New appointments strengthen research and teaching in support of the University’s new Aerospace Engineering degree and growing enrollment.
Michigan Technological University’s Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering (MAE) is expanding its faculty in response to strong growth in student enrollment, increasing national demand for expertise in key engineering fields, and the launch of our BSAE degree program. We’ve added eight new faculty members to join our flight crew for the 2025-26 academic year, strengthening our research and teaching capacity.
Top Row: Roland Platz (left), Aslihan Vuruskan (center), Kevin Howard (right); Middle Row: Ze Feng (Ted) Gan; Bottom Row: Tania Demonte Gonzalez (left), Geordan Gutow (center), Andrew Oliva (right). Not Pictured: Madelyn (Hoying) MacRobbie.
Tania Demonte Gonzalez, Assistant Teaching Professor – Ph.D., Michigan Tech. Dynamic systems modeling and control. Senior Personnel on DOE-funded Marine Energy project; published in Energies on nonlinear predictive control of wave energy converters.
Ze Feng (Ted) Gan, Assistant Professor – Ph.D., Penn State. Rotorcraft aeroacoustics and electrified aerospace propulsion. Authored “Challenges and Opportunities for Low Noise Electric Aircraft” in the International Journal of Aeroacoustics.
Geordan Gutow, Assistant Professor – Ph.D., Georgia Tech. Robotics, dynamics, applied mathematics, and AI. Former Intelligence Community Postdoctoral Fellow at Carnegie Mellon. Leads eight funded projects, including Air Force– and NSF-supported initiatives in space operations and multi-agent planning.
Kevin Howard, Assistant Professor – Ph.D., University of Minnesota. Former CFD technical expert and supervisor at Ford Motor Company, specializing in aerodynamics for consumer vehicles and NASCAR racecars.
Madelyn (Hoying) MacRobbie, Assistant Professor – Ph.D. expected August 2025, MIT/Harvard Medical School. Aerospace physiology and in-space medical systems. 2023 Emerging Space Leader awardee; her research includes studying physiological adaptation to altered gravity. (Starting January 2026.)
Andrew Oliva, Assistant Professor – Ph.D., University of Notre Dame. Aerothermodynamics and hypersonic flow. Published in Physics of Fluids. Will spearhead MAE’s hypersonics program in support of the new aerospace degree.
Roland Platz, Assistant Professor – Former Associate Professor at Deggendorf Institute of Technology (Germany). Structural dynamics, smart structures, and uncertainty quantification; led a major EU-funded collaborative research center with TU Darmstadt.
Aslihan Vuruskan, Assistant Teaching Professor – Ph.D., Missouri S&T. Aerodynamics and CFD. Amelia Earhart Fellowship recipient; published optimization work in the Journal of Aircraft.
With these faculty joining in the 2025–26 academic year, Michigan Tech MAE is building robust capacity in aerospace and mechanical engineering research and education aligned with national priorities.