SUTA’s Awards Committee is delighted to announce the results of the 2016 SUTA Awards.   Dr. Amin’s Lifetime Achievement Award The fourth winner of the SUTA’s Dr. Amin’s Lifetime Achievement Award is Dr. Mohammad Ghodsi, professor of Computer Engineering Department at Sharif University of Technology (SUT). Professor Ghodsi who himself graduated from SUT in 1975 has been teaching in the university since 1979 with the exception of 5 years, during which he completed his PhD in the US in 1980’s. During this long tenure, he taught many courses, supervised close to 200 research projects (at BS, MS, and PhD levels), and held several positions including head of department. Through writing many books, co-founding Iran’s computer society, and involvement in campaigns such as anti-plagiarism, Dr. Ghodsi’s contributions reached out of the Sharif campus and benefited students and professionals nationwide. By presenting this award to Professor Ghodsi, SUTA continues the path that it took since the inception of Dr. Amin’s Lifetime Achievement Award in recognizing dedicated individuals whose contributions have touched the lives of the most brilliant of our country’s young men and women. The previous winners of Dr. Amin’s Lifetime Achievement Award are Dr. Siavash Shahshahani (2010), Dr. Saeed Sohrabpour (2012), and Dr. Reza Mansouri (2014). Alumni Achievement Award The third winner of the SUTA’s Alumni Achievement Award is Mr. Hessam Armandehi. Mr. Armandehi is a 30 year old successful entrepreneur whose company, Cafe Bazaar which he founded in Iran, reached astonishing success and was featured in prominent publications worldwide (such as Wall Street Journal and Washington Post). He received his BSc in Computer Science from SUT in 2008 and his MSc from Chalmers University in Sweden in 2012. Upon graduation, he went back to Iran where he put his learnings into good use and founded Cafe Bazaar, a leading smartphone application marketplace for Persian speakers serving close to 25 million smartphone users. His company was one of the first successful startups in Iran employing many Sharif graduates and showing the world of possibilities to younger generations.  In presenting the award to Mr. Armandehi, SUTA appreciates the hard work of those graduates who, against all the odds, manage to create exciting new opportunities for the youth in Iran. The previous winners of Alumni Achievement Award are Dr. Behrokh Khoshnevis (2012) and Dr. Mahmoud Tebiani (2014).   Staff Award The recipient of this year’s Staff Award is Mr. Ehsanollah Arzpeyma, the long serving officer of the university's registrar's office. Mr. Arzpeyma is such a known figure in the university and among the alumni that no justification seems to be necessary. He is indeed a monumental figure on campus as no Sharif graduate has left school without his/her academic record being meticulously examined by him. In addition to serving the university in the above-mentioned capacity for such long time, he has also been helping SUTA and the alumni association. Staff Award was formed this year by merging the two award categories of Alumni Distinguished Service Award and Staff Appreciation Award. The past winners of Alumni Distinguished Service Award are Dr. Alinaghi Mashayekhi (2012) and Mr. Alireza Hamzelou and Mr. Mehdi Hakimpour (2014). The past winners of Staff Appreciation Award are Ms. Afsaneh Tehrani and Mr. Mansour Ajoudani (2014).  Dr. Mojtahedi Awards have been announced in a prior communique.  Best Regards, SUTA 2016 Awards Committee Dr. Jalil Kamali Dr. Shahryar Makarechi Dr. Masoud Olfat Dr. Bahram Zahir

The Awards Committee is delighted to announce the results of SUTA’s 2016 Dr. MojtahediInnovation Awards.

We have received 12 submissions as follows:

 

4 in Mechanical Engineering

3 in Civil Engineering

2 in Chemical Engineering

1 in Chemistry

1 in Material Engineering

1 in Electrical Engineering

 

The submission in Electrical Engineering (EE) was not a project but rather introducing a research group with its publications and activities. Given this and the fact that a competition with just one project was inappropriate, EE was taken out of the competition.

 

We also combined Chemical Engineering, Chemistry, and Material Engineering into one category with 4 projects. And so we ended up with three categories as follows.

 

Mechanical Engineering (4 projects)

ChemEng/MatEng/Chemistry (4 projects)

Civil Engineering (3 projects)

 

The evaluation has been performed in just one round, as the turn out was relatively low, and the winners are announced as follows:

 

Mechanical Engineering:

Dr. Amir Shamloo, Ms. Sara Salehi, "Applications of MEMS in Biological Sciences"

ChemEng/MatEng/Chemistry:

Dr. Mohammad Jafar Abedkhodai, Ms. Elaheh Jooybar, “Construction of polymer careers to transport platelet lysate to be used in the reconstruction of cartilage tissues”

Civil Engineering:

Mr. Aref Samadi-Dooki, “The effects of Substrate’s Physical Properties on Cells Adhesion.”

We would like to congratulate our winners and to sincerely thank our judges, and all teams who sent us their projects. 

 

Best Regards,

SUTA 2016 Awards Committee

Dr. Jalil Kamali

Dr. Shahryar Makarechi

Dr. Masoud Olfat

Dr. Bahram Zahir

Dr. Mojtahedi's Innovation Award: SUTA is inviting researchers of Sharif University to take part in the competition. Details can be found in the announcement here. Also the form to be completed for nominees is included here.

Dear members,

it is with great pleasure to announce to the membership that the bi-annual SUTA awards will be held for the fourth time in conjunction with the 2016 SUTA Reunion. These awards will be given in four categories as follows:

1.       Dr. Mojtahedi’s Innovation Award to recognize the best research conducted in every department of Sharif University of Technology.

2.       Dr. Amin’s Lifetime Achievement Award to recognize a scholar with outstanding contribution to the university.

3.       Alumni Achievement Award to recognize an alumnus with outstanding achievement in industry or academia.

4.       Staff and Alumni Service Award to recognize an alumnus or university staff with outstanding service to the university, SUTA, or the society (This award is formed as a combination of the Alumni Distinguished Service Award and the Staff Appreciation Award).

In cooperation with the university, SUTA is reviving Dr. Mojtahedi’s innovation award which was dormant after its inception in 2010. For the other three categories, as usual, we are soliciting input from SUTA membership. We would like to encourage our members to inform us of their nominations for these awards by October 31, 2015. The nominations must be sent to awards@suta.org and should include a short biography of the candidate and an explanation to justify the candidacy.

 

For further information about the awards and its past recipients, we invite members to visit SUTA web-site and read Dr. Jalil Kamali’s article in SUTA Newsletter No. 77.

 

 

Best Regards

SUTA Awards Committee

SUTA Board of Directors eagerly seeks your opinion about SUTA activities and how we can enhance the quality of services provided to our members. Moreover, if you have attended or intended to attend SUTA Reunion 2014 in Milan, Italy, your feedback would significantly help us improving the quality of Reunion 2016. Even though, you are welcome to provide anonymous feedback, we strongly recommend you to provide your name and contact information, so as to better use your experiences and opinions Please follow the link below and complete the short survey! It would be great if you fill it out at your earliest convenience  https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1hL6rNd8jNpr1KPEJAOtOFqEBWqat3_cPzIq0Nhbzyg0/viewform?usp=send_form

SUTA has raised its concern on the new policy taken by University of Massachusetts in prohibiting Iranian students to get admitted in  graduate studies. We have sent the following letter to University Presidents.

                                                                                                                 February 16, 2015

Dr. Robert L. Caret,

President of the University of Massachusetts,

Dr. Kumble R. Subbaswamy,

Chancellor UMASS Amherst,

Dr. John J. McCarthy, 

Dean of UMASS Graduate School

Dear Sirs,

On behalf of Sharif University of Technology Association (SUTA), I am writing you to express our concern about University of Massachusetts Amherst’s new policy on prohibiting the admittance of Iranian students for Science and Technology studies.

In the last 10 years, several US institutions such as IEEE and American Chemical Society have introduced restrictions on membership and publication by Iranians, with the argument to comply with the U.S. sanction laws, but they subsequently removed these restrictions, due to pressure from their own members, and reconsideration of U.S. sanction laws. We believe no US academic institution has been fined for accepting Iranian students until now.

Iranian scholars in general, and graduates of Sharif University of Technologies in particular have been very instrumental in the development and advancement of US academic programs around the nation. Moreover, U.S administrations have always stressed on the improvement of cultural relations among the two nations, particularly through academic relations.

Even with the current U.S Sanctions against Iran, We believe that the measure taken by UMass is an extreme interpretation of U.S. Sanction law. The emphasis of many U.S officials on more rigorous cultural exchange among two nations is a sign of how U.S sanctions on Iran is targeted on particular areas, and should not be extended to any cultural and academic relations among nationals of two countries.

We hope the values of academic and cultural relations would prevail and UMass Amherst would reconsider its decision.

Masoud Olfat, Ph.D.

President of Sharif University Association (SUTA)

Masoud.olfat@SUTA.org,               

Hand over to the new board

The 2014 SUTA election results were released by the Supervisory Committee last week and on January 21, 2015, at a common meeting of the 7th and the 8th boards, the management of SUTA has been handed over to the newly elected board. Furthermore, till their next meeting, where they will choose the permanent president, secretary, VP and treasurer, the newly elected board has assigned Dr. Masoud Olfat as interim president, and Ms. Bahar Abghari, as the interim secretary. The combination of the newly elected board is as follows:

1. Masoud Olfat: interim president
   
2. Bahar Abghari: interim secretary
   
3. Shariar Makarechi
   
4. Nastaran Zamani
   
5. Davood Navaian
   
6. Sepehr Hamzelouia
   
7. Mohammadreza Kianmehr
   
8. Shayan Ghotbi: substitute member
   
9. Mohammad Mahmoodi: substitute member
   

From the 7th board, Dr. Bahram Zahir, Ms. Negin Sadr, Dr. Masoud Olfat, Dr. Vahid Arbab and Ms. Nahid Toosi were present and they shared their experience with the new board. The new board can be reached at "board@suta.org".

The Toronto Chapter had an event on January 15, 2015, with Dr. Davar Boghaei as the speaker. The talk entitled "Basic Sciences in Emerging Technologies."

Dr. Boghaei has been recognized for his long time service to SUTA, since 2000, as one of the main contact points in Tehran, and helping with the registration of reunion attendees from Iran. We wish him all the bests, and hope that he continues his involvement with our association.

   

Toronto Chapter Execuitive Team

A few months ago Alireza Seyedi, a dear Sharifi friend (EE 1371) and a distinguished researcher at UCF passed away. In recognition of Alireza's impact and his many academic achievements and to celebrate his extraordinarily innovative life, his family and friends with the help of University of Central Florida established Alireza Seyedi Doctoral Research Innovation Endowed Scholarship. Initial fund of $17,365 was raised by family and friends. The fund has a target of $30,000 in order to be self-sustaining. Once the fund meets the minimum eligibility for establishing an endowment account, in accordance with the foundation policy, it will be invested in the UCF Foundation’s endowment long-term investment pool. The donations to this scholarship are eligible for tax deduction in accordance with US IRS regulations.
It makes sense to me that SUTA take the initiative to spread the word in this regard. If you are interested in making donations/ getting more information, please see the following link:http://adadpay.com/2015/01/07/post_726/

As we declared last month, in an effort to clarify some of the definitions and processes in SUTA Bylaws, the 7th SUTA Board of directors has drafted a new amendment (called the Second Amendments) to the Bylaws.

This new amendment includes clarifying the definition of all member categories, the composition of SUTA Board of directors, and chapter relations. These modifications have been discussed in SUTA Reunion 2014 meeting in Milan Italy, and we also received several comments on the proposed changes, since the matter has been discussed with all members.

Hereby, we are presenting the modified amendment to all members:

  New draft of the Second Amendment to SUTA's Bylaws

If you still have comments on this new version, please contact us via this email address: members@suta.org. We will put this Amendments into referendum, along with the election for 8th SUTA Board of directors, from January 4 to 12, 2015.

Best Regards
Board of Directors