The College of Engineering is home to more than 75 faculty whose research tackles today’s most pressing local and global challenges. From coastal resiliency and offshore wind energy to robotics, nanotechnology, and water reuse, our faculty lead nationally and internationally recognized work that blends interdisciplinary discovery with user-driven, applied solutions to real-world problems.

Over the past two decades, the College of Engineering at the University of Rhode Island has received 16 CAREER Awards from the National Science Foundation—more than half of all such awards granted to URI faculty. Four faculty have also earned prestigious Young Investigator Awards from the Office of Naval Research. These national honors reflect both the exceptional talent of our early-career faculty and the growing recognition of URI Engineering’s leadership in key research areas, including resilient infrastructure, advanced materials, AI and cybersecurity, robotics, biomedical technologies, and naval and marine engineering.

This momentum is backed by a dramatic rise in research activity. Since 2016, external research funding has increased fivefold, driven by interdisciplinary collaboration with government, industry, and academic partners at the state, national, and global levels.