Dimitrios Kyritsis’s teaching practices have earned him the 2008 Rose Award for Teaching Excellence from the College of Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Since he joined the Department of Mechanical Science and Engineering in 2002, students have continuously ranked Kyritsis highly as a professor for his innovative instruction and as a faculty advisor for his skillful mentoring of undergraduate members participating in senior design project teams. Students also said they appreciate the opportunities to work alongside Kyritis as laboratory assistants and the meaningful assignments given to them.

After earning his Ph.D. in 1998 at Princeton in mechanical and aerospace engineering, Kyritsis was a postdoctoral research fellow at Yale, then a lecturer at that university from 2001-02. From Yale he moved to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where he is presently an associate professor. Kyritsis’s research focuses on power engineering, including power generation, biofuels, reactive fluid mechanics and laser diagnostics.