Frank Z. Feng, assistant professor of mechanical engineering, has been awarded the 1994 Doherty Professorship in Ocean Utilization from the MIT Sea Grant College Program.
Every year, the program selects one new faculty member for an award of $25,000 per year for two years.
Dr. Feng's research interest is in nonlinear dynamics, bifurcation and chaos. Under the Doherty fellowship, Dr. Feng will study wave-wave interaction due to nonlinear resonance and will numerically simulate the effect of surface films on wave motions. This research should provide a theoretical basis for detecting ocean oil spills by remote sensing techniques.
The Doherty Fellowship, endowed by the Henry L. and Grace Doherty Charitable Foundation, encourages promising nontenured professors to undertake marine-related research that will encourage innovative uses of the ocean's resources. The area of research is unrestricted and may address any aspect of marine use and/or management, whether social, political, environmental or technological.
A version of this article appeared in the April 27, 1994 issue of MIT Tech Talk (Volume 38, Number 30).
