Overview

At UTSI, Dr. Majdalani served on the Executive, Research, Compensation Incentive, Awards and Fellowship, Faculty Evaluation, Library, and Computer Resources Committees (ad hoc). In showcasing the UTSI revitalization plan in the area of propulsion, he gave 6 special presentations to Brig. Gen. Stringer (AEDC Commander), Dr. Fletcher (UT Consultant), Dr. Murphy (UT Trustee), Dr. Bartlett (Boeing Aircraft), and the Congressional group. Outside the university setting, he gave 7 invited talks, two of which at the 2006 AIAA/ASME Joint Propulsion Conference; the Combustion Stability Technical Interchange Meeting; the Science and Engineering Fluid Dynamics Section of ATK Thiokol; the 2005 NSF/EPSCoR Meeting on Computational Applications and Cyber-infrastructure; and the Aerospace Testing Alliance (ATA), Arnold Engineering Development Center.

On the national level, Dr. Majdalani has established strong industrial partnerships with Orbital Technologies Corporation, Software and Engineering Associates, and Gloyer-Taylor Laboratories. He is also seeking to institute a collaborative environment with the Center for Simulation of Advanced Rockets (CSAR), University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. On the international level, he has established an open dialogue and communication highway with Professor Grégoire Casalis, Director of Research at ONERA/SUPAERO, Toulouse, France and with Professor Sjoerd Rienstra, Eindhoven University of Technology, Netherlands.

As far as curriculum is concerned, Dr. Majdalani introduced during his tenure at USTI the following into the UT catalog: (1.) AE/BE/ES/ME 646 Hydrodynamic Instability and (2.) AE 681 Advanced Viscous Flow Theory. He also offered a two-semester course series, Perturbation Methods I and II, the sequel being a novelty. Dr. Majdalani revamped and reintroduced AE 561, Fundamentals of Aeroacoustics, which was being phased out and participated in the short course on Combustion Instability; he developed two short courses on Hybrid Rocket Propulsion and Oscillatory Wave Modeling. The former was commissioned by the AIAA Technical Committee on Hybrids. He was offered at UTSI for the first time in Spring 2008. In implementing some of his CAREER initiatives, Dr. Majdalani established an NSF-sponsored website posting a comprehensive list of available fellowships and a library of technical videos/DVDs/CDs encompassing vocabulary building, public speech, acoustics, fluid dynamics, propulsion, and stability.

Dr. Majdalani's professional activities include peer reviewing 4 engineering textbooks and numerous manuscripts for 17 professional journals between 2003 and 2007. He has also served as a seasonal NSF panelist reviewing proposals in the CAREER, CCLI (Course, Curriculum, and Laboratory Improvement), CMS (Civil and Mechanical Systems), STTR/SBIR, and PMP (Particulate and Multiphase Processes) programs. In the AIAA society, Dr. Majdlani is active in the area of hybrid propulsion and have been designated “Technical Expert in Analytic Approaches to Hybrid Rocket Flow Fields,” and Chair of Education for the AIAA Technical Committee on Hybrid Rockets. He was elected Member of the External Advisory Board for the Center for Simulation of Advanced Rockets three years in a row. 

In directing MS and doctoral dissertations, Dr. Majdalani advised 10 students: Sean Fischbach (PhD), Brian Maicke (PhD), Joshua Batterson (PhD), Lokesh Bhatia (PhD), Tony Saad (PhD), Timothy Barber (MS), Erin Halpenny (MS), Ajay Katta (MS), Michel Akiki (MS), Nadim Zgheib (MS), and Jeisson Parra.

In his tenure at Marquette University, he worked on a variety of College (Computing and Resources, Mechanics, Elections, Dean Search) and Department committees (Executive, Search, Computing, Graduate, Research, Search, Laboratory, Freshman, Curriculum, Energy, and ABET). As a member of the Department ABET (Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology) committee, he was engaged in organizing course curricula. Having been designated the ME representative for our Department, he helped to introduce the subject of Mechanical Engineering to the General Engineering class. As Advisor to the Student Chapter of ASME, he was responsible for hosting seminars and field trips. He also contributed his time to organize and run the Department Seminar. He was actively involved with the Wisconsin Space Grant Consortium (WSGC), being one of the few Faculty members with an aerospace research orientation at Marquette University. Just prior to and during my transition to The University of Tennessee, he served as Taskforce Director for the NASA/WSGC sponsored BalloonSat Program (2002–04). Finally, he participated regularly in the College of Engineering Open House and other College and Department events. He has also been actively involved in reviewing manuscripts for different professional journals.