Jyotirmoy “Jyoti” Mazumder, Robert H. Lurie Professor of Engineering, Department of Mechanical Engineering and the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, College of Engineering, University of Michigan (U-M), Director of the Center for Laser-Aided Intelligent Manufacturing at U-M, and Director of the NSF I/UCRC for Lasers and Plasmas for Advanced Manufacturing, U-M, passed away on April 10, 2021 at the age of 70.

Professor Mazumder was a renowned scholar and world-leader in laser-based manufacturing. He earned a BS in metallurgical engineering from Calcutta University (now the Indian Institute of Engineering Science and Technology) in 1972 and MS and PhD degrees in process metallurgy from Imperial College, London, in 1978. He joined the University of Michigan faculty as a professor of mechanical engineering in 1996.

With an extraordinary career spanning 41 years, Professor Mazumder spent 16 of those at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, and 25 at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor where he conducted groundbreaking research in the areas of materials processing using lasers and the non-equilibrium synthesis of materials with tailored properties along with their evaluation and characterization.

He published 400 papers, co-authored various books, and held more than 25 patents. He is known as a pioneer in additive manufacturing and took his research to market by commercializing Direct Metal Deposition (DMD) technology and recently developing in-situ sensors for 3-D printing and welding that have the capability to detect defects, composition, and phase transformation.

Professor Mazumder was elected to the prestigious National Academy of Engineering in 2012 and received numerous awards and honors over the years including the Schawlow Award for seminal contribution to Laser application research from the Laser Institute of America in 2003, the William T. Ennor Award for manufacturing from ASME in 2006, the Adams Memorial Membership award from the American Welding Society in 2007, the Thomas A. Edison Patent Award from ASME in 2010 for inventing the first closed loop direct metal deposition system, and the Distinguished University Innovator Award in 2012 from the University of Michigan. He is an American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) Fellow, American Society of Metals (ASM) Fellow, Fellow of the International Academy of Photonics and Laser Engineering (IAPLE), and was named President of the Laser Institute of America (LIA) in 2000.

On October 7, 2021, the ME department held a memorial celebration of Joyti’s life and career. The celebration was joined by Joyti’s family, friends, colleagues, and current and former students.

Professor Mazumder loved what he did for a living and always said his work was his hobby. He leaves behind a legacy of bright engineers throughout the world carrying on his teachings and research and will be sorely missed.