Message from the chair

Harold J. Steudel (33K JPG)

As we enter the summer months of 2003, it is with great satisfaction that I reflect on the completion of another exciting and productive year in the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering. In January 2003, Nilay Argon joined our department as an assistant professor after completing her PhD work in industrial engineering at Georgia Tech last year.

Nilay's research and teaching will strengthen our program by offering her expertise in the areas of stochastic process models for analyzing production-flow lines, and applying statistical methods to analyze data generated from computer simulations of complex production systems. I am sure you will enjoy the article in this newsletter to learn more about Nilay. (See the faculty profile in this issue.)

In this newsletter you can also read about the recent $400,000 National Science Foundation CAREER research award received by Assistant Professor Darek Ceglarek to develop generic multistage assembly process models for identifying and eliminating root causes of dimensional variation. Since such variation can lead to long ramp-up time during new product launch, especially for automotive and aerospace assembly lines, and low production yield below design intent expectations, Darek's stream-of-variation system has applications across many discrete manufacturing industries, such as in automotive, aerospace, shipbuilding and appliance manufacturing, where product dimensional integrity is crucially important. (See the story in this issue.)

This summer Professor Raj Veeramani will be working with other ISyE faculty to finalize the new graduate-level curriculum in the recently approved area of information systems. With the other ISyE specializations in decision sciences/operations research, health systems, human factors, manufacturing and production systems, and quality engineering, this new specialization area will generate exciting research and teaching initiatives to continue our efforts to offer a world-class educational program in our top-10-rated ISyE department. We certainly appreciate the support and encouragement we receive from our many sources, including our alumni and friends, as we continue to strive for excellence in these challenging times.

This last academic year we had a record number of 79 BS graduates, along with 45 MS and 9 PhD students graduating from our department and embarking on the next stages of their lives. We wish all our graduates great success and happiness in their lives, and hope that they and all our alumni and friends will keep in touch with the ISyE department.

We would like to hear from you with updates to your addresses, job titles, and any interesting goings-on so that we can enhance the accuracy of our alumni database and share the good things that are happening with your lives and careers. Just E-mail me at steudel@engr.wisc.edu to let me know what you are doing.

I hope that you enjoy this newsletter, and as always, we welcome your comments and suggestions.

Harold J. Steudel
360 Mechanical Engineering Building
1513 University Avenue
Madison, WI 53706-1572

Tel: 608/262-9927
Fax: 608/262-8454
E-mail: steudel@engr.wisc.edu
Web: www.engr.wisc.edu/ie