Assistant Professor (TT) - Mechanical and Industrial Engineering - Additive and Advanced Manufacturing

Job Summary

The Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering (MIE) at the University of Massachusetts Amherst is seeking talented applicants qualified for a tenure-track assistant professor position in additive and advanced manufacturing. Under exceptional circumstances, highly qualified candidates at other ranks may receive consideration. The appointment is expected to begin September 1, 2027. Applicants are encouraged to describe how their work aligns with the goals and values outlined in the university's strategic plan, including advancing equity and inclusive excellence.

The position is defined broadly across additive and advanced manufacturing, with particular interest in work that connects processing to microstructure and to performance. The search builds on existing campus capability in metal additive manufacturing and extends to advanced alloys, ceramics, composites, and hybrid material systems, and we are committed to expanding the scope of our department beyond its traditional strengths. We welcome work applying additive manufacturing to energy, aerospace, biomedical, and extreme-environment applications. We seek candidates whose work is grounded in measurement, through experiment, through physically based modeling explicitly validated against data, or through both. Scholars working across disciplines or in nontraditional areas of manufacturing are particularly encouraged to apply.

Areas of interest include, but are not limited to, process science of laser powder bed fusion, directed energy deposition, wire arc additive manufacturing, and cold spray; in-situ monitoring, sensing, and data-driven control; residual stress, fatigue, and qualification and certification of printed materials; printability-driven and compositionally complex alloys and printable ceramics; multi-material and functionally graded deposition across dissimilar metals, ceramics, and polymer hybrid composites; sustainable manufacturing with recycled and bio-derived feedstocks; and design for additive manufacturing, from architected materials and metamaterials to micro- and nanoscale fabrication.

As a campus, college, and department with an increasingly diverse student body, we are looking for candidates who can operate effectively in a diverse faculty and student community, and who value collegiality, collaboration, achievement, and integrity. We encourage applications from individuals with a commitment to mentor under-represented demographics within engineering. We welcome candidates who have had non-traditional career paths, those who have paused their careers for family or other reasons, or who spent time outside of academia.

Essential Functions

The candidate is expected to develop an externally funded research program in additive and advanced manufacturing, and to develop and maintain an internationally recognized scholarly presence.

The candidate is expected to contribute to teaching existing graduate and undergraduate courses in mechanical engineering, such as manufacturing processes, materials science, and heat transfer, and will be encouraged to develop creative new curricula, including graduate coursework in manufacturing and materials engineering.

The candidate is also expected to contribute meaningful service to their department, College, University and externally within their field through participation in committees, faculty governance, and activities that support the academic community.

Other Functions

Other duties as assigned.

Minimum Qualifications

Applicants must have a Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering, Materials Science and Engineering, Manufacturing Engineering, or a closely related field, or anticipate such a degree at the time of appointment.

Additional Details

The Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering has 38 full-time, tenure-track faculty members and approximately 140 graduate students and 830 undergraduates. The department’s FY25 research expenditures exceeded $9.5 million. Additional information about the Department can be obtained at https://www.umass.edu/engineering/mechanical-and-industrial-engineering.

MIE has a long history of successful interdisciplinary research, including digital design and manufacturing, materials science and engineering, robotics, wind and renewable energy, bioengineering, and computational and experimental fluid dynamics. Academic units affiliated with the department include the Wind Energy Center, the Energy Transition Institute, the Marieb Center for Nursing and Engineering Innovation, I-Corps at UMass, the Center for Personalized Health Monitoring, the Institute for Applied Life Sciences, and the UMass Transportation Center. Several MIE faculty are also affiliated with the Materials Science and Engineering interdisciplinary graduate program.

UMass Amherst is home to state-of-the-art additive manufacturing (AM) facilities, including the ADDFab core facility, equipped with industry-standard laser powder bed fusion (EOS M290), laser directed energy deposition (LENS 450), projection stereolithography (ProFluidics), and PolyJet AM systems (Stratasys). In 2025, ADDFab also acquired a two-photon polymerization-based direct laser writing 3D nanoprinter, UpNano NanoOne Bio, supporting cleanroom-free micro- and nanoscale device fabrication. Additional capabilities include a newly installed wire arc additive manufacturing system in MIE and a cold spray system in the National Polymer Institute, supporting large-scale and advanced metal-based AM research. These platforms are matched by campus characterization capability spanning the full process–structure–property chain: electron backscatter diffraction and EDS on a Magellan 400 XHR-SEM, analytical TEM with EELS and electron tomography, SAXS/WAXS/GIXRD alongside ambient and high-temperature X-ray diffraction, X-ray fluorescence, Raman and FTIR spectroscopy, and scanning probe microscopy. Mechanical and dimensional qualification is equally well supported, with axial-torsional fatigue testing on an Instron ElectroPuls 10000, Brinell/Vickers/Rockwell hardness, full-field photoelastic strain mapping, stylus profilometry, and coordinate measurement to 1.8 μm volumetric accuracy.

The Daniel J. Riccio Jr. College of Engineering is recognized as one of the top 35 public engineering schools in the nation by U.S. News & World Report and is the #1 public engineering program in New England. Our inclusive and dynamic community includes ~2700 undergraduate, ~650 graduate students and ~160 instructional faculty (full-time tenure stream and lecturers) across five engineering departments—biomedical, chemical and biomolecular, civil and environmental, electrical and computer, and mechanical and industrial. Our faculty members are developing life-saving medical devices and therapeutics; revolutionizing next-generation manufacturing and materials; advancing AI, robotics and autonomous systems; designing smart infrastructures; tackling climate change; and leading breakthroughs in computing and cybersecurity. They are recipients of prestigious national recognitions, including 22 CAREER Awards since 2020. With over $69 million in research expenditures and 20+ affiliated research centers and programs, we're at the forefront of discovery. Our faculty and students engage actively in innovation, transforming ideas into meaningful impact through entrepreneurship activities, patenting new discoveries, and new venture creation. Our new Sustainable Engineering Laboratories building offers immersive labs and learning spaces, enabling us to test and develop technologies that address real-world sustainability challenges. The College strives to be a leader in transformative engineering education, supporting faculty in the development of their teaching expertise through various initiatives such as our membership in the Kern Entrepreneurial Engineering Network (KEEN).

For more on the Riccio College of Engineering and our mission, visit: https://www.umass.edu/engineering/ and https://www.umass.edu/engineering/about/mission-vision-and-inclusivity-statement.

UMass Amherst is a leader in providing institutional supports for faculty to combine work and family/personal responsibilities, and has been listed among the Chronicle of Higher Education's "Great Colleges to Work For." UMass is in the top 10% of public research-intensive universities in the COACHE survey for making having and raising children compatible with the tenure track. UMass Amherst maintains a nationally recognized ADVANCE Institutional Transformation program that seeks to increase equity in STEM fields through collaboration (https://www.umass.edu/advance/home). For more information on work-life balance at UMass Amherst, see https://www.umass.edu/prospective-faculty/work/balance.

This position is subject to final budgetary and administrative approval.

Working Conditions

Work is primarily performed in an indoor university environment and involves lifting and transporting materials or equipment and general physical activity, including prolonged standing, walking, or assuming low postures.

Work Schedule and Work Arrangement

Full-Time, academic year position. Schedule varies depending on teaching, research and service.

Salary Information

The University expects to pay within an approximate range between $79,350 and $129,272 for this position. Please note:

The low end of the pay range in all faculty searches at the University of Massachusetts Amherst is the minimum salary for the rank included in the collective bargaining agreement between the University and the Massachusetts Society of Professors, UMass Amherst/MTA/NEA. Engineering TT starting salaries are typically well above this minimum.

The high end of the pay range reflects the 75th percentile for the department/discipline based on established, disciplinary-specific faculty compensation surveys.

The specific pay for this position will be determined by the University based on consideration of all relevant factors, including faculty rank and required or relevant certifications, when and if it decides to extend an offer of employment.

Special Instructions for Applicants

Candidates must provide the following in their application package addressed to the "Additive Manufacturing Search Committee." Applications will be reviewed starting on November 1, 2026 and reviewed until the search is completed. All files must be provided in .pdf format. Applicants must disclose whether and to what extent AI tools were used in the preparation of their application package; this disclosure should appear in each statement submitted.

A cover letter, addressed to the "Additive Manufacturing Search Committee." The cover letter should a) introduce yourself, and b) briefly describe your interest in and alignment with this position and the mission and vision of the Riccio College of Engineering. Page limit: 1 page.

An overall vision statement. Candidates should describe the overall vision of what they would like to accomplish in their career, integrating across all aspects of teaching, research, outreach, and service, and discuss the inspiration that will sustain them in this faculty position. Page limit: 2 pages.

A research statement. Candidates should situate their past research in a broader scholarly context and give their research vision for this position. Candidates are specifically asked to mention the types of scholarship they will perform independently and where they anticipate collaborating, how that scholarship will be disseminated, expectations for how that scholarship will be funded, and any connections to community engagement, broadening participation in STEM, or grand challenges in engineering. Candidates are also encouraged to identify the experimental and computational infrastructure their proposed program would require. Page limit: 3 pages.

A teaching and mentoring statement. Candidates should address teaching and mentoring of graduate and undergraduate students, as well as recruiting of graduate students. Candidates should describe their past teaching and mentoring experience and express their vision for educating the next generation of engineers. Candidates are specifically asked to mention existing courses in manufacturing and materials engineering they are qualified to offer and also mention courses they are interested in developing. Please discuss any plans for making engineering engaging to all students. Page limit: 2 pages.

A current curriculum vitae. The CV is typically ordered as follows: 1) education, 2) employment, 3) awards and honors, 4) sponsored research (if any), 5) peer-reviewed publications, 6) service, 7) teaching experience, and 8) other sections as considered appropriate by the candidate.

Contact information (name, title, email address, institution) for 3 professional references. At least one reference should be from a current or former supervisor. Reference letters will be requested after the short list is approved (see Process below).

Process

The steps of the process are as follows:

A minimally qualified pool is identified from the applicants, ideally by the middle of November 2026.

All remaining candidates are evaluated and a "long list" is identified, which will be interviewed via video conference in December 2026. Candidates invited to these interviews will be emailed at least one week before the scheduled date.

A "short list" is developed from the long list, and these candidates will be invited to interview on campus.

For candidates advancing to the short-list (on-campus interview) stage: references will be contacted.

On-campus interviews are anticipated in February 2027.

This position will remain open for the time period required by any applicable collective bargaining agreement and will continue until a suitable candidate pool is identified. Interested applicants are strongly encouraged to apply early.