December 11, 2009 | Faculty

Horacio Espinosa Named James N. and Nancy J. Farley Professor

He is leading a defense department research initiative on hybrid DWNT-polymer fibers

EVANSTON, Ill. --- Horacio Espinosa, professor of mechanical engineering in the McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science at Northwestern, has been named the James N. and Nancy J. Farley Professor in Manufacturing and Entrepreneurship.

Espinosa's research focuses on characterizing and modeling mechanical behavior and properties of materials at small scales, biomaterials and artificial bio-inspired materials, and materials subjected to high-strain rates. He has also developed the expertise and tools to address microscale and nanoscale fabrication towards multiphysics testing of nanomaterials. He has published more than 200 articles and book chapters on these subjects.

He is currently leading a Department of Defense Multidisciplinary University Research Initiative (MURI) program titled "Multiscale Design and Manufacturing of Hybrid DWNT-Polymer Fibers."

Director of the Theoretical and Applied Mechanics Graduate Program, Espinosa is the recipient of numerous honors and awards, including the National Science Foundation CAREER Award, the Office of Naval Research Young Investigator Award, a Society of Engineering Science Junior Medal, the American Academy of Mechanics (AAM) 2002-Junior Award and the Lazan and Hetenyi Awards from the Society for Experimental Mechanics (SEM). He also was elected fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, the SEM and the AAM.

He is editor-in-chief of the Journal of Experimental Mechanics, co-editor of the Wiley Book Series in Micro and Nanotechnologies and associate editor of the Journal of Applied Mechanics. He also serves on the editorial board of several Nanotechnology journals. He joined the Northwestern faculty in 2000.