Rice University Mechanical Engineering

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Rice University Mechanical Engineering In the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Rice University, we combine high educational standards with research distinction and community service.

Our diverse faculty and students are at the forefront of making tomorrow’s technologies a reality. We are a small department making a BIG impact! Our focus on interdisciplinary research means we are well-suited to finding unconventional solutions to huge problems, changing our world for the better. Our faculty-to-student ratio at Rice is six-to-one, ensuring students get the individual attention and support they need to realize their potential. Our students are curious, driven, and motivated to make the world a better place. We produce leaders who are well-versed in a rapidly advancing science. We offer a world-class education at a top-ranked university with a great quality of life. In 2017, Niche Ranked Rice No. 1 for Best Campus Life. In 2018, Kiplinger ranked us No. 8 for Best Value among all colleges and universities, public and private. The Princeton Review has consistently ranked us in the top two for Happiest Students, Best Quality of Life, and Best Race/Class Interaction. Our location in Houston, Texas, the fourth-largest city in the United States, means you’ll be in a city with a competitive edge. Our location is unbeatable – a campus frequently named as one of the nation’s most beautiful, with an average year-round temperature of 70 degrees. And our proximity to both the oil & gas industry and the largest medical center in the world – the Texas Medical Center – means lots of opportunity for collaboration.

🚀 Join us for a MECH 585 Special Seminar featuring guest speakers from NASA’s Johnson Space Center, exploring the textil...
10/22/2026

🚀 Join us for a MECH 585 Special Seminar featuring guest speakers from NASA’s Johnson Space Center, exploring the textile and materials engineering behind human space exploration.

The seminar features three presentations:

Wendy Gao, Textile Materials Lead at NASA’s Johnson Space Center (JETS II), on “Fire-resistant Textile Development for Exploration Vehicles with Enriched-Oxygen Cabin Environments.”

Stephanie Rodgers-Ahnen, Senior Subject Matter Textile Engineer at NASA’s Johnson Space Center, on “NASA’s Development of Next Gen Lunar Space Suit Fabrics.” (Virtual)

Bobby Jones, EC5 Advanced Suit Team at NASA’s Johnson Space Center, on “Artemis Suit Material Effects of Calendaring Woven Fabrics on Dust Resistance.” (Virtual)

đź“… Thursday, October 22, 2026
⏰ 9:25 AM - 10:40 AM
đź“Ť OES 130, Rice University

🗣️ Join us for the Mechanical Engineering Seminar Series featuring Dr. Dan Sameoto, Professor of Mechanical Engineering ...
10/15/2026

🗣️ Join us for the Mechanical Engineering Seminar Series featuring Dr. Dan Sameoto, Professor of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Alberta and leader of the Innovations in Manufacturing, Polymers, and Advanced Composite Technologies (IMPACT) lab, presenting “Next-generation Applications of Bioinspired Materials from Microfluidics to Composites.”

For over 20 years, bio-inspired materials have been explored for diverse applications, including climbing robots, pick-and-place systems, skin adhesives, and space technologies. Dr. Sameoto will explore areas where these materials could have a greater impact, focusing on revolutionary applications rather than material optimization, with a focus on three key areas: microfluidics, soft robotics, and composites with tunable shape, stiffness, and emissivity.

đź“… Wednesday, October 21, 2026
⏰ 3:30 PM - 4:30 PM
đź“Ť Maxfield Hall 251, Rice University
https://events.rice.edu/event/441433-mech-seminar-series-presents-dr-dan-sameoto

Join us for the Mechanical Engineering Seminar Series featuring Dr. Michael Goldfarb, H. Fort Flowers Professor of Mecha...
10/12/2026

Join us for the Mechanical Engineering Seminar Series featuring Dr. Michael Goldfarb, H. Fort Flowers Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Director of the Center for Intelligent Mechatronics at Vanderbilt University, presenting “Advances in knee prostheses: Past, present, and future.”

Dr. Goldfarb will provide a brief history of design innovations in knee prostheses for people with above-knee amputation, focusing on major advances over the past several decades. The talk will discuss how these innovations motivate current approaches to improve knee prostheses, and describe current research aimed at providing greater safety, mobility, and freedom for people with above-knee amputation.

đź“… Wednesday, October 14, 2026
⏰ 3:30 PM - 4:30 PM
đź“Ť Maxfield Hall 251, Rice University

https://events.rice.edu/event/441432-mech-seminar-series-presents-dr-michael-goldfarb

🗣️ Join us for the Mechanical Engineering Seminar Series featuring Dr. Yuri Bazilevs, Professor of Civil and Environment...
10/05/2026

🗣️ Join us for the Mechanical Engineering Seminar Series featuring Dr. Yuri Bazilevs, Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering and of Mechanical Engineering, the J. Lawrence Wilson Chair in Engineering, and inaugural Director of the SCALES research center at Vanderbilt University, presenting "Isogeometric and Meshfree Thin Shells: Methods and Applications to Architected Materials and Structures at the Structural and Nano Scales."

đź“… Wednesday, October 7, 2026
⏰ 3:30 PM - 4:30 PM
đź“Ť Maxfield Hall 251, Rice University

https://events.rice.edu/event/441431-mech-seminar-series-presents-dr-yuri-bazilevs

🗣️ Rice Mechanical Engineering is growing! We have three faculty searches this year as we expand our research and educa...
10/02/2026

🗣️ Rice Mechanical Engineering is growing!
We have three faculty searches this year as we expand our research and educational mission. Mechanical engineering is one of the most sought-after majors among incoming Rice undergraduates, and our faculty are advancing research in health and well-being, energy and sustainability, aerospace, advanced materials, and robotics.

Houston gives our department a distinctive home. We're next door to the Texas Medical Center, the world's largest medical complex; in the heart of the U.S. energy industry; and close to NASA's Johnson Space Center.

Please explore the postings below for more information:
🔹 One tenure/tenure-track position in Aerospace, open rank, as part of our growing aerospace engineering initiative: https://apply.interfolio.com/192999
🔹 One tenure/tenure-track position in Solid Mechanics: https://apply.interfolio.com/192822
🔹 One full-time teaching faculty position focused on enhancing experiential learning throughout the undergraduate program: https://apply.interfolio.com/193833

Applications received by November 1, 2026, will receive priority review, though the portals will remain open through December 15, 2026.

Surgineering: the engineering of surgery.Associate professor Farshid Alambeigi uses the term to describe his work betwee...
10/01/2026

Surgineering: the engineering of surgery.

Associate professor Farshid Alambeigi uses the term to describe his work between his lab at Rice and the operating room at Houston Methodist. Every project begins with surgeons and the challenges they face every day.

His team develops flexible surgical robots, AI tools that support surgeons rather than replace them and robotic bioprinting systems that could one day help build living tissue and even organs for transplantation, all with one goal: safer surgery and better outcomes for patients.

Learn more about his work: https://news.rice.edu/news/2026/rice-engineer-brings-surgineering-mindset-future-medicine

Photo by Emily Kinsolving, Courtesy of Dell Medical School / The University of Texas at Austin.

What if your clothes could help you move?Vanessa Sanchez, assistant professor of mechanical engineering, has received th...
09/18/2026

What if your clothes could help you move?

Vanessa Sanchez, assistant professor of mechanical engineering, has received the Toyota Programmable System Innovation Fellowship, one of only two awarded this year. Her project will knit sensing and motion directly into fabric, creating soft robotic textiles for wearable movement assistance, adaptive car seats and soft safety systems.

It is one more example of how Rice Mechanical Engineering faculty are advancing research in wearables, health and well-being to design technology around people.

Please join us in congratulating Dr. Sanchez!
Read more: https://news.rice.edu/news/2026/rices-sanchez-exploring-future-where-fabric-itself-becomes-robot

🗣️ Join us for the Mechanical Engineering Seminar Series featuring Dr. Sonia Martínez Díaz, Ph.D., Professor in the Depa...
09/15/2026

🗣️ Join us for the Mechanical Engineering Seminar Series featuring Dr. Sonia Martínez Díaz, Ph.D., Professor in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at the University of California, San Diego, presenting "Coverage Control Across Scales: Data-driven Solutions, Dynamic Scenarios, and Optimal Transport."

đź“… Tuesday, September 16, 2026
⏰ 3:30 PM - 4:30 PM
đź“Ť Maxfield Hall 251, Rice University

https://events.rice.edu/event/440040-mech-seminar-presents-dr-sonia-martinez-diaz

This past April, the Artemis II Orion spacecraft completed a successful splashdown in the Pacific Ocean, returning four ...
09/11/2026

This past April, the Artemis II Orion spacecraft completed a successful splashdown in the Pacific Ocean, returning four astronauts from the Moon. The three-parachute cluster that safely slowed the capsule was designed with contributions from Rice MECH's Prof. Tayfun E. Tezduyar and Prof. Kenji Takizawa Waseda University, the only computational fluid-structure interaction modeling team working with NASA Johnson Space Center on the parachute design. Rice's role in this historic mission has now been published in a new journal article.

đź“° Rice News: https://news.rice.edu/news/2026/rice-research-helps-power-safe-return-astronauts-historic-orion-splashdown
🔬 Read the article: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11831-026-10769-3

Research led by Keya Ghonasgi could soon change how stroke patients recover.Keya Ghonasgi, assistant professor of mechan...
08/12/2026

Research led by Keya Ghonasgi could soon change how stroke patients recover.

Keya Ghonasgi, assistant professor of mechanical engineering, is leading a new Brain Institute collaboration alongside Simon Fischer-Baum, associate professor of psychological sciences, with clinical support from Dr. Sheng Li of UThealth Houston. Together, they are using a bilateral wearable exoskeleton to test a more active approach to rehabilitation. Instead of passively moving an affected limb, this mirror-mode technology lets a patient's dominant arm guide their affected limb, mapping movement from one arm to the other at the joint level to actively engage the brain and muscles.

Learn more: https://news.rice.edu/news/2026/rice-brain-institute-collaboration-test-patient-driven-robotic-therapy-stroke-recovery

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6100 Main Street, MS/321
Houston, TX
77005

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Wednesday 8am - 5pm
Thursday 8am - 5pm
Friday 8am - 5pm

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