Current DEAA Awardees

The following individuals have been selected to receive the 2013 Distinguished Engineering Alumni Award. The awardees have distinguished themselves through their outstanding personal qualities, knowledge, and significant contributions to their fields.

George Born — Special Category

As a CU-Boulder professor of aerospace engineering sciences since 1985 and founding director of the Colorado Center for Astrodynamics Research, George Born has made a large impact on the University of Colorado, the field of satellite dynamics and applications, and countless students who have gone on to make outstanding contributions of their own.

He earned his BS, MS, and PhD at the University of Texas at Austin in 1962, 1965, and 1968, respectively, and was a senior engineer at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory on several pioneering satellite missions from 1970 to 1983. His contributions in furthering the precision of orbit determination for remote-sensing satellites, and contributions to the field of satellite oceanography, have made lasting impacts.

He also has been instrumental in building a world-class faculty and program in aerospace engineering sciences at CU-Boulder. He recruited many top faculty and students, and is responsible for introducing the remote-sensing focus to the department. His book, “Statistical Orbit Determination,” has become the leading textbook for graduate courses at major universities.

He was elected to the National Academy of Engineering in 2004, and is a fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics and the American Astronautical Society. He received the AIAA Mechanics and Control of Flight Award, the AAS Brouwer Award, and 10 NASA awards from 1970 to 2005.

John W. Lund (CivEngr '58, PhD 67) — Education/Research & Invention

After earning his PhD in civil engineering at CU-Boulder, John W. Lund went on to become a professor, department chair, and dean at the Oregon Institute of Technology, and co-founder and director of the Geo-Heat Center, the world’s premier institution in the direct use of geothermal energy. He was named OIT professor emeritus in 1999, but continued to direct the Geo-Heat Center until 2010.

His leadership in the development of geothermal energy continues today as a private consultant, working on direct-use projects in East Africa and around the world. He has published more than 300 professional papers and provided training for geothermal engineers and scientists in 36 countries. He also taught courses in transportation engineering and worked on transportation design criteria and publications for the U.S. Forest Service.

He was awarded the Geothermal Pioneer Award and Joseph Aidlin Award by the Geothermal Resources Council, an organization for which he was a multi-term director and president, and he received geothermal recognition awards from professional organizations in Macedonia, Italy, and Germany. He also is a past president of the International Geothermal Association.

OIT awarded him its Faculty Excellence Award and Exemplary Faculty Award, and he is a recipient of two Distinguished Service Awards from the National Council of Examiners for Engineering and Surveying.

Herb Morreale (CompSci '91) — Industry & Commerce

As the founder of several successful companies, a nonprofit organization, and the Domino Award given annually to CU-Boulder students, Herb Morreale is an outstanding alumnus, valued friend, and long-standing advisor to the computer science department.

Upon his graduation in 1991, Morreale and classmate Trent Hein launched XOR, Inc., and nurtured the startup into a company with more than 500 employees and $50 million in revenue. After leaving XOR in 2000, Morreale founded Loon Lake Investments, an angel investing syndicate; Kalos Strategy Group, a management consulting firm that merged performance management and leadership development; and Adeptive Software, which is now the fastest growing company in the title and escrow software market. In 2004, he became chief technology officer at Gold Systems, where he led an expansion into VoIP unified communications through a partnership with Microsoft, and he subsequently served as chief technology officer for Me.dium (later OneRiot), which developed groundbreaking technology in social media.

Since 2010, he has been CEO of 6kites, Inc., a company providing expertise in social business, mobile, Web, and enterprise application development. He also founded the charitable organization Topplers, which seeks to impact the world by inspiring, educating, and motivating people to “set big things in motion,” and oversees the Domino Award, which he created in 2002 and awards to two CU students each year.