The Center for Entrepreneurship’s Faculty Innovation Ambassador (FIA) Program seeks to accelerate the commercialization of research by providing an avenue for faculty and researchers to collaborate with experts in the U-M Engineering community. The program provides a network of experienced faculty members who provide mentoring and advice to other faculty through a peer-to-peer educational structure.

Each department within the U-M College of Engineering has at least one designated faculty ambassador. Ambassadors are selected based on their participation in CFE programming, experience launching a company, or involvement in extensive commercialization activities through licensing and collaborations with industry. They can help faculty or graduate students understand the key issues at every stage: ideation, concept hardening, risk reduction, licensing/spinout. They also offer advice on business planning, consultation on road mapping for commercialization activities, and help on seeking funding outlets.

Interested in having a meeting with an FIA member? Contact Gurhari Singh gurhari@umich.edu to arrange a meeting.

Steven Goldstein – Professor Emeritus of Mechanical Engineering, Biomedical engineering, and Orthopedic Surgery. Research Professor Emeritus, Institute of Gerontology.

Dr. Goldstein joined the faculty at the University of Michigan in the Section of Orthopedic Surgery in 1981, and was promoted to Assistant Professor on tenure track in 1983. He is a prolific investor with more than 25 patents, several of which have led to devices or technologies currently in use for patient care, he is a co-founder of two university start-up companies, and has served on numerous advisory boards for a variety of small and large companies. Dr. Goldstein also serves on the CFE Board. 

Joerg Lahann – Professor of Chemical, Material Science, Biomedical, and Engineering, Professor of Macromolecular Science and Engineering, and Director of the Biointerfaces Institute

Prof. Lahann first joined the Department of Chemical Engineering in 2003, and in 2012 was appointed Director of the Biointerfaces Institute. His research is broadly related to surface engineering with strong ties to biomedical engineering and nanotechnology. He works extensively with advanced polymers, biomimetic materials, microfluidic devices, engineered microenvironments, nano-scale self-assembly. He supports biomedical breakthroughs through a unique framework that emphasizes interdisciplinary efforts at the interface between life sciences, physical sciences and engineering.

Perry Samson – Arthur F Thurnau Professor, Professor of Climate and Space Sciences Engineering, and Professor of Information, School of Information

Prof. Samson has been part of the  Climate and Space Sciences Engineering at the University of Michigan faculty since 1979. In 1996, Prof Samson was awarded the Arthur F. Thurnau Professorship, and in 2010 named  Distinguished Professor of the Year in 2010 by the President’s Council of Universities in the State of Michigan. He is co-founder of The Weather Underground, founder of LectureTools, and  serves on the Executive Board of the Ann Arbor Hands on Museum. Prof. Samson has a passion for innovations for education. 

Ryan Eustice – Associate Professor of Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering, Electrical and Computer Science, and Mechanical Engineering

He is the Director of the Perceptual Robotics Laboratory (PeRL), and his active research projects include applications to autonomous underwater ship hull inspection, multi-vehicle cooperative underwater navigation, benthic high-resolution mapping, and automotive active safety and self-driving capabilities. Eustice is a part of the MTRAC Transportation program. He is currently pursuing the commercial applications of his research for autonomous vehicles.

Euisik Yoon – Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Biomedical Engineering and Director of the Lurie Nanofabrication Facility.

He is a Professor and the Director of the Solid-State Electronics Laboratory and the Lurie Nanofabrication Facility. His research interests are self-contained microsystems that combine and process natural signals (such as bio, chemical, optical and thermal signals) as well as electrical signals on a single chip platform by integrating new MEMS/nano structures with low-power, wireless VLSI circuits and systems.

Shuichi Takayama – Professor of Biomedical Engineering and Professor of Macromolecular Science and Engineering

Dr. Takayama currently serves on the executive committee of the Biointerfaces Institute. From Dr. Takayama research, two start-ups have emerged: PHASIQ which has developed  multiplexed immunoassays without fear of cross-reactivity, and 3D Biomatrix with develops products for three dimensional cell culture generation.  

Grant Kruger – Assistant Research Scientist, Mechanical Engineering and Adjunct Assistant Professor of Undergraduate Education, and Research Investigator, Anesthesiology, Medical School.

Dr. Kruger’s current research focus is on intelligent medical informatics systems and biomedical devices. Through his career, he has been responsible for performing and facilitating various research projects and has authored and co-authored manufacturing and biomedical research funding proposals, scientific research papers and patents.

L. Jay Guo – Professor of Electrical Computer Science, Mechanical Engineering, Macromolecular Science and Engineering, Applied Physics

He has extensive experience and expertise in nanofabrication, and recently has been focusing on developing continuous roll-to-roll nanoimprinting and nano-inscribing techniques for high-throughput fabrication of nanostructures with applications in nanophotonics, biosensors, and organic solar cells. His lab is also developing photonic microresonator based ultrasound detectors for high-resolution and high-sensitivity biomedical imaging application.

David Wentzloff – Associate Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, and Faculty Co-Director for Graduate Education in the office of the Associate Dean for Entrepreneurial Programs

His research focuses on RF integrated circuits, with an emphasis on ultra-low power design. In 2012, he co-founded PsiKick, a fabless semiconductor company developing ultra-low power wireless SoCs.

Paul A. Green – Research Professor, University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute, and Research Professor and Adjunct Professor of Industrial and Operations Engineering

Dr. Green leads a research team that focuses on driver distraction, driver workload, and workload managers, navigation system design, and motor-vehicle controls and displays.

Mark Moldwin – Associate Chair, and Professor of Climate and Space Sciences and Engineering

Dr. Moldwin’s primary research interests are magnetospheric, ionospheric and heliospheric plasma physics, and pre-college space science education and outreach. He has published over 150 refereed scientific articles on these subjects. Prof. Moldwin is or has been the principal or co-investigator of over 70 externally peer-reviewed scientific projects including building the magnetometers to fly on NASA’s Space Technology – 5 satellites, the upcoming Air Force DSX mission satellite, and ground-based magnetometer deployment in North America, South America, Africa and Antarctica.

Yaoyun Shi – Associate Professor Electrical Engineering and Computer Science

Prof Shi’s main research interest is quantum information processing. His research aims to understand the ultimate information processing power that Mother Nature allows. A recent focus is on quantum cryptography, in particular random number generators (RNGs) that can prove to the user that the output is truly random. All current solutions require the user to blindly trust the output quality. As cryptographic keys are generated by RNGs, such quantum-based “trustworthy” RNGs will provide a fundamentally more secure foundation to information security than what is possible using the current technologies.