Stay in touch with fellow UConn engineering alumni. Visit our Engineering LinkedIn alumni page and fill us in on your latest activities or learn what your college friends are doing nowadays!  Some recent alumni news follows:

A Norwich, CT company started by alumni Michael Curtis (M.S., Ph.D. Environmental Engineering,’80, ‘87); and Joel Douglas (B.S. Civil Engineering, ‘77), Engineered Carbon Solutions has received pre-seed funding totaling $150,000 from Connecticut Innovations, the state’s quasi-public authority responsible for technology investing and innovation development. ECS has also secured matching funds from private investors, as required by the pre-seed legislation. The company manufactures biomass fuel for direct use in pellet stoves and boilers, Frog City Fuel. This low-cost heating product will be available at Agway and other stores for the 2013-2014 heating season. ECS has equipment on order and will be establishing its first biomass pellet mill in Norwich, CT.  Frog City Fuel is formulated with up to 70% recycled post-consumer waste.  CEO Michael Curtis remarks that local production of Frog City Fuel provides a growing number of local jobs and achieves re-use of high volume waste products, making it an environmentally-friendly fuel product.

Andrew Gere (B.S. Civil Engineering, ’92) was promoted to Vice President of Operations at San Jose Water Company, San Jose, CA.  Andrew has been with the company since 1995 and has been instrumental in the development and implementation of many regulatory compliance plans and capital improvements necessary to the Company’s success.  He leads the company’s largest employee base, including Water Quality, Operations, Distribution Systems and DS Support. In that role, he is in charge of planning and directing comprehensive programs, budgets and management staff related to water resources, water quality control, water production, storage, distribution, infrastructure maintenance and repair, metering, procurement, logistics and environmental management.

Michael McGinnis (B.S., M.S. Civil Engineering, ’96, ’98), Ph.D., is an assistant professor of Civil Engineering at the University of Texas – Tyler. He received his Ph.D. from Lehigh University in 2006 and pursues research in structural engineering, non-destructive evaluation, structural fire engineering and applied mechanics.

Xingjian (Chris) Xue (Ph.D. Mechanical Engineering, ‘07), an Assistant Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of South Carolina, is a member of the HeteroFoaM Center, which is an Energy Frontier Research Center established by the US Department of Energy’s Office of Basic Energy Sciences.  UConn Mechanical Engineering professor Wilson Chiu is also a member.  Dr. Xue’s research interests include materials for electrochemical energy conversion and storage, reliability and durability of functional and structural materials, and transport phenomena and electrochemical kinetics. In 2011, he received a Promising Investigator Research Award from the University of South Carolina.