Dr. Cynthia Hipwell, Oscar S. Wyatt Jr. ’45 Chair II Professor and director of the INVENT Lab in the J. Mike Walker ’66 Department of Mechanical Engineering at Texas A&M University, is the invited speaker for the 2020-2021 Ethel Ashworth-Tsutsui Memorial Lecture, sponsored by Texas A&M Science Outreach.
Hipwell, a Texas A&M Engineering Experiment Station Eminent Professor and a member of the National Academy of Engineering, will present a virtual lecture, “Nanoscale Phenomena in the Human-Machine Interface,” at 5:35 p.m. Wednesday, January 27, via Zoom (link information is available on website). The lecture is free and open to the public and presented in conjunction with the J. Mike Walker ’66 Department of Mechanical Engineering Spring 2021 Seminar Series.
Hipwell joined the Texas A&M faculty in 2017 and has been working in the area of technology development based upon nanoscale phenomena for more than 20 years. Her research interests include nanoscale energy transport and tribology of small-scale devices; surface physics in and sensors and actuators for haptic and human/machine interfaces; and innovation business processes, technology and technology platforms to speed the innovation process. In addition to National Academy of Engineering, Hipwell is an elected fellow of the National Academy of Inventors and a member of The Academy of Medicine, Engineering, and Science of Texas (TAMEST).
Renowned as both a technology and business process innovator, Hipwell is known as a leader in creating environments that encourage and reward innovation, ownership, teamwork and excellence. She started a Grace Hopper Women Innovators Program at Texas A&M and is a champion of student advocacy, chairing the J. Mike Walker ’66 Mechanical Engineering Mentoring Committee and mentoring student/faculty teams in technology commercialization programs. She was recognized in 2019 with both the Aggie Women Network Eminent Scholar Award and the Mechanical Engineering Industry Advisory Council Faculty Mentoring Award.
At the conclusion of Hipwell’s presentation, Texas A&M graduate students Ava Brozovich (Medical Science, Health Science Center College of Medicine) and Rishita Das (Department of Aerospace Engineering) will be recognized as the 2020-2021 recipients of the Ethel Ashworth-Tsutsui Memorial Awards for Research, while fellow graduate student Kari Eifler (Department of Mathematics) will be honored with the Ethel Ashworth-Tsutsui Memorial Award for Mentoring. Each will receive a $500 check, a memorial plaque and a certificate of recognition.
The awards are presented by Women In Science and Engineering (WISE) to highlight research and mentoring efforts by women on the Texas A&M campus in honor and remembrance of Ethel Ashworth-Tsutsui, a longtime faculty member in the Texas A&M Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics. Tsutsui was a founding member of WISE and cared deeply about the retention and recognition of women in the university’s graduate programs. Both the awards and the event are sponsored by WISE, the College of Science, the Texas A&M Division of Research, the Texas A&M Graduate and Professional School and the College of Engineering.
Women In Science and Engineering at Texas A&M is an organization of graduate students, staff and faculty from various science and engineering backgrounds. The group was created to address specific problems faced by women in nontraditional fields.
For more information about the lecture or other outreach events and women’s programs in the College of Science, please contact Texas A&M Science Outreach at (979) 845-7363 or outreach@science.tamu.edu.
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Contact: Shana K. Hutchins, (979) 862-1237 or shutchins@science.tamu.edu
