Harry Pierson
Industrial Engineering
Harry Pierson received a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering and a master’s degree in engineering management from the University of Missouri-Rolla. He holds a doctorate in industrial and systems engineering from The Ohio State University. Pierson has worked as a visiting assistant professor of mechanical and manufacturing engineering at Miami University, and has experience in the manufacturing industry through positions with Spang & Co. and Ingersoll-Rand. His research interests include agile/advanced manufacturing, robotics, mechatronics, and industrial automation.
Narasimhan Rajaram
Biomedical Engineering
Narasimhan Rajaram’s research interests are in the development of functional and molecular optical imaging techniques that can assess tumor biology and predict long-term outcome. He received a bachelor’s degree in electronics and instrumentation engineering at Anna University in Channai, India. He holds a doctorate in biomedical engineering from the University of Texas at Austin, and has served as a postdoctoral associate and research scientist at Duke University.
Xintao Wu
Computer Science and Computer Engineering
Before coming to the U of A, Wu was a professor of software and information systems at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. He received a bachelor’s degree in information science from the University of Science and Technology of China, a master’s degree in computer engineering from the Chinese Academy of Space Technology and a doctorate in information technology from George Mason University. He will hold the Charles D. Morgan/Acxiom endowed Graduate Research Chair.
Gary Prinz
Civil Engineering
Gary Prinz investigates steel infrastructure challenges related to extreme or repeated loads, including earthquake loads, blast and vehicle or rail traffic. Prinz joins the University of Arkansas from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, where he was a postdoctoral researcher. He received his bachelor’s, master’s and doctorate in civil engineering from Brigham Young University and is a registered professional engineer in the state of California.
Benjamin Runkle
Biological and Agricultural Engineering
Before coming to the U of A, Benjamin Runkle was a post-doctoral research scientist at the University of Hamburg’s Institute of Soil Science in Hamburg, Germany. He holds a bachelor’s degree in civil and environmental engineering from Princeton and a master’s degree and doctorate in civil and environmental engineering from the University of California, Berkeley. Runkle’s research focuses on sustainability and water resources, and his interests include carbon-water interactions in wetlands and permafrost landscapes.
Wenchao Zhou
Mechanical Engineering
Wenchao Zhou earned a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from the Huazhong University of Science and Technology in Wuhan, China, a master’s degree in mechanical engineering from Xi’an Jiaotong University in Xi’an China, and a doctorate in mechanical engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology. He has worked at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, and as a research fellow on additive manufacturing technology for electronics at the Shenzhen Institute of Advanced Technology in Shenzhen, China.