Tim Morgan

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Education:

BS, Mechanical Engineering, Iowa State University, 2010
MBA, Iowa State University, 2010
PhD, Mechanical Engineering and Human Computer Interaction, Iowa State University, 2017

Past research focus:

My previous research was in the non-invasive measurement of multiphase flows (primarily using X-rays) and using virtual reality to visualize the resulting data to improve the understanding of complex flow phenomena.

Teaching focus:

I will be primarily teaching design courses in the mechanical engineering department. Initially, that is ME 1700 (Introduction to Computer Aided Design).

Joins from:

I most recently worked at Iowa State University in ITS as a Systems Analyst with the High Performance Computing group supporting faculty and graduate students who used Iowa State’s Nova computing cluster to further their research.

What kind of classroom experience do you look forward to creating?

I try to bring a practical, applied approach to teaching. Engineering is, after all, applied science. The students absolutely need to understand the math and science behind the systems they are working on, but that alone isn’t enough. It is by understanding how the math and science manifests in the real world that they will begin to develop an “engineering intuition” and begin to understand how to use the laws of physics to their advantage instead of it being an obstacle to overcome.

Tell us about your journey to this role.

I sort of fell into academia by accident. I grew up in Ames and, when I was in high school, I met Dr. Ted Heindel through a family friend and ended up working for him one summer. I enjoyed the people I was working with and the challenge of engineering so much that I continued to work for him through undergrad, grad school (where I was also co-advised by Dr. Judy Vance), and then as a post-doc. After the post-doc I went to the HPC group. I loved my time with HPC, but the chance to return to ME was too good to pass up.

What do you hope to pass on to your students?

The most important thing I hope to instill in my students is an understanding of the obligation they will have in their career as an engineer. People tend to think about engineers as working with machines, but ultimately, the machines are there to help people. And when engineers make mistakes, the consequences can be catastrophic — as we have seen far too many examples of recently. If students understand the obligation they have for the safety of those who use what they design, I believe it will drive them to be the best engineers they can be, and to learn all that they can, both while they are in school and throughout their careers.

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