Giacomo Po has joined the University of Miami College of Engineering (CoE) as an assistant professor in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering (MAE).
His interests lie in the research and development of high-temperature and high-strength materials for extreme environments such as those encountered in aerospace and nuclear applications, with particular emphasis on refractory metals and ceramics. His contributions to the field consists in enabling material design by prediction of macroscopic properties from computer simulations of microstructure evolution, which are systematically compared to experiments carried out at similar scales.
“I was attracted to the College to further my research and passion of high-quality teaching courses on numerical methods in materials science, multi-scale modeling of materials, continuum mechanics of deformable bodies, science of materials defects and failure, strength of materials, and plasticity,” Po says. “I am excited to continue furthering my research and teaching the next generation of mechanical and aerospace engineers.”
Po received his bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from the University of Bologna, Italy, and his master’s in mechanical engineering and PhD in structural and solid mechanics at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA).
As a co-principal investigator at UCLA, Po was awarded research grants from the Office of Fusion Energy Sciences with the U.S. Department of Energy, the Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR), National Science Foundation’s Civil, Mechanical and Manufacturing Innovation (CMMI) and Sandia National Laboratories. He has published more than 40 peer-reviewed journal articles since 2011. He also is the main author of the Mechanics of Defects Evolution Library (MoDELib), a parallel multi-physics computer library dedicated to investigating dislocation-based plasticity at the mesoscale, which is used by several academic institutions and national labs around the world. Po also received the UCLA Mechanical Engineering Outstanding PhD Award in 2011.
“Giacomo’s research expertise in solid mechanics is poised to lead to breakthrough discoveries in powder metallurgy and material sciences in our Johnson & Johnson Collaborative Laboratory,” says Jean-Pierre Bardet, dean of the College of Engineering. “It promises to advance 3D printing manufacturing in the healthcare and aerospace sectors, and benefits millions of people worldwide.”
