Alumni

With a passion for space travel that began in childhood, it’s no surprise that Todd Mosher (MS AeroEngr ’95, PhD ’00) chose a career building spacecraft.

Mosher’s father worked for Martin Marietta at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, so he grew up hearing stories about the robotic spacecraft being built there and the planets to which the vehicles would travel. In his bedroom, with walls bedecked with astronaut wallpaper, Mosher dreamed about going into space.

Searching for the right college can be like searching for the right relationship. Ultimately, you hope to find that elusive quality known as chemistry—especially when your plan is to become a chemical engineer.

When he wasn’t slaving over books and experiments in the Engineering Center at CU-Boulder, Vern Norviel could be found painting in the fine arts building or playing the pipe organ at Macky Auditorium.  That was 20 years ago. Today, you’ll find him in the heart of the Silicon Valley, working at the leading edge of DNA chip technology.

Jim Voss has had a unique and varied career, ranging from government service to industry to academia, since earning his master's degree in aerospace engineering at CU-Boulder in 1974.

JoAnn Joselyn grew up during a period of amazing firsts, when advances in science and space exploration captured the imagination of people around the world. "Sputnik was launched on my 14th birthday, and I knew then I was destined for space work," says Joselyn, who has had a 35-year career studying space weather.

So it is fitting that Joselyn went onto capture some of her own "firsts." A 1965 CU-Boulder graduate in applied math, she became the first woman to earn a doctoral degree at CU in astrogeophysics—the study of solar-planetary interactions.

Mike Wirth (ChemEngr '82) was promoted to executive vice president of Chevron's global downstream business in March, a position carrying responsibility for the company's worldwide refining, marketing, lubricants, and supply and trading businesses. He previously served as president of global supply and trading.

Xiaodong Zhang (MS CompSci '85, PhD '89) left the College of William and Mary, where he has taught computer science since 1997, to become chair of the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at Ohio State University in January. He also holds an endowed chair professorship, the Robert M. Critchfield Professor in Engineering, at OSU.

"We've been Googled," Brad Schell (ArchEngr '82) announced on his web site March 14, after the Internet search giant acquired his Boulder-based company, @Last Software. The company developed the award-winning 3D design product SketchUp, which is popular among professional engineers and architects, filmmakers, and even students.

Kathryn Tobey has followed an unlikely path since completing her undergraduate degree in chemical engineering at CU in 1984. Today she works as the program director for a Lockheed Martin Space Systems payload development and delivery project.

In 1986, as a Green Mountain High School senior in Lakewood, Colorado, Daniel Kubitschek watched the spacecraft Voyager's encounter with Uranus on NASA TV and decided he wanted to work at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory one day.

One of four brothers to earn CU-Boulder engineering degrees, Kubitschek navigated his way through a bachelor's degree (MechEngr '90), a stint at the Applied Physics Laboratory in Maryland, and two graduate degrees (MS AeroEngr '94, PhD '97) before landing at JPL in the fall of 2000.

"At CU I learned how to think and create knowledge in my field of study," says Charles Glass, who earned his master’s in civil engineering at CU-Boulder in 1994 and his PhD in 1997. "I also learned how to work independently on a project, which gave me the confidence to know that I could solve problems using the tools that I learned at CU. I have applied that knowledge, or confidence, to study areas outside of my specialty, to start a small consulting firm, and to build wealth."

The term "maverick" has been tossed around to the point where it's lost almost all significance, but chemical engineer Janet Reiser (ChemEngr '77) is a true specimen of the breed. She's a Democrat who lives in Alaska and ran for public office; she's a former corporate executive who became an entrepreneur, and she's a chemical engineer trained to work with physical formulae and compounds who now creates products based on light.

It’s March 2007, and there’s Jacob Melvin, a senior computer science major at the University of Colorado at Boulder. He’s got a two-point-something grade point average, and he’s barely hanging on in a required class. He’s not worried about trying to land his dream job. He’s worried about graduating.

Ever since he was a kid growing up in Lake Orion, Michigan, Steve Chappell (MS AeroEngr '03, PhD '06) has dreamed of being an astronaut or a scientist studying spaceflight. Through the years he has gone to great lengths pursuing that dream, from climbing some of the world's highest mountains to walking on the ocean floor—activities that have helped prepare him for a space-oriented career.

On his way to becoming a physician, Randall Clark’s (AeroEngr ’78, MD ’82) road to medical school took a detour via aerospace engineering. But the route was more coherent than it might seem.

Clark is an associate professor of anesthesiology at the University of Colorado Denver School of Medicine and interim chair of the Department of Anesthesiology at The Children’s Hospital on the Anschutz Medical Campus in Aurora, Colorado. His specialty is pediatric cardiac anesthesiology.

Natural gas, a close relative to crude oil, rarely attracts as much interest or headlines as petroleum. Since natural gas burns cleaner than oil or coal, produces less greenhouse gases, and is found in abundance in this country, environmentalists and energy analysts have begun touting natural gas as a bridge fuel from petroleum to renewable, low-carbon energy sources.

Change is a constant at Bend Research Inc. Staying nimble in the changing world of chemical research also is the driving force behind the company's three decades of success in developing membrane and novel drug-delivery technologies.

Since joining Bend Research in 1983, Rod Ray (PhD ChemEngr '83) has held numerous positions working his way up through the company. As president and chief executive officer, Ray is charting a new course for the company as it enters its next phase in the development of pharmaceutical and health care products.