Alumni

Retired Maj. Gen. Jeannie M. Leavitt, the U.S. Air Force’s first female fighter pilot and a 1990 graduate of The University of Texas at Austin, will deliver the keynote address at UT’s 141st Spring Commencement on May 11.

Affirm CFO and mechanical engineering alumnus Michael Linford will give the keynote address at the 2024 Cockrell School of Engineering Undergraduate Student Commencement ceremony on May 10.

The University of Texas at Austin will reimagine its approach to training civil, architectural and environmental engineering students as society’s designers, with a renewed emphasis on leadership and service needed to solve global challenges. A transformational investment from a UT alumnus will galvanize this approach, which he calls “engineering the big.”

Energy security is getting a boost at The University of Texas at Austin. The Cockrell School of Engineering will now partner with the Kay Bailey Hutchison Energy Center.

Aerospace engineering alumnus Andreas Mogensen took to the stars today, flying his second trip to the International Space Station (ISS) where he is serving as the mission pilot and space station crew commander for the Huginn Mission.

The six-month mission includes astronauts from NASA, the European Space Agency (ESA), Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency and Russia’s Roscosmos. Mogensen will conduct more than 30 experiments for the ESA during the mission divided into three pillars: climate, health and space for Earth. He will also collaborate with team members on experiments for other space agencies.

When it comes to achieving career goals, Stephanie Wilson is a great example to follow.

She has taken part in three space missions as a NASA astronaut, spending a combined 42 days in space during that time.

Lew Griffith has three degrees, including a master's, but this year, at age 99, he is finally attending his first commencement ceremony.

A nearly 30-year career in the U.S. military as an engineer and pilot that spanned World War II, Korea and the Vietnam War interrupted this Texas Engineer's education and his ability to walk with fellow graduates. But at this year's Cockrell School Commencement Ceremony, Griffith is being honored for his military service and his commitment to education, despite all the obstacles that got in the way.

Alumna and NASA Astronaut Stephanie Wilson will give the keynote address at the 2023 Cockrell School of Engineering Undergraduate Student Commencement Ceremony on May 5.

Researchers behind discoveries that led to vaccines for the virus that causes COVID-19 have identified a potential Achilles heel that exists in all coronaviruses. These findings, led by researchers at The University of Texas at Austin, could aid the development of improved treatments for COVID-19 and also protect against existing and emerging coronaviruses.

A career is a long, winding road that includes, failures, successes and unexpected turns along the way.

This was the advice to the next generation of students from the panelists at the Cockrell School of Engineering's third annual Black Alumni Panel. The conversation, titled Celebrating Black Excellence, between chemical engineering and aerospace engineering alumni who both ended up in Information Technology shows how different careers can turn out from the plans they made as students.

Cockrell School alumnus, software engineer and Shark Tank finalist Ecleamus Ricks, Jr. has always considered himself a creator. Fascinated with his grandfather’s skills as a carpenter, Ricks knew he wanted to build things using science and numbers.

The National Academy of Engineering has elected Benny Freeman, a professor in the McKetta Department of Chemical Engineering at The University of Texas at Austin, to the academy for 2023. Alumnus Fariborz Maseeh, who received a master’s degree in civil engineering from UT Austin, has also been elected.

Earlier this month, the Cockrell School of Engineering, Department of Aerospace Engineering and Engineering Mechanics and the Texas Innovation Center officially kicked off our new space tech entrepreneurial program, Launch Texas. Hundreds of students, faculty, alumni and members of the space tech industry came together in Mulva Auditorium in the Engineering Education and Research Center for the Go For Launch event, which featured alumnus and CEO of Blue Origin Bob Smith, a panel of experts on the future of the space economy and presentations by student founders of space tech startups.

Hundreds of students, faculty and staff members, alumni and friends gathered to celebrate a transformative gift resulting in the naming of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering in the Cockrell School of Engineering at The University of Texas at Austin. The department will now be named the Chandra Family Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering.

Established in 1957, the Distinguished Engineering Graduate Award is the highest honor that the Cockrell School bestows on its alumni. The five distinguished engineering graduates for 2021 are pioneers, entrepreneurs and highly respected leaders in their fields and in their communities. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic and challenges to hosting in-person events last year, the 2021 distinguished graduates were honored this year at a special event on September 9.

Researchers from The University of Texas at Austin and North Carolina State University have discovered for the first time a unique property in complex nanostructures that has thus far only been found in simple nanostructures. Additionally, they have unraveled the internal mechanics of the materials that makes this property possible.

In just eight short years, Payam Banazadeh (B.S. Aerospace Engineering 2012) skyrocketed from a passionate high school student sitting in an astronomy class to becoming the founder and CEO of Capella Space, the first commercial space company to launch and operate Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) satellites.

Jerry A. Yang is a PhD student in electrical engineering at Stanford University. He received his B.S. in electrical engineering from The University of Texas at Austin in 2020. He currently works on strain engineering in two-dimensional materials in Prof. Eric Pop's lab. In addition, he works on exploring the role of internships in first-generation and low-income engineering students' professional identity development in Prof. Sheri Sheppard's Designing Education Lab. He is a member of the Institute for Electrical and Electronics Engineers as well as a student member of the American Society of Engineering Education. He is also pursuing his M.A. in Education.

Meet Sepehr Bastami, an aerospace research engineer at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia. Bastami conducts cutting-edge aeronautics research, serving on two projects related to sustainable aviation and human contributions to safety in aviation.

Thanks to a seed gift from Cockrell School of Engineering alumnus Stuart Lodge (B.S. Mechanical Engineering 1984), a new program in the Texas Innovation Center gives MBA students real-world business experience as they learn from and help faculty- and graduate student-led startups develop their business commercialization plans.