Corina Sandu, professor of mechanical engineering and associate department head for graduate studies in the College of Engineering at Virginia Tech, was recently named the Robert E. Hord Jr. Professor of Mechanical Engineering by the Virginia Tech Board of Visitors.
The Hord professorship was established by a gift from the late Robert E. Hord, Jr., who earned his bachelor’s degree in 1949 and a master’s degree the following year, both from the College of Engineering. He was an enthusiastic supporter of Virginia Tech’s chemical and mechanical engineering programs.
The professorship acknowledges and rewards faculty in the Department of Mechanical Engineering who have shown exceptional merit in research, teaching, and/or service. Recipients hold the position for a five-year term.
A member of the Virginia Tech faculty since 2003, Sandu has made significant contributions to research and scholarship in foundational theories and practical applications of multibody system dynamics and vehicle dynamics. She has advanced the science of uncertainty quantification for multibody systems, real-time parameter estimation, and off-road vehicle performance.
She has built unique infrastructure for terramechanics studies and has developed specialized courses in multibody dynamics, terramechanics, off-road vehicle performance, and ground vehicle dynamics, for which she has extensively integrated research into course material.
Sandu has been involved in research projects that have garnered more than $12 million in funding and has written 79 peer-reviewed journal papers, nine book chapters, 97 peer-reviewed conference proceedings, 18 other conference proceedings and 50 technical reports. She has given 46 keynotes and invited presentations, 87 poster presentations and 114 oral conference presentations.
Her scholarship has been widely recognized. She is a Fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, a Fellow of the Society of Automobile Engineers (SAE), and a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellow. She received the SAE Forest R. McFarland Award twice in 2013 and again in 2019. She has also been recognized for her service to SAE’s international publication’s board, and for her service in the SAE engineering meetings board.
Sandu has directed 17 doctoral dissertations and 19 master’s degree theses. She has also been a committee member on 29 Ph.D. committees, 38 master of science committees, four master of engineering committees, two non-thesis master of science committees, and has served as an external examiner for 10 Ph.D. students and one master’s degree student.
She received her bachelor’s degree in mechanics from Bucharest Polytechnic Institute and an M.S. and Ph.D. from the University of Iowa.
