John R. Dixon
Professor Emeritus of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. John was Director of the Mechanical Design Automation Laboratory, and served as Department Head. He is a Fellow of ASME, has served as Director of the Design Theory and Methodology Program at National Science Foundation, and was the first recipient of the Ralph Coates Roe Award as Outstanding Mechanical Engineering Educator. His research into design processes, sponsored by both industry and government, has lead to over sixty technical papers and numerous books. In 1998, J.R. Dixon received the Outstanding Educator Award from the Design Engineering Division of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME).
Education
B.S. and M.S. in Mechanical Engineering, M.I.T., 1952-53
Ph.D., Mechanical Engineering, Carnegie-Mellon University, 1961
Accreditation
Certified by the Massachusetts Department of Education, Grades 5-12
Academic Positions
• University of Massachusetts
---
Director of Mechanical Design Automation Laboratory, 1983-93
--- Professor and Head of Mechanical Engineering, 1966-71 and 1981-83
• Swarthmore College, Associate Professor, 1964-66
• Purdue University, Associate Professor, 1961-64
• Carnegie-Mellon University, Assistant Professor, 1960-61
Industrial Practice and Consulting
• Plant Engineer, Jarl Extrusions, Inc., East Rochester, NY, 1955-57
• Project Engineer, Jos. Kaye and Company, Cambridge, MA, 57-58
• Consulting
---
IBM, Endicott, NY, Design Innovation, 1963
--- Scott Paper, Philadelphia, PA, Design Innovation, 1968-70
--- U.S. Dept of Transportation, Washington D.C., Design Faults, 1973
--- Various Clients, Energy Conservation, 1978-81
--- Becton-Dickinson, 1995
--- Otis Elevator, 1996
Government Service
• Military Service: 1953-1955
• Program Director for Engineering Design, Theory and Methodology
National Science Foundation (NSF), 1988-89
• Member National Research Council (Branch of National Academy
of Science) Committe on Engineering Design, 1989-90
Book Produced: "Improving Engineering Design: Designing for
Competitive Advantage" Published by National Academy Press, Washington, DC ISBN 0-309-04478-2
Research 1983-93
Research sponsored by National Science Foundation (NSF)
and a consortium of industrial firms including Polaroid, Xerox, Ford,
AMP, DEC, Smith and Wesson, Becton-Dickenson, GE Corporate Research,
GE Aircraft Engines, and GE Plastics. Major themes of the research:
(1) Computer-based models of design processes, including parametric,
configuration, and conceptual design; (2) Feature-based representations
for new intelligent CAD systems; and (3) support for management of
design. The research has resulted in over sixty publications and in
new software for support of the design process.
Honors
• Fellow of ASME
• Ralph Coates Roe Award, Outstanding Mechanical Engineering Educator, 1976
• Outstanding Design Educator, Design division, ASME International, 1998
• Tau Beta Pi, Sigma Xi, Pi Tau Sigma
Books Authored - Technical
• Design Engineering: Invention, Analysis, and Decision Making,McGraw-Hill, 1966.
• Introduction to Probability, Wiley, 1964
• Thermodynamics I, Prentice-Hall, 1975
• Engineering Design and Design for Manufacturing, With Corrado Poli,
Field Stone Publishers, 1996
Other Technical and Business Writing (see listings below)
• Over Sixty Technical Engineering and Engineering Education Papers
• Two Articles for Business Journals
• New York Times Op-Ed Article, 1989
• Over Twenty Op-Ed Articles on Various Technology and Public Policy
Subjects in Berkshire Eagle Newspaper
• Taught first-year writing course at UMass
Books Authored - Fiction
• Harry's Last - A detective/mystery - Creative Arts Book Company - 1999
• Secret Losses - A novel - Field Stone Publishers - 2000
• Gwyneth's Secret Grandpa - Field Stone Publishers - 2000
• Not By Chance - A novel - Field Stone Publishers - 2003
• Mariannes's Secret Cousins - Field Stone Publishers - 2005
Business Owner and Operator
Dixon Energy Systems, 1976-1981
Engineering and Contracting in Industrial and Commercial Energy Conservation
Heat Pump, Solar, and Heat Recovery Systems
Other
• Co-Founder and Editor of the "Journal of Research in Engineering Design"
• Editorial Boards of Four Technical Journals, 1985-99
Special Training
Mediator of business and professional disputes - Endispute, Inc., 1993
Personal Data
Born: Akron, Ohio, 1930
Married: Two Children, Four Grandchildren
Hobbies: Writing, Hiking, Piano, Ikebana
Foreign Travel: Japan, China, Germany, Austria, England, Italy, Spain, Sweden, Wales, Switzerland, Denmark
1. Selected Engineering Education Publications
"Why We Need Doctoral Programs in Design," Mechanical Engineering, Vol. 114, No. 2, February, 1992.
"Engineering Design Science: The State of Education," Mechanical Engineering, Vol. 113, No. 2, February, 1991.
"Engineering Design Science: New Goals for Education," Mechanical Engineering, Vol. 113, No. 3, February, 1991.
2. Selected Design Management Publications
"Quality Is Not Accidental - It's Designed," New York Times Sunday Business Section, June 26, 1988 (with M.R. Duffey).
"The Neglect of Engineering Design," California Management Review, Berkeley, CA, Winter, 1990 (with M.R. Duffey).
3. Selected Research Publications
"An Architecture for Application of Artificial Intelligence to Design," Proceedings, 21st ACM/EEE Design Automation Conference, Albuquerque, NM, June 25-27, 1984 (with M.K. Simmons and P.R. Cohen).
"Reasoning about Quantitative Methods in Engineering Design," Workshop on Coupling Symbolic and Numerical Computing in Expert Systems, Bellevue, WA, August 27-29, 1985 (with M.K. Simmons).
Dominic I: Progress Towards Domain Independence in Design by Iterative Redesign," Proceedings, 1986 ASME Computers in Engineering Conference, Chicago, IL, July 20-24, 1986 (with E.C. Libardi and M.K. Simmons).
"Dominic II: More Progress Towards Domain Independent Design by Iterative Redesign," ASME Proceedings, Intelligent and Integrated Manufacturing Analysis and Synthesis, ASME PED-Vol. 25, Boston, MA, December 13-18, 1987 (with M. Orelup and M.K. Simmons).
"A Proposed Taxonomy of Mechanical Design Problems," Proceedings, ASME Computers in Engineering Conference, San Francisco, CA, July 31-August 3, 1988 (with M.R. Duffey, R.K. Irani, K.L. Meunier and M.F. Orelup).
"Dominic II: Meta-Level Control in Iterative Redesign," Proceedings, Seventh National Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AAAI-88), St. Paul, MN, August 23-26, 1988 (with M.F. Orelup, P.R. Cohen and M.K. Simmons).
"A Review of Research in Mechanical Engineering Design. Part I: Descriptive, Prescriptive, and Computer-Based Models of Design Processes," Research in Engineering Design, Springer-Verlag, New York, Vol. 1, No. 1, 1989 (with S. Finger).
"A Review of Research in Mechanical Engineering Design. Part II: Representations, Analysis, and Design for the Life Cycle," Research in Engineering Design, Springer-Verlag, NY, Vol. 1, No. 2, 1989 (with S. Finger).
"Languages for Feature Based Design and Manufacturability Evaluation," International Journal of Systems Automation: Research and Applications, 1992 (with D.W. Rosen).
"Features and Algorithms for Tooling Cost Evaluation in Injection Molding and Die Casting," Proceedings of the ASME Computers in Engineering Conference, San Francisco, CA, August 2-6, 1992 (with D.W. Rosen, C. Poli and X. Dong). (This paper won the Best Paper Award.)
"Representing Function, Behavior and Structure during Conceptual Design," Proceedings of the ASME Design Theory and Methodology Conference, Scottsdale, AZ, September 13-16, 1992 (with R.V. Welch).