineering. The first phase of construction on the Merrill Engineering Building was completed in 1960^[8] and it served as the main building for the College of Engineering until the John and Marva Warnock Engineering building was completed. The building still houses most of the student and research labs used by the college of engineering.

The MEB also houses a TRIGA nuclear reactor 25 feet below ground level in a double-wall reactor tank filled with water that has been operating since 1975.^[9] The reactor was featured in a report by ABC in 2005 about the security concerns with university research reactors. ABC felt that the security was inadequate, but that has been disputed by many other sources.^[9]

Notable alumni

Notable College of Engineering Alumni and Faculty Alan C. Kay John Warnock Ralph Hartley Ivan Sutherland

Chemical Engineering

• Wilbert L. Gore - Co-inventor of Gore-Tex fabrics

Electrical Engineering

• Cleon Anderson - Former President and CEO of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE).
• Nolan Bushnell - Founder of Atari and Chuck E. Cheese, he has been inducted into the Video Game Hall of Fame and the Consumer Electronics Association Hall of Fame. He was also named one of Newsweek's "50 Men That Changed America."
• David Evans - Computer scientist and graphics pioneer and co-founder of Evans & Sutherland
• Ralph Hartley - Co-founder of Information Theory (along with Shannon and Hamming), inventor of Hartley Transform and Hartley Oscillator, IEEE Medal of Honor recipient
• Calvin Quate - One of the inventors of the atomic force microscope and recipient of the IEEE Medal of Honor
• Simon Ramo - The father of the intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) and partly responsible for the formation of two Fortune 500 companies
• John Warnock - Computer scientist best known as a co-founder of Adobe Systems Inc.

School of Computing

• Robert Adamson (software pioneer) - Computer scientist. Developed Gener/OL, one of the first interpretive languages.
• Alan Ashton - Computer scientist, co-founder of WordPerfect and Thanksgiving Point
• Brian A. Barsky - Professor at the University of California, Berkeley working in computer graphics and geometric modeling as well as in optometry and vision science.
• Jim Blinn - Computer scientist and MacArthur Fellow, known for his work on Carl Sagan's Cosmos documentary and inventing the first method for representing surface textures in graphical images.^[10]
• Edwin Catmull - An Academy Award winning computer scientist and current president of Walt Disney Animation Studios and Pixar Animation Studios.
• Jim Clark - Computer scientist, prolific entrepreneur and founder of several technology companies, including Silicon Graphics, Inc., Netscape Communications Corporation, myCFO and Healtheon
• Frank Crow - Computer scientist, developed anti-aliasing methods for computer graphics
• Henri Gouraud, Computer scientist, inventor of Gouraud shading
• Jim Kajiya - Computer scientist, developed the frame buffer concept for storing and displaying single-raster images and the rendering equation.
• Alan Kay - Computer scientist, recipient of the Turing Award, credited with the concept of the Laptop computer.^[11]
• Martin Newell - Computer scientist and graphics pioneer best known as the creator of the Utah Teapot
• Fred Parke - creator of the first CG physically-modeled human face
• Bui Tuong Phong, Computer scientist, inventor of the Phong reflection model and the Phong shading interpolation method

Notable Faculty

• David Evans - founder of the computer science department at the U, graphics pioneer and co-founder of Evans & Sutherland
• Stephen Jacobsen - Distinguished professor and founder of Sarcos, a robotics company that is now part of Raytheon
• Suhas Patil - Computer scientist, prolific entrepreneur and founder of Cirrus Logic, a fabless semiconductor company.
• Ivan Sutherland - Winner of the Turing Award in 1988 for Sketchpad, co-founder of Evans and Sutherland
• Thomas Stockham - founder of Soundstream Inc., one of the experts selected to investigate President Richard Nixon's White House tapes.
• Willem Johan Kolff - the father of artificial organs, pioneer of hemodialysis as well as artificial organs

College Deans

College of Engineering Deans:[12]		Tenure[12]	Bio
	Joseph F. Merrill	1897-1928	Before becoming dean of the College of Engineering Merrill was the director of the State School of Mines. The first modern four-year engineering degree at the school was introduced in 1895 with Joseph F. Merrill as the first principal. The first department of engineering was organized in 1896 with Merrill as the first dean.
	Richard B. Ketchum	1928-1939
	Albert L. Taylor	1939-1952
	Samuel S. Kistler	1952-1965
	Max L. Williams	1965-1973
	Wayne S. Brown	1973-1978	Brown was a professor of mechanical engineering prior to becoming the dean of the college. He is the founder of TerraTek a geomechanics measurement and analysis company, which was purchased by Schlumberger in 2006[13]. He is also the founder of the Utah Innovation Foundation, which is now called the Wayne Brown Institute, that helps develop early stage companies.
	Laurence H. Lattman	1978-1983
	Joseph D. Andrade	1983-1987
	David W. Pershing	1987-1998
	Gerald B. Stringfellow	1998-2003
	Richard B. Brown	2004-Present

References

External links

• College of Engineering Homepage
• Electrical and Computer Engineering Homepage
• School of Computing Homepage
• Mechanical Engineering Homepage
• Chemical Engineering Homepage
• Bioengineering Homepage
• Materials Science and Engineering Homepage
• Civil and Environmental Engineering