At Michigan State University, I am a professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering and professor of Mechanical Engineering, and have also taught in Computer Science and Engineering. I co-direct MSU's Genetic Algorithms Research and Applications Group (GARAGe) , which is administered jointly by the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and the Department of Computer Science and Engineering. In February, 2007, I was awarded the university's highest teaching award, the Alumni Club of Mid-Michigan Quality in Undergraduate Teaching Award (pictured on right with MSU President Lou Anna Kimsey Simon).
Then, on May 14, 2009, I was honored as one of three winners of Michigan Distinguished Professor of the Year, by the Presidents Council of the State Universities of Michigan. Michigan's fifteen state colleges and universities annually nominate one faculty member each for the award, and the selection committee picks three to receive the honor. The awards were presented by the President's Council at a banquet at the Radisson Hotel in Lansing.
The 8-minute video clip presented on MSU Today on the Big Ten Network is available at the link above. A half-hour version has also been shown on the Big Ten Network, and I'll post a link to that if I can find it. See the Teaching and International Activities sections of my web pages for more information about the project.
I received the Ph.D. in Computer and Communication Sciences from the University of Michigan in 1972, where I was a member of the Logic of Computers Group, in which John Holland pioneered the development of genetic algorithms. My major professor was Bernie Ziegler, an expert on the theory of simulation and on automata theory. In my dissertation research, I developed a genetic algorithm (using a floating point representation and Gaussian mutation operator) to parameterize a model of the metabolism of a bacterial cell undergoing nutritional shifts, and a simple model, using a cellular automaton, of a bacterial cell colony based upon these cells. To my knowledge, solving for those metabolic rate constants was the first use of a genetic algorithm to solve an actual hard problem (i.e., one for which the solution was wanted, not just a study of the GA on a test problem). It ran about a year (calendar time) and over half a year (CPU time) on an IBM 1800 computer (first at UM, then at MSU).
I teach the Senior Capstone Design course in Electrical and Computer Engineering, ECE 480, (http://www.egr.msu.edu/classes/ece480/goodman) and the junior-level course in Professionalism and Ethics, ECE 390. In even-numbered years, I co-teach a graduate course in evolutionary computation. I am developing an undergraduate specialization in Information and Communication Technology for Development (beginning in Africa). I have chaired the department's Undergraduate Curriculum Committee for several years. For more information on my teaching and instructional development activities, click on Teaching and on International Activities.
My research deals primarily with developing new ways of using evolutionary computation to solve problems in engineering design (see Research). In 1999, my research colleague, Prof. Ron Averill, and I founded a spinoff company, Red Cedar Technology) to make our design automation technology available to industry.
My research has also included funded work to develop methods to allow teams of engineering students (and, ultimately, engineers) distributed around the world to collaborate more effectively in solving engineering design problems. For more information on that topic, see International Activities.
I was recently co-General Chair of the 2009 World Summit on Genetic and Evolutionary Computation, Shanghai, June 12-14. For my Intro to Genetic Algorithms tutorial slides, see here.
E-Mail Address: goodman@egr.msu.edu
Office address:
(My office is
actually 2308M Engineering building, but my mailing address is:)
Dept. of
Electrical and Computer Engineering
2120 Engineering Building
Michigan
State University, East Lansing, MI 48824
Phone: (517) 355-6453
Fax: (517) 353-1980
(My name is sometimes misspelled as Eric Goodman.)
