Allan F. Bower

Allan Bower is Professor of Engineering at Brown University, where he teaches in the undergraduate mechanical engineering program and in the graduate program in mechanics of solids. He earned undergraduate and graduate degrees at the University of Cambridge, and spent a short period on the faculty at Cambridge before joining Brown in 1992. His research involves developing and using computer simulations to model deformation and failure in materials. Applications of interest have included modeling wear, plasticity and fatigue between contacting surfaces; fracture in composites and ceramics; failure mechanisms in microelectronic circuits; and stress induced phenomena in thin films and nanostructures. He currently serves as co-director of the General Motors/Brown collaborative research laboratory in computational materials research, which develops computer simulations that help design lightweight materials and engineered surfaces for automotive applications.