Mechanical and Aeronautical Engineering

At the present time, the Department of Mechanical and Aeronautical Engineering (MAE) considers itself to be one of the leaders on campus in CS&E fields. This leadership is the result of the strong and fundamental efforts that exist in MAE in Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD), Energy Systems Design, Computed-Aided Design (CAD), Computed-Aided Manufacturing (CAM), Computational Mechanics, and real-time control and optimization of physical systems. The MAE Department is both internationally and nationally recognized for its excellence in engineering and scientific computation, and the Department plans to build its future around this excellence and other CS&E-related subjects. The MAE Department considers the CS&E Initiative as an opportunity for both growth and joint appointments. It is MAE's expectation that MAE can play a key role in attracting faculty for the CS&E Initiative, and MAE has many faculty members who would be interested in joint appointments. The current research areas in which the MAE Department excels are directly related to the CS&E Initiative, and MAE should play a significant role in teaching, facility development, and research opportunities. It should also be pointed out that the CS&E Initiative is an excellent opportunity for the College of Engineering to develop strong ties with the other colleges on the Davis Campus. The need for strong multi-disciplinary interactions between the College of Engineering and the Biological and Physical Sciences is growing rapidly, and the MAE Department is committed to developing these activities. The MAE Department fully endorses the CS&E Initiative, and it is committed to actively participate in the development of the multi-disciplinary teaching and research in a potential new division for CS&E. MAE feels that the CS&E Initiative should be one of the top priorities of the UC Davis campus, and it should be closely connected to all of the colleges and departments on campus that would benefit from its activities.