Mechanical engineering professor Jane Davidson receives national energy award

Contacts:

Rhonda Zurn, College of Science and Engineering, rzurn@umn.edu, (612) 626-7959

MINNEAPOLIS / ST. PAUL (12/04/2012)—Jane H. Davidson, a mechanical engineering professor in the University of Minnesota College of Science and Engineering, has been named as the recipient of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) Frank Kreith Energy Award for significant research on solar systems for residential buildings and solar thermo chemical cycles to produce fuels.

Davidson, director of the University of Minnesota's Solar Energy Laboratory and Ronald L. and Janet A. Christenson chair of renewable energy, was also honored for contributions as an exemplary educator in renewable energy and for shaping solar energy research and policies at the national and international level.

The award was established in 2005 to honor an individual for significant contributions to a secure energy future with particular emphasis on innovations in conservation and/or renewable energy.

Before coming to the University of Minnesota in 1993, Davidson was a faculty member at the University of Delaware, Newark, and the Colorado State University, Fort Collins; and held engineering positions at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Tennessee, and the Research Triangle Institute, North Carolina.

Her current areas of research include solar energy systems for residential buildings and solar thermo-chemical cycles to produce fuels. In 2011, she and her colleagues inaugurated the first indoor concentrating solar simulator in the United States. It is used to test prototype solar reactors. In the conduct of her research, she has been the major advisor of 26 doctoral and 49 master’s degree students.

Davidson recently served on the National Research Council’s America’s Energy Future Renewable Electricity Panel, Governor Tim Pawlenty’s Clean Energy Technology Task Force and ASME’s Global Climate Change Task Force. She also served as an elected member of the boards of the American Solar Energy Society (ASES) and the Solar Rating and Certification Corporation.

Davidson has published more than 250 scientific papers, including over 105 articles in archival journals, and six book chapters. She has lectured worldwide in diverse venues, and has briefed Congress and state legislatures on energy issues. She served as associate editor (1992-98) and editor (2000-05) of the ASME Journal of Solar Energy Engineering.

An ASME Fellow, Davidson has held various positions in the Society, including chair of the ASME Solar Energy Division (SED). She currently serves on ASME’s Publications Committee (2012-15), and was the Society’s representative for the inaugural Carbon Management Technology Conference held in February. Since 1996, she has organized numerous SED symposiums, panels and technical paper sessions. She received an ASME Dedicated Service Award in 2003 and SED’s John I. Yellott Award in 2004. She is a member of Tau Beta Pi, the Engineering Honor Society, and Sigma Xi, the Scientific Research Society.

Davidson received her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in engineering science and mechanics from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, in 1975 and 1976, respectively. She earned her Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from Duke University (Durham, N.C.) in 1984.