Ehsan Dehghan-Niri

There are many reasons why Ehsan Dehghan-Niri made the decision to return to academia from his industry role, but the top reason is so he can carry out his passion for teaching.

He left his role as a nondestructive testing engineer at General Electric “to become a professor and have a very significant, lifelong impact on all of my students,” Dehghan-Niri says.

He became motivated to teach and research in the engineering field early in his academic career. 

“I realized that engineers have completely changed the world we live in with innovative ideas about modern homes, bridges, aircraft and cars,” Dehghan-Niri says. “I found engineering to have a broad impact on human lives.”

He looks forward to supplementing textbook curriculum with his industry experience, as his career helped to broaden his vision of real-world challenges and expand his academic and industrial networks.

Dehghan-Niri will strive to incorporate his teaching style into courses in nondestructive evaluation, ultrasound testing and quality control in additive manufacturing at the School of Manufacturing Systems and Networks, one of the seven schools in the Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering at Arizona State University.

Along with teaching, Dehghan-Niri, who is a 2021 NSF CAREER Award recipient, plans to continue advancing his research ambitions at ASU. His expertise is backed by more than 40 proposals and white papers and various projects funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, NASA, the U.S. Department of Defense and others totaling about $6 million.

“My NSF CAREER project involves pioneering advanced, bioinspired nondestructive evaluation technology,” Dehghan-Niri says. “I conduct fundamental studies on the exceptional near-field auditory system of the aye-aye, one of the most unusual primates in the world.”

To achieve his research and teaching goals, Dehghan-Niri says he aspires to create a nondestructive evaluation/testing, or NDE/T, center that integrates research, education and outreach with the primary objective of furthering the security and economic prosperity of ASU and the nation.

“ASU is a world-renowned institution with visionary leadership that is expanding exponentially,” Dehghan-Niri says. “I want to contribute to and be a part of this extraordinary growth.”

When he isn’t pushing the boundaries of his research or guiding his students in the classroom, you’ll find Dehghan-Niri spending time with his kids and cooking.

Meet the newest faculty members of the Fulton Schools of Engineering here.

Written by Sona Srinarayana