UBC Reports
November 14, 1996

Salcudean, de Silva honoured by peers

Engineering professors Martha Salcudean and Clarence de Silva have won Meritorious Achievement Awards from the Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of B.C. (APEGBC).

The Meritorious Achievement Award is given to APEGBC members for outstanding achievements in professional and technical fields.

Salcudean was appointed to UBC in 1985 as professor and head of Mechanical Engineering. In 1993 she assumed the position of associate vice president, Research (Physical and Applied Sciences). She began a two-year administrative leave from that position in July. She holds the Weyerhaeuser Industrial Research Chair in Computational Fluid Dynamics.

Her research has focused on the area of heat transfer and fluid flow, especially in computational fluid dynamics, and the modelling of transport phenomena in industrial processes. Her work has been aimed at improving industrial processes, particularly in the pulp and paper industry.

One of the first women in Canada to achieve the rank of professor in engineering and the country's first female engineering department head, she is deeply involved in teaching, graduate student supervision, mentoring and outreach programs.

De Silva joined UBC's Mechanical Engineering Dept. as a professor in 1988. He holds the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC)-B.C. Packers Chair in Industrial Automation, established to apply advanced technology to Canada's fish processing industry.

His research and development activities are primarily in process automation, robotics, intelligent control and instrumentation, in which he is an internationally recognized authority.

One of the important aspects of his research is his collaboration with industry to resolve real problems in the industrial environment. As NSERC-B.C. Packers chair, he has established the only laboratory in Canada aimed at developing automated fish processing technologies to reduce waste and increase productivity.