Michael Todd

Associate Professor and Vice-Chair, Structural Engineering

Structural dynamics, nonlinear vibrations, time series modeling, structural health monitoring strategies for civil, mechanical, and aerospace systems, fiber optic sensor system design and noise propagation modeling.

Professor Todd's research applies to civil, mechanical, and aerospace structural systems. He focuses on developing tools from structural vibrations, nonlinear dynamics, and time series modeling fields for structural health monitoring and damage prognosis strategies. He also works to develop fiber optic sensor arrays and RFID-enabled sensor networks for making the measurements necessary for initiating such strategies. By integrating these sensor technologies with targeted processing algorithms, Todd is able to create "smart structures" that continually provide data regarding health and performance in an online, efficient manner for optimal decision-making, reconfiguration, performance enhancement, and life safety. Todd's unique ability to combine hardware and software research domains further strengthens the Jacobs School's position as a world leader in integrating large-scale and field testing with computational analysis for purposes of damage diagnostics, damage prognostics, and response modeling of civil, mechanical, and aerospace structural systems.

Capsule Bio:
Michael Todd joined the UC San Diego Structural Engineering Department in 2003. He received his B.S.E. (1992), M.S. (1993), and Ph.D. (1996) from Duke University's Department of Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science as a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow. In 1996, he began at the US Naval Research Laboratory as an American Society for Engineering Education post-doctoral fellow, where he was later named Section Head (2000) of the Fiber Optic Smart Structures Section until 2003. He has published more than 150 journal papers, conference proceedings, and reports, and holds 4 patents. His main research areas are in structural health monitoring strategies, in fiber optic measurement systems, and in RFID sensor networking for civil infrastructure assessment with UAVs. With partners at Los Alamos National Laboratory, Todd helped create the country's first graduate degree program in structural health monitoring, damage prognosis, and validated simulations at UCSD. Among his many honors, Todd received the 1999 Alan Berman NRL Publication Award, the 2003 and 2004 NRL Patent Award, and the 2005 Structural Health Monitoring Person of the Year award given at the Fifth International Workshop on Structural Health Monitoring. He is a a 2004-2005 UCSD Hellman Fellow and a 2005 Von Liebig Entrepreneurship award winner.