Elisabeth Smela Promoted to Full Professor

University of Maryland President Wallace D. Loh recently announced the promotion of Elisabeth Smela to the rank of Professor, effective July 1, 2011.

A member of the ME faculty since 2000, Smela earned her B.S. in Physics at MIT and her doctorate in Electrical Engineering from the University of Pennsylvania. Prior to joining the Department, Smela worked as a research scientist at Linköping University, Sweden, a senior scientist at Risø National Laboratory in Denmark, and later served as Vice President of Research and Development at Santa Fe Science and Technology, Inc. (SFST) in New Mexico.

Smela has published 60 journal articles, primarily on organic materials and microelectromechanical systems (MEMS). Her research is particularly focused on artificial muscles, polymer MEMS, and bioMEMS. She uses organic materials (from polymers to cells) in sensors and actuators; in collaboration with others these devices are included in more complex systems, such as micro-robots, cell-based sensors, and CMOS/MEMS integrated systems. Smela’s articles have appeared in a number of respected peer-reviewed journals, including Science, NanoLetters, and Advanced Materials.

A Fellow of the NSF Summer Institute in Japan, Smela has received a number of awards for her research and academic accomplishments, including the NSF Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE) (2004); the E. Robert Kent Teaching Award for Junior Faculty (2004); the DuPont Young Professor Award (2003); and the Outstanding Invention award from the Office of Technology Commercialization (2004).

To learn more about Professor Smela’s research, please visit her faculty page.

Published May 17, 2011