Faculty of Engineering announces appointments

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BY Faculty of Engineering

June 20, 2008

Appointments of two department chairs, two endowed chairs and six directors have been announced in the Faculty of Engineering.

  • Saeid Habibi has been appointed chair of the Department of Mechanical Engineering and David Capson has been appointed chair of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering.
  • Jun Chen has been appointed the Barber-Gennum Endowed Chair in Information Technology and Christopher Swartz has been appointed the Dofasco Endowed Chair in Process Automation and Information Technology.
  • Stephen Veldhuis has been appointed director of the McMaster Manufacturing Research Institute and Joseph McDermid has been appointed co-academic director (McMaster) of the Initiative for Automotive Manufacturing Innovation.
  • John Brash has been reappointed director of the School of Biomedical Engineering and Brian Baetz has been reappointed director of the Engineering and Society Program.
  • Timothy Davidson has been appointed acting director of the McMaster School of Computational Engineering and Science and David Jackson has been appointed acting director of the McMaster Institute for Energy Studies, both for six-month terms.

    “I would like to extend my appreciation to all of these very accomplished individuals and commend them on their willingness to contribute in the administration of the Faculty,” said David Wilkinson, dean, Faculty of Engineering.

    Saeid Habibi succeeds Samir Ziada as chair of the Department of Mechanical Engineering. He joined McMaster as associate professor in 2006 from the University of Saskatchewan. He holds a PhD in Control Engineering from the University of Cambridge and a B.Sc. from Dundee University.

    David Capson succeeds Max Wong as chair of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. Most recently, Capson served as acting dean of Graduate Studies for the University. He received his PhD from McMaster University and B.Sc. (Eng.) from the University of New Brunswick.

    Jun Chen, assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering, received his B.Sc. degree in Electronic Engineering from Shanghai Jiao Tong University, and M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Cornell University.

    Christopher Swartz, associate professor of chemical engineering, received his B.Sc. (Eng.) from the University of Cape Town and PhD from the University of Wisconsin. Swartz also serves as director of the McMaster Advanced Control Consortium (MACC).

    Stephen Veldhuis, associate professor of mechanical engineering, earned his B. Eng and Mgmt. degree from McMaster, M. Eng. from Carnegie Mellon and PhD from McMaster. He has been actively involved in the Machining Systems Laboratory of the MMRI for several years.

    Joseph McDermid earned his B.A.Sc. from Queen's University, and M.Eng. and PhD degrees from McGill University. He holds the NSERC/Stelco Industrial Research Chair in Steel Product Application.