The ME department is pleased to welcome Jesse Austin-Breneman and Shanna Daly who are joining the faculty as assistant professors.
Jesse Austin-Breneman
Austin-Breneman earned his PhD from MIT and was a postdoctoral research associate in the MIT Ideation Lab and the MIT Global Engineering and Research Lab. His research focuses on system-level approaches to difficult engineering design problems, such as large-scale complex system designs and product design for emerging markets. His work uses empirical studies, practitioner interviews and simulations to gain insight into issues facing multi-disciplinary design teams working in these fields. He is particularly interested in how teams manage competing objectives throughout the design process and formal strategies for helping them do so. Austin-Breneman leads the Global Design Laboratory.
Shanna Daly
Daly earned her PhD from Purdue University and is currently working as an assistant research scientist and adjunct assistant professor in Engineering Education at the University of Michigan. Her research focuses on strategies for design innovations through divergent and convergent thinking as well as through deep needs and community assessments using design ethnography, and translating those strategies to design tools and education. The National Science Foundation and the Helmsley Foundation support her research and she teaches design and entrepreneurship courses at the undergraduate and graduate levels, focusing on front-end design processes. Daly leads the Daly Design and Engineering Education Research Group.
