Required Credit Hours/Tuition and Fees
- 30
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Curriculum
The department offers both thesis and non-thesis options. Both options require the completion of 30 graduate credit hours. To take full advantage of the academic experience available, however, students are encouraged to take the thesis option.
The thesis option requires a minimum of 24 credit hours of coursework plus six credit hours of ME 599-Thesis.
Thesis students will be guided in thesis work by a thesis advisor with the assistance and concurrence of an advisory committee. The thesis topic will be selected from an area in mechanical engineering and approved by the student’s advisor. When possible, part-time students will be encouraged to select topics complementing their professional responsibilities. Writing a thesis involves an intensive research effort and generally requires several semesters of work to complete. Students are encouraged to find a thesis advisor and begin their thesis work well in advance of registering for thesis credits.
The non-thesis option requires a minimum of 27 credit hours of coursework plus three credit hours of ME 598-Research Project.
Non-thesis students are required to work on a research project, the topic of which is mutually agreed upon by the student and a faculty advisor, and write a report describing their project and present their findings to an examining committee. A research project is less involved than a thesis.
Of the 30 credit hours required, at least 21 credit hours must be in mechanical engineering courses, of which at least 15 credit hours must be at the 500-level (which may include six credit hours of ME 599-Thesis for the thesis option and three credit hours of ME598-Research Project for the non-thesis option). Six credit hours must be in mathematics and must be selected from a list of courses already approved by the mechanical engineering faculty. The program allows students to take one graduate-level elective course from outside the program. The elective course may be taken from any of the courses listed in the current Graduate Catalog, provided the student meets prerequisites.
All students are required to complete either ME 530-Advanced Dynamics or ME 575-Advanced Fluid Mechanics.
The mechanical engineering discipline has a close interface with civil engineering in the areas of stress analysis and elasticity, and with electrical engineering in the areas of system dynamics and control theory. Whenever possible, courses in these areas will be cross-listed to enrich the variety of course offerings for students in all programs.
The specific program of study is selected by the student and approved by the student’s advisor.
