DIT professor working as Fulbright scholar


1 Dec 2011

DIT professor Eugene Coyle

A professor at the Dublin Institute of Technology (DIT) has been awarded a Fulbright scholarship and is now researching energy policy at Purdue University and the College of Technology through July 2012.

Eugene Coyle is head of the School of Electrical Engineering Systems at the Dublin Institute of Technology (DIT). His research project at Purdue in West Lafayette, Indiana, is the latest in a series of projects, partnerships and exchanges between DIT and the College of Technology.

“Being here as a Fulbright scholar in a research capacity is a wonderful opportunity to reflect and engage in research,” Coyle said. “Great work is being done here in sustainable energy.”

Coyle will be working with Purdue’s Global Policy Research Institute, as well as the College of Technology to conduct a comparison of energy policy in the United States and Europe and how those are reflected in engineering and technology education.

Book to focus on energy

He will also collaborate with faculty in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering Technology, the College of Engineering, Discovery Park and the Energy Center. His research will culminate in a book that will address energy policy at the national level, sources for generating electricity, accrediting standards and academic programmes.

“If tomorrow somebody said, ‘I want a new programme in sustainable energy, they can use the book as an exemplar of good programmes that have already been developed,” Coyle said. “When I combine in the other things — innovation, leadership, humanitarian engineering — there will be a set of information oriented in a way to be helpful.”

Coyle will be the book’s main author, written in association with Melissa Dark, W.C. Furnas professor in the College of Technology, who will share editing responsibilities. The final publication will include chapter contributions from a number of academics, mainly based at Purdue and DIT.

While Coyle is in the United States, he also sees another role to be played, that of liaison and champion of the DIT and Purdue partnership.

“My first passion is to enhance and build upon the research collaboration that we’ve achieved to date, and also the teaching nexus associated with that,” he said. “I’ll be working with some of the researchers and maybe making joint proposals and collaborations in research and student projects.”

In his first month on campus, Coyle has already been impressed with the people and resources available, and he is thankful of the support received by library faculty.

“My observation is that Purdue is a very fine organisation, very well organised, and very well administered. Most universities aspire to this,” he said. “It’s been quite a joy to be here, and I thank the College of Technology and the Global Policy Research Institute for hosting me in my Fulbright experience.”