Alumnus Robert Behnken, PhD, will receive a Distinguished Alumni Award and Shelly Sakiyama-Elbert, PhD, will receive a Distinguished Faculty Award.
Robert L. Behnken
<p><img style="margin:10px 20px 10px 10px" alt="" align=left src='http://admin.seas.wustl.edu/ContentImages/newsphotos/Behnken_news_landing_72.jpg'>Colonel Robert Behnken, BS ’92, United States Air Force, has served on two missions to the International Space Station and has logged more than 708 hours in space—including more than 37 hours on six spacewalks. He currently serves as chief of the Astronaut Office for NASA. He has received the Meritorious Service, Defense Meritorious Service and Defense Superior Service medals from the U.S. Air Force and two space flight medals from NASA. As an undergraduate at Washington University, Behnken served in the Air Force Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC) while earning bachelors’ degrees in physics and mechanical engineering. He was chosen as Outstanding Mechanical Engineering Senior. He later attended the California Institute of Technology as a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow, where he earned his master’s degree and doctorate in mechanical engineering.
After graduate school, Behnken was assigned to Eglin Air Force Base, Florida, where he worked as a technical manager and developmental engineer for munitions systems. After completing Air Force Test Pilot School at Edwards Air Force Base, California, he was assigned to the F-22 Combined Test Force (CTF) at Edwards, where he served as the lead flight test engineer. He has more than 1,300 flight hours in more than 25 different types of aircraft.
Read more at alumni.wustl.edu
Shelly E. Sakiyama-Elbert
<p><img style="margin:10px 20px 10px 10px" alt="" align=left src='http://admin.seas.wustl.edu/ContentImages/newsphotos/News%20photos%20post%202.15.12/Sakiyama_feature_news_landing_72.jpg'>Shelly Sakiyama-Elbert is professor of biomedical engineering and associate chair for graduate studies in the School of Engineering & Applied Science. Her groundbreaking research, which has been generously funded by the National Institutes of Health, focuses on developing biomaterials for drug delivery and cell transplantation for the treatment of peripheral nerve and spinal cord injury. She takes a highly interdisciplinary approach to her research, combining an understanding of biology, chemistry and biomedical engineering to develop new bioactive materials that can enhance wound healing and tissue regeneration.
Sakiyama-Elbert served as a faculty fellow in the Office of the Provost from 2012 to 2013. She received the Award for Excellence in graduate mentoring from the Graduate Student Senate and dean of the Graduate School of Arts & Sciences in 2011, and was honored by the School of Engineering & Applied Science in 2008 with the Dean’s Award for Excellence in advising and mentoring. She is also a member of the Hope Center for Neurological Disorders and the Center for Materials Innovation, both at Washington University.
Read more at alumni.wustl.edu.