In motorsports, you often meet people who have “been there and done that.” Chris Andrews (BSIDE ’92) is one of those people. As a lifelong race engineer, and current technical lead of Vasser Sullivan’s IMSA sports car team, Chris has had an influence on stock cars, open wheel racing, and even Purdue’s own pioneering motorsports teams.

The American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) held its annual AIAA SciTech Forum in Orlando on January 6-10, 2025. Several Purdue University researchers were honored during the event.

Sevinch Pasilova, a junior studying mechanical engineering at Purdue in Indianapolis, conducted research on aerogels and had the opportunity to send her findings to NASA.

Which is more difficult: slaloming down a ski slope at 50 miles an hour, or designing a rocket to travel 1,000 miles an hour? William Flaherty, a Purdue mechanical engineering student, has done both!

Ajay Malshe has been elected as a 2025 International Director for the Society of Manufacturing Engineers (SME).

The School of Mechanical Engineering has announced recipients for several graduate-level departmental fellowships and scholarships for the 2024-2025 academic year.

Purdue engineers are famous for launching into space — but only one Boilermaker has built spaceships for Captain Marvel!

David Altenau (BSME 1988) is the founder and chairman of the Pitch Black Company, a visual effects powerhouse whose empire stretches from Star Wars to Barbie to Indiana Jones.

It’s not often you can work beside people who literally wrote the book in their chosen field. In 2024, we bid a fond farewell to seven of the most impactful faculty members from the School of Mechanical Engineering, who have all chosen to retire. Stuart Bolton, James Braun, Patricia Davies, Klod Kokini, Peter Meckl, Gordon Pennock, and Steven Wereley leave behind an incredible legacy — and a combined 251 years of experience at Purdue.

As AI use continues to skyrocket, high-performance semiconductors are consuming increasing amounts of energy. To decrease energy use, Purdue University researchers are working with Intel to create coral-shaped heat sinks that will revolutionize immersion-based chip cooling.

Sustainable energy sources like wind and solar present a challenge: how do you store excess energy during periods of overproduction for when you really need it? Some large-scale utilities have turned to mechanical energy storage: lifting heavy weights or pumping water uphill into a reservoir. Once that energy is needed, the weight is released and its mechanical energy powers a generator that produces electricity.
These mechanical batteries have been proven to work on a large scale, but never at the scale of a single residential home. A team of Purdue University undergraduates undertook a study to investigate whether a “gravity battery” could be made small enough to fit into a single-family home.