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John B. VanderSande, Cecil and Ida Green Distinguished Professor, retired in June 2005 after a thirty-year career at the Institute.

John received the B.S. in mechanical engineering from Stevens Institute of Technology in 1966, and the Ph.D. in materials science from Northwestern Univ­ersity in 1970. He was a post-doctoral Fulbright Scholar with P.B. Hirsch at the University of Oxford, Department of Metallurgy. 

John’s scholarly activities have focused on the observation of the structure of materials, particularly metals and ceramics, by various forms of electron microscopy, as well as on the relationship between the processing of a material and its performance. As an example of the latter, modifying microstructure through rapid solidification processing has been a favorite topic of John’s. Following the discovery of so-called high-temperature superconducting oxides, John directed some of his attention to the study of these fascinating materials. Out of this branch of his research came inventions that helped establish the basis for technology around which American Superconductor Corporation was founded. In the area of the environment, safety, and health John has studied carbonaceous material produced by combustion processes in an effort to correlate particle structure and composition with the particle source. 

In addition to his fine teaching, research, and committee work in DMSE, John made major contributions to the Institute. From June 1992 to January 1999, John served as Associate Dean of the School of Engineering, during which time on two occasions he became Acting Dean. He played a seminal role in the formation of the Singapore-MIT Alliance, MIT’s distance education collaboration with the National University of Singapore, the Nanyang Technological University, and the government in Singapore. He was the first Executive Director of the Cambridge-MIT Institute (CMI), a major alliance between the University of Cambridge and MIT funded by the British government and industry for the purpose of improving productivity and entrepreneurship in the UK. 

Among his awards and honors is the 1994 Columbus Quincentennial Award from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts for his co-founding of American Superconductor which earned him recognition for his “spirit of discovery” and for his “breakthrough work in developing high-temperature superconductors.” Emblematic of John’s love of MIT and its students, he and co-recipient Dr. Gregory Yurek gave the $5,000 prize along with $5,000 in American Superconductor stock to the Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program (UROP) to promote the development of innovative applications of high-temperature superconductor wires. For his work as the first Executive Director of CMI he was named Extraordinary Fellow, Churchill College, University of Cambridge (2000). 

In retirement John can look forward to having the time to enjoy his many off-campus interests which include swimming, cycling, classical music, numismatics, antique American furniture, and Colonial New England architecture. 

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