Auburn Engineering secures record $117.7M in research awards and contracts for FY24

Auburn University’s Samuel Ginn College of Engineering has set a college record for new research awards and contracts for a fiscal year, closing FY24 with $117.7 million.

Auburn Engineering has now increased its annual research awards and contracts by more than 300% since 2018, when the college brought in $29 million. The college also set a record with engineering faculty members submitting 544 proposals requesting $458 million in research funding.

“In recent years, the Samuel Ginn College of Engineering has generated record-breaking levels of funding in new research awards and contracts, alumni support and student enrollment,” said Mario Eden, dean of engineering. “Our vision is to provide research that improves quality of life and fosters economic competitiveness, and that’s exactly what our dynamic faculty and students are doing as part of one of the elite public engineering institutions in the nation.”

In 2017, the college began a strategic hiring initiative that resulted in an increase of nearly 50 faculty members. In turn, this has increased the number of research proposals and funding amounts for each request.

“Our faculty members are not only setting a standard in the classroom, they are also doing so as part of the university’s research enterprise,” said Allan David, the college’s associate dean of research. “Whether it’s related to transportation, health, advanced and additive manufacturing, cybersecurity or the environment, our faculty members are conducting cutting-edge research that is improving the quality of life, driving our economy and making us safer both here at home and across the globe.”

Funding for several high-profile research areas included:

• Transportation and Resilient Infrastructure — $32,457,000
• Advanced and Additive Manufacturing — $18,340,000
• Applied Research — $15,061,000
• Cybersecurity and Intelligent Systems — $11,100,000
• Biomedical and Health Systems Engineering — $6,900,000
• Advanced Communications and Electronics — $9,081,000

Several impactful awards and contracts included:

• $50 million ($22 million awarded in FY24)
  U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command Aviation & Missile Center
  “Lightweight, Advanced Manufacturing of Metallic, Polymer and Composite Structures for Aviation and Missile Weapon Systems”
• $10 million
  Department of Energy
  Model Regional Operations Center to Enhance Cyber Security of US Electricity Sector
  Frank Cilluffo and James Goosby (McCrary Institute for Cyber and Critical Infrastructure Security)
• $6,552,227
  Federal Transit Administration
  “Low and No Emission-Component Assessment”
  Christian Brodbeck (engineering administration) and Mark Hoffman (mechanical engineering)
• $3,255,444
  State of Kansas
  “Additive Manufacturing Material and Process Rapid Qualification for Vehicle Applications”
  Nima Shamsaei and Shuai Shao (mechanical engineering)
• $3,012,027
  U.S. Air Force
  “Novel Timber Structures for Air Force Expeditionary Environments”
  James Davidson, J. Brian Anderson, David Roueche and Kadir Sener (civil and environmental engineering)
• $1,250,000
  National Asphalt Pavement Association
  “Synthesis of State of Practice and Research Needs for Airfield Asphalt Pavement Resilience”
  Benjamin Bowers (civil and environmental engineering)
• $1,099,000
  Trideum Corp.
  “Missions based multi-domain operations test environment”
  Stephen Mills (Applied Research Institute) and Hunter Burch (electrical and computer engineering)

Courtesy of Auburn University.