Sunil S. Mehendale

Sunil S. Mehendale
"The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing."
—Socrates

Contact

  • Associate Professor, Manufacturing and Mechanical Engineering Technology
  • PhD, Mechanical Engineering, University of Maryland-College Park
  • MTech, Mechanical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, India
  • BS, Mechanical Engineering, University of Bombay, India

Biography

Sunil Mehendale is an Associate Professor in the Department of Manufacturing and Mechanical Engineering Technology at Michigan Technological University. Prior to joining Michigan Tech as a faculty member in the College of Engineering, he worked for Carrier Corporation, Syracuse, NY as a Staff Engineer and Scientist in the Heat Transfer Technology and Components group. There, he was responsible for developing and implementing advanced heat exchanger technologies as well as state-of-the-art design and simulation tools in the areas of energy efficiency, heat transfer, and fluid flow. Before Carrier, he worked for seven years at Delphi Thermal Systems, Lockport, NY, where he was engaged in the research, design, and development of advanced energy-efficient heat exchangers, primarily evaporators for automotive climate control systems.  Before joining Delphi, Dr. Mehendale worked as a post-doctoral research associate in the Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, where he designed and developed micro-scale heat exchangers intended for US military personnel in a project sponsored by DARPA, US Department of Defense.

Dr. Mehendale’s area of teaching and research interest and expertise is primarily in the thermal-fluids sciences, with emphasis on the design and optimization of high-efficiency energy conversion systems and heat exchangers, boiling and condensing flows, and two-phase flow distribution in heat exchangers, as well as alternate energy resources / technologies such as solar energy, wind energy, fuel cells, and biofuels.

Dr. Mehendale is a member of ASME, ASEE, and ASHRAE. He also serves as a reviewer for the International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer, International Journal of Refrigeration, ASME’s Journal of Heat Transfer, and ASME’s Journal of Thermal Science and Engineering Applications.

Research Interests

  • Computational fluid dynamics
  • Boiling and condensing flows
  • Two-phase flow distribution in heat exchangers
  • Novel heat exchanger technology
  • Heat exchanger modeling and optimization
  • Novel thermodynamic cycles for cooling, heating, and power
  • Alternative energy technology (solar, wind, biofuels, and others)
  • High-efficiency HVAC and refrigeration systems

Teaching Interests

  • Fluid mechanics
  • Thermodynamics
  • Heat transfer
  • Alternative energy
  • Air-conditioning and refrigeration
  • Dynamics