Melanie Derby
Professor
Dr. Charles E. Wilson Chair in Engineering
Contact information
3022 Rathbone Hall
785-532-5610
derbym@k-state.edu
Education
- Ph.D., Mechanical Engineering, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, 2013
- M.S., Mechanical Engineering, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, 2010
- B.S., Mechanical Engineering, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, 2008
Professional experience
Dr. Melanie Derby received her B.S. degree in Mechanical Engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in 2008. She then joined an Office of Naval Research-sponsored MURI project at RPI for graduate study, under the direction of Profs. Michael Jensen and Yoav Peles. At RPI, she studied condensation heat transfer and received her M.S. in 2010 and Ph.D. in May 2013. In August 2013, she joined the faculty at Kansas State University and researches thermal-fluids problems pertaining to the Food, Energy, and Water Nexus.
Research
Dr. Derby runs the Cooling and Heating Innovation Lab. Her expertise areas include multi-phase flows, phase change, building energy, and rural resilience. She directs a team of talented and motivated graduate and undergraduate students at K-State. Please contact Dr. Derby if you are interested in collaboration or joining the research group.
Academic highlights
Dr. Derby has authored and/or co-authored over 70 peer-reviewed journal articles and conference papers and holds one patent. Dr. Derby was awarded a 2017 NSF CAREER Award, 2017 ASME ICNMM Outstanding Early Career Award and 2017 K-State College of Engineering Outstanding Assistant Professor Award. She and her students have presented their work at more than 20 conferences and meetings, and six of her students have won poster presentation awards or best paper awards. Since joining Kansas State University in 2013, she has received research funding from the NSF, NASA, ONR, DOE, ASHRAE and industry. She is an active member of ASHRAE and ASME, and is an affiliate of K-State's Institute for Digital Agriculture and Advanced Analytics.