Bladimir Ramos-Alvarado was awarded a Kenneth Kuan-Yun Early Career Professorship, which he will hold until 2028. Credit: Provided by Bladimir Ramos-Alvarado.
Mechanical engineering early career professor: Bladimir Ramos-Alvarado
May 11, 2026
UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Bladimir Ramos-Alvarado, associate professor of mechanical engineering with a courtesy appointment in chemical engineering, was awarded a Kenneth Kuan-Yun Early Career Professorship, a three-year professorship that Ramos-Alvarado will hold until 2028. Kenneth K. Kuo, distinguished professor of mechanical engineering who died in 2016, endowed two early-career professorships in 2010, the Kenneth Kuan-Yun Kuo Early Career Professorship and the Kenneth K. and Olivia J Kuo Early Career Professorship.
Q: What is the primary focus of your research?
Ramos-Alvarado: My research has two main areas. First, we are exploring questions about the properties of solid-liquid interfaces. Properties such as wettability, how a droplet spreads on a surface, how heat transfer goes across interfaces, how momentum transfers at interfaces, and by momentum, I mean velocity — viscous effects of liquids interacting with solids, meaning, how fast the fluid is going to move at an interface. We also deal with friction— solid-fluid and solid-solid interfaces —and we study all these transport processes using molecular dynamics simulations, meaning we use computers to model how atoms and molecules interact across interfaces.
The second area is electronics cooling. We are particularly interested in how to develop cooling systems for high-power electronics, like those found in communications and high-performance computing devices, such as data centers, and all kinds of CPUs and GPUs.
Q: What are some notable grants or achievements you have recently received?
Ramos-Alvarado: I am currently leading two U.S. National Science Foundation grants, one of which is a collaborative effort with researchers from the University of Maryland, and the second one is based at Penn State. I am also a co-principal investigator on a $7.5 million grant to support semiconductor innovation at Penn State through the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)’s Next-Generation Microelectronics Manufacturing (NGMM) program.
Front Row, L-R: Alfredo Arevalo, PhD in mechanical engineering, Rodrigo Lomeli, PhD candidate in mechanical engineering. Middle Row, L-R: Oscar Martinez, Fall 2025 intern, Juan Pablo Murrieta, PhD candidate in mechanical engineering, Luis Arturo Garcia, PhD student in mechanical engineering, Christian Campos, Fall 2025 intern. Back Row: Luis Daniel Aguilar, Fall 2025 intern. Credit: Provided by Bladimir Ramos-Alvarado.
Q: How does the Kenneth Kuan-Yun Kuo Early Career Professorship impact your work, and what does it mean to receive this recognition?
Ramos-Alvarado: It’s a humbling event. It is a major milestone in my career, which has allowed us to do more research and primarily support students. These funds allow our students to travel and disseminate the research we’re doing. Three years ago, I created an internship program focused on bringing primarily undergraduate students to the U.S. to have an international research experience, and this year is the fourth edition. This is a program I started in collaboration with ITESM (Instituto de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey – the most prestigious private university in Mexico), and it is a fully grassroots program. I use my professorship to sponsor these students, fund them, and pair them with faculty. Currently, we have a 100% recruitment rate in this program — every student I have brought in has become a doctoral student at Penn State. When I was growing up, I wanted to come to the United States to do research and wasn’t sure how to do it — I didn’t have the opportunities or funding. I’m doing this program for my community, particularly Mexicans, particularly at Penn State. It’s very fulfilling.
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