The AE Department welcomes Prof. J. Craig Dutton as the new Department Head effective Sept. 1, 2007

4/10/2013 Written by Susan Mumm

The AE Department welcomes Prof. J. Craig Dutton, who has accepted an offer to become the new Department Head effective Sept. 1, 2007, and will be awarded the Abel Bliss Professorship in the College of Engineering pending Board of Trustees' approval. Dr. Dutton is already familiar with Aerospace Engineering's people and programs through 15 years of affiliation as a former faculty member in mechanical engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana.

Written by Written by Susan Mumm

The AE Department welcomes Prof. J. Craig Dutton, who has accepted an offer to become the new Department Head effective Sept. 1, 2007, and will be awarded the Abel Bliss Professorship in the College of Engineering pending Board of Trustees' approval. Dr. Dutton is already familiar with Aerospace Engineering's people and programs through 15 years of affiliation as a former faculty member in mechanical engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Dutton has been serving as Chair of the Department of Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering at the University of Texas at Arlington since 2004. Having earned a PhD in 1979 from Illinois' Mechanical & Industrial Engineering Department, now Mechanical Science and Engineering (MechSE), Dutton began his academic career at Texas A&M University. He came back to Illinois as an associate professor in 1985 and successfully worked his way through the ranks. He was named MIE's W. Grafton and Lillian B. Wilkins Professor from 1998 to 2003, and was named a Donald Biggar Willett Professor in the College of Engineering from 2003 to 2004. From 2000 to 2003 he served as MIE's associate head for undergraduate programs. Dutton's affiliation with Aerospace Engineering began in 1990 and continued until he left for the University of Texas three years ago.

Dutton is a leading researcher in compressible fluid flow, propulsion, and heat transfer. His current research interests are centered on laser-diagnostic measurements of high-speed separated and mixing flows and shock wave/boundary layer interactions. The experimental techniques used in his work include LDV, PIV, PLIF, Mie/Rayleigh scattering, CARS, and PSP/TSP. Dutton's research has been funded by several federal agencies including ARO, ONR, AFOSR, DARPA, and NSF. He has published the results of his research widely in the refereed journal literature, as well as in conference proceedings.

Dutton is a Fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers and an Associate Fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics. He currently serves on the Editorial Advisory Board of the journal, Experiments in Fluids. Noting the excellence of Illinois' programs, Dutton said he's excited about coming back to UIUC and the challenge of the new position. "I've watched the development of the Department over the years and it's really made great strides. The Department has consistently made excellent faculty hires, which is critical to its success, and we'll definitely want to continue that in the future."

The Bliss Professorship is a result of a bequest from the estate of Helen Bliss, whose father, Abel, was a Civil Engineering student in the 1870s.


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This story was published April 10, 2013.