Dr. Dereje Agonafer
Director, EMNSPC
Prof. Dept. MAE
UT Arlington
 

In 1999, Dr. Dereje Agonafer left IBM where he was was the IBM Center of Competence for Computer Aided Thermal Engineering and joined the University of Texas at Arlington as Professor and Director of Electronics, MEMS, and Nanoelectronics Systems Packaging Center (http://maepro.uta.edu/emnspc/). He was also Director of  the former Industrial Assessment Center at UTA (http://maepro.uta.edu/iac/index.html). He currently advises 14 graduate students including 4 PhD’s. Since joining UTA in 1999, he has graduated 3 PhD and 53 MS students. The research at the UTA center is multidisciplinary and focuses on a variety of research related to thermo/mechanical issues in Microelectronics, MEMS and Nanoelectronics with broad applications including computers, telecommunications and bio-fluidics. The center has a strong synergy with UTA’s Automation & Robotics Research Institute (ARRI) (http://64.46.169.132/arri/) and NanoFab Research and Training Facility (http://www.uta.edu/engineering/nano/). He serves on a number of university committees including a “Member of the UTA Intellectual Property Committee (assigned by President of UTA)”, “Chair of the MAE Industrial Relations Committee”, Chair, “UTA ASME Student Section”, Chair, “UTA NSBE Student Section” and an active participant in UTA’s McNair Scholars Program.

In addition to a PhD program focusing in packaging, in Fall 2001, Professor Agonafer established a certificate program in packaging. The Certificate in Electronic Packaging program provides graduate-level knowledge in the field of electronic packaging, with a concentration on numerical and experimental characterization of thermo/mechanical issues. The program is tailored to encourage attendance from industry. Courses are taught by faculty of the departments of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and Materials Science and Engineering, plus other UTA faculty and adjunct faculty as needed. Technical material covered in the classroom will be complemented by a number of seminars by industry leaders in the packaging field. Students will receive the certificate after completing 12 credit hours of packaging courses, as advised by the certificate program manager, and must have a cumulative GPA of 3.0 in the four selected courses (http://www.uta.edu/engineering/specials/elec_pkging.php).

Professor Agonafer is a Fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers International.  In March 1996, he received the "The National Society of Black Engineers Alumni Extension Technologist of the Year" award.  In April 1998, Professor Agonafer was the recipient of the “The University of Colorado School of Engineering Distinguished Engineering Alumni Award (DEAA) in the category of Research and Invention.” The award “represents the most significant honor the College gives and acknowledges the highest professional achievements. In November 1998, he received “The Howard University Distinguished PhD Alumni Award.”  Also, in November 1998, he received “ASME K-16/EEPD Clock Award for Outstanding Contribution in Computer Aided Thermal Management of Electronic Packages.” In 2002, he received ASME International Electronic and Photonic Packaging Division Highest Division Award for “Outstanding Contributions to the Area of the Application of the Science and Engineering of Heat Transfer to Electronic and Photonic Packaging.” In March 2005, Professor Agonafer received an award from University of Texas at Arlington for having a strong record of external funding and scholarly achievement.  

Senior Design Project Supervision

1.       Team Thermalloy (Spring/Summer 2000): “Numerical/Experimental Characterization and Improvement of Microprocessor Heat Sinks for Thermalloy Corporation,” J. Sudderth, J. Leal, M. Rater, D. Rangel, and L. Sutton.

2.         Team Hewlett-Packard (Fall/Spring 2000-2001): “Project Superdome,” B. Rogers, M. Vuga, J. Flusche, C. Crawford, J. Sweat.

3.        Team Motorola (Fall/Spring 2000-2001): “Investigate and Engineer a Linear Power Amplifier Heat Sink,” B. Kingsbury, E. Marquez, N. Teufel, B. Werchan.

4.         Team Nokia (Fall/Spring 2000-2001): “Thermo-Mechanical Characteristics of a Ball Grid Array Package Resulting in Heat Sink Design for Telecommunication Applications,” B. Harmon, K. Richarme, B. Muhlenkamp, C. Cochran, J. Baker, J. Williams.

5.         Team Hewlett-Packard (Fall/Spring 2002-2003):  “Optimization of Serial Heat Sinks for Hewlett-Packard Superdome Computer,” Ronnie Mathews, Thomas Morrell, Al Thompson, Jeff Wilson.

6.         Team Nokia (Spring/Summer 2003):  “Heat Pipe Assisted Heat Sink for Nokia Base Station,” Harold Brady, Hiroshi Ito, Ngoc Le, Nuwan Rodrigo and John Snyder.

7.         Team Nokia (Fall 2003/Spring 2004):  “Heat Pipe Assisted Heat Sink for Nokia Base Station,” Damena Agonafer, Juan Ibarra, Kendrick McGee and Frank Platt.

8.         Team Lockheed (Fall2004/Spring2005):  “Electronic Packaging of Irregular PCB – Part I” Nguyen Lac, Thuan Le, Koon Man Liu, David Nguyen and Karim Yasin

9.         Team Lockheed (Fall 2005/Spring 2006): “Electronic Packaging of Irregular PCB – Part II” Shahnaz Ayub, Toru Fujino, Jake Huddin, Kei Kamohara, and Melinda Nichols Walden.

10.       Team AMD, (Summer 2007/Fall 2007) "Optimization and Redesign of Heat Sink for X-1950 Pro Graphics Video Card" Mohamad Bilal, Salman Karim, Thang , Thien Nguyen and Majd Qasem.

11.       Team AMD (Fall 2007/Spring 2008) “Design and Development of a Heat Sink for High Powered Graphical Processing Units (GPUs).” Karla Duran, Mark Fulenwider, Wan T. Hue, Ryan King, and Phuong Nguyen.

12.       Team Siemens (Spring/Summer 08) "Fabrication and Characterization of Mimic Cell Identical to Siemen's Power Cell." Sean Calhoun, Raza Rahi and Ossama Jaffery.

Patents

1.      August 13, 2002: US 6,431,260: “Cavity plate and jet nozzle assemblies for use in cooling an electronic module, and methods of fabrication thereof”

2.      January 8, 2002: US 6,337,794: “Isothermal heat sink with tiered cooling channels”

3.      February 17, 1998: US 5,719,745: “Extended surface cooling for chip stack applications”

4.      January 6, 1998: US 5,704,419: “Air flow distribution in integrated circuit spot coolers”

5.      July 1, 1997: US 5,644,687: “Methods and system for thermal analysis of electronic packages”

6.      January 9, 1996: US 5,482,113: “Convertible heat exchanger for air or water cooling of electronic circuit components and the like”

7.      December 6, 1994: US 5,370,178: “Convertible cooling module for air or water cooling of electronic circuit components”

8.      July 12, 1988: US 4,757,370: “Circuit package cooling technique with liquid film spreading downward across package surface without separation”