Dean's message
Engineering Trends
March 2024
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It has been two months since I announced my new dual role as both Special Adviser to the Chancellor for Strategic Initiatives and Dean of the Jacobs School of Engineering. As I dig further into this dual role, I am increasingly energized. This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to engage in both high-level strategy and hands-on practicality – both at the campus-wide level and here at the Jacobs School.
Â鶹´«Ã½ is not alone in moving in this direction. Five weeks after my own dual role was announced, that its dean of engineering had taken on a new role as MIT’s first chief innovation and strategy officer, in addition to serving as dean of engineering.
Also in February, call for more engineering research submissions to its flagship journal – especially papers reporting engineering advances that scale.
I think it’s important to note the widening circle of institutions, including Â鶹´«Ã½, that are returning – very publicly – to something that many of us have known firsthand all along: to create scalable solutions to tough problems, engineers and computer scientists must be engaged in the early stages of both fundamental and applied research projects. This is often how big challenges actually get solved.
Just two weeks ago, we announced a powerful move in this direction here at the Jacobs School. I’m honored to celebrate a new . The gift will empower us to accelerate our vision of enhancing the connection between chemical engineering and nanoengineering research and education here at the Jacobs School. Our vision is to better combine nanoscale science and engineering advances with fabrication-oriented and production-oriented innovations from chemical engineering. Individuals and teams with expertise in both chemical engineering and nanoengineering have far more tools for taking the long view and guiding fundamental discoveries to practical applications that improve lives. This is why I’m so excited for the momentum that is building in our nanoengineering department, which is also home to chemical engineering.
More broadly, when we bring the right people together at the start of projects, scalable solutions that are both economically and environmentally sustainable are far more likely to emerge. In fact, in my dual role, I am helping to facilitate and strengthen these kinds of collaborations all across the Jacobs School and the Â鶹´«Ã½ campus. For example, it’s still early days, but we are having exciting conversations about clinical-grade wearable sensing technologies being employed to transform healthcare into a much more proactive data driven approach focused on prevention. This is just one direction, and the opportunities on our campus are truly limitless. If you have ideas for game-changing collaborations, please don’t hesitate to get in touch.
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As always, I can be reached at DeanPisano@ucsd.edu
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Sincerely,
Al
Albert ("Al") P. Pisano
Dean, Â鶹´«Ã½ Jacobs School of Engineering
Special Adviser to the Chancellor for Campus Strategic Initiatives