ByGeorge!

September 2008

Renowned Aerospace Expert to Lead Engineering School


David S. Dolling, GW’s newest dean, is an internationally recognized expert in supersonic and hypersonic fluid dynamics.

BY RACHEL MUIR

David S. Dolling traces his love of flight to building model airplanes and watching air shows as a child growing up in England. While a teenager, he joined the Royal Air Force Cadets, a program that enables young people to learn firsthand about aviation, and the rest was history. “I became fascinated by the engineering and science behind flight—it’s fair to say that the fascination has never left me,” says Dolling, who begins his tenure as dean of GW’s School of Engineering and Applied Science in September.

Dolling comes to GW with a wealth of qualifications. Most recently, he served as associate dean for academic affairs, Joe C. Walter, Jr. Chair in Engineering, and professor of aerospace engineering and engineering mechanics at the University of Texas, Austin. Dolling is a fellow of both the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics and the United Kingdom’s Royal Aeronautical Society, has held a number of leadership positions in the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, and was appointed to the Engineering Accreditation Commission.

While Dolling spent the past 25 years at the University of Texas, he says the decision to come to GW was an easy one. “I was attracted by the combination of existing GW qualities and by the clear potential that the School of Engineering and Applied Science has to play a larger role locally and on the national stage,” says Dolling. “The motivation, energy, and enthusiasm of the students and faculty played a crucial role, as did the proximity to government, industry, and the high-tech corridor in Northern Virginia.

“A commitment has been made at the highest levels of GW to strengthen the School of Engineering and Applied Science,” he adds. “An opportunity to play a leadership role in that endeavor is very exciting.”

Although Dolling says it is too soon for him to have formed highly articulated objectives, his preliminary goals for the school include strengthening and expanding its undergraduate and graduate offerings, making it an increasingly attractive education and research destination for students, taking full advantage of the Virginia Campus, and forging more research collaborations with industry, government, research institutes, and other schools.

Dolling’s research concerns supersonic and hypersonic fluid dynamics. “A key element in determining the aerodynamics of an airplane—the forces and movements acting on the plane due to its motion through the air—is whether or not it is traveling above or below the speed of sound,” he explains. Supersonic speeds are in the range of Mach 2 to 5, or two to five times the speed of sound. Hypersonic speeds are typically Mach 5 and above. “In this field, a fluid can be a gas or liquid, so air is considered a fluid,” he says. “Therefore, fluid dynamics is the study of the dynamics of airflow over an airplane, missile, or rocket.”

Dolling currently is the principal investigator on a five-year, $5 million program sponsored by the U.S. Air Force on scramjet propulsion technologies. One of the long-range outcomes of his research could be less expensive access to space, he explains. are now propelled into space by rockets, which, because they carry both fuel and an oxidizer, tend to be large and heavy.” In contrast, a scramjet-propelled vehicle would carry only fuel. “One advantage is that such vehicles could be much lighter, allowing more payload to be carried into space,” he says.

Earlier in his career, Dolling developed a high-speed wind tunnel laboratory at the University of Texas and built an internationally recognized research program in experimental gas dynamics. Before joining the University of Texas in 1983, Dolling spent six years as a researcher and lecturer at Princeton University. He earned both an undergraduate and Ph.D. degree from London University and spent three years studying at the Von Karman Institute for Fluid Dynamics in Brussels.

When he’s not in the lab or classroom, chances are Dolling has his nose in a book or is spending time with his family. “I am an avid news reader and also enjoy biographies, political or military memoirs, and history, mostly concerning the 20th century,” he says.

His wife, Susan, is a graduate of Princeton and also is a professor and writer/translator. She will be teaching part time in the Columbian College of Arts and Sciences. The couple has two children: a 20-year-old son, Zachary, who is a student at the University of Texas, and a 22-year-old daughter, Anne, who has Down syndrome and is relocating with them to the region. “We are looking forward to living in the Washington, D.C., area and enjoying all that a major city and seat of government can offer,” Dolling says.



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