Wendy Okolo

Last updated

Wendy A. Okolo is a Nigerian aerospace research engineer in the Intelligent Systems Division at NASA Ames Research Center. [1] She is the first Black woman to obtain a Ph.D. degree in aerospace engineering from University of Texas at Arlington. [2] She is also the Special Emphasis Programs Manager for Women at Ames. [3]

Contents

Education

Okolo obtained her secondary education at Queen's College, an all-girls school in Lagos, Nigeria. She then received a bachelor's degree in aerospace engineering at the University of Texas at Arlington (UTA) in 2010. Okolo later became the first Black woman to obtain a Ph.D. in aerospace engineering from UTA in 2015 at age 26. [2] Her Ph.D. studies were supervised by Atilla Dogan. [4] During Okolo's undergraduate years, she served as president of the Society of Women Engineers at the university. [5]

Career

Okolo started her career as an undergraduate intern for Lockheed Martin, working on NASA's Orion spacecraft. [3] Over the course of two summers, she interned with the Requirements Management Office in Systems Engineering and the Hatch Mechanisms team in Mechanical Engineering. [3] As a graduate student, Okolo later worked in the Control Design & Analysis Branch of the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL), Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. [6]

Okolo is a Sub-Project Manager in the Intelligent Systems Division of NASA Ames. [7] She is a research engineer in the Discovery and Systems Health Technology (DaSH) [8]

Personal life

Okolo says her sisters taught her the sciences with their day-to-day realities. She describes them as her heroes. [7] [9]

Awards

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">University of Texas at Arlington</span> Public university in Arlington, Texas, US

The University of Texas at Arlington is a public research university in Arlington, Texas. The university was founded in 1895 and was in the Texas A&M University System for several decades until joining the University of Texas System in 1965.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wendell Nedderman</span>

Wendell Herman Nedderman was an American academic administrator who was president of the University of Texas at Arlington for nearly 20 years, first as acting president, then as president, leaving that post in July 1992. He began his 33 years of full-time service at UT Arlington in 1959 as the founding dean of the College of Engineering. This was followed by four years as vice president for academic affairs, and then 20 years as president. A campus engineering building was named Nedderman Hall in 1991 by the UT System board of regents. Campus Street and a portion of Monroe Street were combined and named Nedderman Drive by the City of Arlington in 1992. He was named president emeritus in 1992, and received the Mirabeau B. Lamar Award for Leadership in Learning from the Association of Texas Colleges and Universities. He was awarded the Anson Marston Medal for Achievement in the Field of Engineering in 2000 from Iowa State University.

Dale A. Anderson is an American aerospace engineer, computational fluid dynamicist, researcher, author and professor. He pioneered research in computational fluid dynamics (CFD) with his work at Iowa State University (ISU), alongside John C. Tannehill and Richard H. Pletcher. Anderson was the Professor of Aerospace Engineering, Vice President for Research, and Dean of Graduate Studies at the University of Texas at Arlington, United States. He is best known for his overall contributions to the field of computational fluid dynamics (CFD).

The University of Texas at Arlington (UTA) College of Engineering is a college of engineering at the University of Texas at Arlington in Arlington, Texas. The engineering program was established in 1959 when Arlington State College was officially given the status of a senior college. The college currently offers 11 baccalaureate, 14 master's, and nine doctoral degrees. The College of Engineering celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2009 and is the third largest engineering program in Texas.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Naira Hovakimyan</span> Armenian control theorist

Naira Hovakimyan is an Armenian control theorist who holds the W. Grafton and Lillian B. Wilkins professorship of the Mechanical Science and Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She is the director of AVIATE Center of flying cars at UIUC, funded through a NASA University Leadership Initiative. She was the inaugural director of the Intelligent Robotics Laboratory during 2015-2017, associated with the Coordinated Science Laboratory at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Minerva Cordero Braña is a Puerto Rican mathematician and a professor of mathematics at the University of Texas at Arlington. She is also the university's Senior Associate Dean for the College of Science, where she is responsible for the advancement of the research mission of the college. President Biden awarded her the Presidential Award for Excellence in Science, Mathematics, and Engineering Mentoring (PAESMEM) on February 8, 2022.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Leroy S. Fletcher</span> American academic engineer

Leroy Stevenson (Skipp) Fletcher is an American mechanical and aerospace engineer, and college dean, who served as the 104th president of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers in 1985–86, and was recipient of the 2002 ASME Medal.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Aisha Bowe</span> Bahamian-American aerospace engineer

Aisha Bowe is a Bahamian-American aerospace engineer, founder, and CEO of STEMBoard, a technology company.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Erick Jones</span> American engineering professor

Dr. Erick Christopher Jones Sr. is an industrial engineer and professor in the Department of Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering at the University of Texas at Arlington. He is an expert in radio-frequency identification (RFID), quality engineering, and Lean Six Sigma. He is the George and Elizabeth Pickett Endowed Professor, as well as Associate Dean for Graduate Studies in the College of Engineering at the University of Texas at Arlington (UTA). Jones joined UTA in 2010 after eight years at the University of Nebraska – Lincoln, where he rose to the rank of Associate Professor with tenure. He previously served as the deputy director of the UT Arlington's homeland security focused University Center Security Advances via Applied Nanotechnology (SAVANT) Center and he serves as the current director of the Radio Frequency & Auto Identification (RAID) labs at UTA. Jones was the program director of The National Science Foundation's (NSF) Engineering Research Centers. He is currently Chair of the Supply Chain Technology Committee of International Supply Chain Education Alliance's (ISCEA) International Standards Board (IISB) and Editor in Chief of the International Supply Chain Technology Journal (ISCTJ).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Noël Bakhtian</span>

Noël Bakhtian is the former director of the Berkeley Lab Energy Storage Center at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. She has served as the director of the Center for Advanced Energy Studies at Idaho National Laboratory and as a senior policy advisor for the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.

Karen Elizabeth Willcox is an aerospace engineer and computational scientist best known for her work on reduced-order modeling and the study of multi-fidelity methods. She is currently the director of the Oden Institute for Computational Engineering and Sciences and professor of Aerospace Engineering and Engineering Mechanics at the University of Texas at Austin, Texas.

Dora Elia Musielak is an aerospace engineer, historian of mathematics, and book author. She is an expert on high-speed airbreathing jet engines, and an adjunct professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at the University of Texas at Arlington.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Moriba Jah</span> American aerospace engineer (born 1971)

Moriba Kemessia Jah is an American space scientist and aerospace engineer who describes himself as a "space environmentalist", specializing in orbit determination and prediction, especially as related to space situational awareness and space traffic monitoring. He is currently an associate professor of Aerospace Engineering and Engineering Mechanics at the University of Texas at Austin. Jah previously worked as a spacecraft navigator at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, where he was a navigator for the Mars Global Surveyor, Mars Odyssey, Mars Express, Mars Exploration Rover, and his last mission was the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. He is a Fellow of the American Astronautical Society, the Air Force Research Laboratory, the International Association for the Advancement of Space Safety and, the Royal Astronomical Society. Jah was also selected into the 10th anniversary class of TED Fellows and was named a MacArthur Fellow in 2022. He also was selected into the AIAA class of Fellows and Honorary Fellows in the year of the 50th Anniversary of Apollo 11. The AIAA "confers the distinction of Fellow upon individuals in recognition of their notable and valuable contributions to the arts, sciences or technology of aeronautics and astronautics."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dereje Agonafer</span> Ethiopian-American engineer and educator

Dereje Agonafer is an Ethiopian-American engineer and educator, who is currently a professor of mechanical engineering at University of Texas at Arlington, and member of National Academy of Engineering. He is also a fellow of National Academy of Inventors since 2018.

Victoria Chibuogu Nneji is a Nigerian-born American computer scientist, design and innovation strategist, and a lecturing fellow, known for her research on robotics, automation, human-centered design, and autonomous transportation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Susan Wu</span> Engineer and business woman (1932–2020)

Ying Chu Lin (Susan) Wu was a Chinese-born American businesswoman and engineer in magnetohydrodynamics, aeronautics, and aerospace engineering.

Maruthi Ram Akella is an Indian-American aerospace engineer. Akella specializes in the control of complex dynamical systems that are subject to large scale nonlinearities and uncertainties.

Josette Bellan is a Romanian-French-American aerospace engineer and fluid dynamicist known for her research on turbulence in high-pressure reactions, and on the interactions between fluid dynamics and thermodynamics in these reactions. She is a senior research scientist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) and visiting associate in the Department of Mechanical and Civil Engineering of the California Institute of Technology (Caltech).

Kristin Yvonne Rozier is an American aerospace engineer and computer scientist whose research investigates formal methods including temporal logic and model checking for the formal verification of safety-critical systems, especially those involving air transport, unmanned aerial vehicles, and air traffic control. She is Black & Veatch Associate Professor of Aerospace Engineering, Computer Science, Electrical and Computer Engineering, and Mathematics at Iowa State University, where she heads the Laboratory for Temporal Logic.

References

  1. 1 2 "Dr. Wendy Okolo: The Most Promising Engineer in Government". US Black Engineer. Retrieved 2019-04-29.
  2. 1 2 "African woman reaching lofty heights as aerospace engineer opioid". Philadelphia Tribune. 15 March 2019. Retrieved 5 October 2019.
  3. 1 2 3 "Wendy A. Okolo". ti.arc.nasa.gov.
  4. 1 2 "MAE Ph.D. Student Awarded a NDSEG Fellowship | UT Arlington College of Engineering". www.uta.edu. Retrieved 2019-04-29.
  5. "Close Bonds - Unbranded Stories - UT Arlington". Uta.edu. Retrieved 2019-04-28.
  6. viewlogwin20_oG. "Dr. Wendy Okolo: The Most Promising Engineer In Government - The Bridge News".
  7. 1 2 "Meet Wendy, Nigeria's NASA whizz who is the 'most promising engineer in US government'". TheCable. 19 February 2019.
  8. "Nigerian Wendy Okolo becomes First African Lady to Grasp a Phd in Aerospace Engineering". 3 March 2019.
  9. "Wendy Okolo is the Nigerian Genius and First Black Woman to Earn PhD in Aerospace Engineering at NASA". 21 February 2019.
  10. "MAE Ph.D. Student Awarded an Amelia Earhart Fellowship - UT Arlington College of Engineering". www.uta.edu.
  11. "Okolo Earns AIAA's Leland Award | UT Arlington College of Engineering". www.uta.edu. Retrieved 2019-04-29.