Professor wins NSF outstanding advisor award

The National Science Foundation (NSF) presented the Outstanding Long-Term Faculty Advisor Award to Virginia Tech's mechanical engineering professor Douglas Nelson on June 9 during the Challenge X 2005 Competition at General Motor’s Milford Proving Grounds near Detroit, Mich.

Nelson is the founding advisor of Virginia Tech’s Hybrid Electric Vehicle Team (HEVT), which has participated since 1994 in national alternative-fuel, student-designed vehicle competitions sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy (DoE) and U.S. automakers. Nelson’s award from NSF includes a $15,000 grant to help fund undergraduate participation at Virginia Tech in the Challenge X competition.

Under Nelson’s guidance, the HEVT won a number of awards while participating in the previous FutureCar and FutureTruck challenges. During those competitions, Nelson and his student teams created the world’s first student-designed, fuel-cell-powered car and sports utility vehicle (SUV).

Challenge X, sponsored by DoE and General Motors, is a three-year competition aimed at encouraging university students to develop designs and technology for the next generation of energy-efficient, low-emissions vehicles. During the recent event, the 17 university teams in Challenge X presented the designs they created during the past academic year. Soon, each team will receive a GM Equinox SUV to modify according to those designs.

Nelson and the Virginia Tech team will re-engineer their Equinox into a hybrid SUV powered by electric motors and an engine fueled primarily by ethanol. During the design presentation competition, the HEVT won a $3,000 cash prize for placing fourth overall among the 17 teams and a $2,000 prize for placing second in the best written reports category.

“We received keys to our Equinox during the event,” Nelson said. “We expect the SUV will be delivered by GM by the end of June, so we can begin the vehicle design integration and testing phase for the second year of Challenge X.”

Nelson, who joined the Virginia Tech faculty in 1986, is director of the Center for Automotive Fuel Cell Systems, a DoE Graduate Automotive Technology Education center.

In 1996, the Society of Automotive Engineers presented Nelson with the Ralph R. Teetor Educational Award in recognition of his outstanding contributions as one of the nation’s top engineering educators in the field of automotive technology. In 1998, he received the NSF FutureCar Challenge Faculty Advisor of the Year Award.

Nelson earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in mechanical engineering at Virginia Tech and his Ph.D. at Arizona State University.