is a Professor and Director of Biological Engineering Program. Dr. Shahbazi has 20 years of experience with bioenergy and bioprocess engineering research. He has worked with the production of biofuels such as ethanol through fermentation of various food processing wastes, cereal grain, and woody biomass. He is also involved in value-added product development such as organic acids and biodegradable plastics. He has conducted renewable energy training and workshops in Brazil, Egypt, Jamaica, Senegal and South Africa. 

is an Professor of Biological Engineering. His research interests include engineering design, analysis and synthesis of food and biological processes; bioenergy processing technologies; energy efficiency and management in processing facilities; and computational process engineering and process control. In the field of computational process engineering, he has developed a series of mathematical models and computer programs for the simulation of fluidized bed gasification of biomass, chilling/freezing, and chromatographic separation process.

is a Research Professor of Chemical and Bioengineering and Director of the Chemical Engineering program. His current research includes palladium and palladium-alloy composite membranes for high-temperature gas separations; development of nano-structured filled polymers for advanced separation applications with computer-aided modeling and simulation; development of carbon monoxide-tolerant electrocatalysts for proton exchange membrane fuel-cell electrodes; computational fluid and particle dynamics; and aerosol mechanics. Dr. Ilias is a Fellow of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers and a licensed Professional Engineer.

is a Professor of Economics. Her research interests include economic models of decision-making under uncertainty, greenhouse gas mitigation polices in agriculture, cropland use changes due to the changing economic conditions such as the expansion of ethanol production and the ensuing changes in agricultural non-point source pollution. Dr. Kurkalova has led or co-led a number of multidisciplinary research projects focused on identifying the optimal placement of soil and water conservation practices on agricultural landscapes and the economic means of achieving the optimal placement.