Lou Pape, a doctoral candidate in systems engineering at Missouri University of Science and Technology from St. Louis, has received the 2013 Stevens Doctoral Award for Promising Research in Systems Engineering and Integration from the International Council on Systems Engineering (INCOSE) Foundation. The award, which was presented at the group’s annual INCOSE International Symposium in Philadelphia, Pa., carries a $5,000 grant.

The INCOSE Foundation advances the development and image of systems engineering through funded scholarships, research and international forums. The Stevens Institute Doctoral Award recognizes innovating doctoral-level research related to the field of systems engineering and integration.

Pape is the third systems engineering doctoral candidate to receive the INCOSE award in the last five years. Missouri S&T is the only technological research university in the world to have three Stevens Award recipients.

Pape, an associate technical fellow and systems engineer/architect with Boeing Defense, Space and Security, is an INCOSE Certified Systems Engineering Professional (CSEP) and retired U.S. Air Force colonel. His research at Missouri S&T explores methods of modeling systems architectures using fuzzy inference systems and genetic algorithms for input to agent based acquisition and development models.

“This award recognizes Lou’s research, which is considered an advancement of the state-of-the-art knowledge in systems engineering and integration,” said Dr. Cihan Dagli, Pape’s doctoral advisor and founder and director of the Missouri S&T systems engineering graduate program. “His research will have long-range impacts with the potential for advancement of the state-of-the-practice of systems engineering and integration within the next five to 10 years.”

“The fact that Missouri S&T is the only research university worldwide in the history of the INCOSE award program to have multiple doctoral candidates as recipients is testament to the world-class quality of our program and our students” says Dr. David Enke, chair of  engineering management and systems engineering at Missouri S&T. “We are very proud that our program, our research and our students are receiving this level of recognition.”

Jason P. Dauby, who earned a Ph.D. in systems engineering in 2011, received the award in 2010 for research titled “Assessing System Architectures:  The Canonical Decomposition Fuzzy Comparative Methodology.”

Renzhong Wang, who earned master of science and Ph.D. degrees in systems engineering in 2007 and 2012, respectively, received the award in 2008 for research that proposes an innovative approach to architecture design and optimization inspired by the evolutionary processes of natural species.

Missouri S&T’s Systems Engineering Graduate Program was founded in 1999 through a proposal with the University of Southern California to the Boeing Co. to provide off-campus systems engineering graduate education to Boeing engineers and their suppliers, worldwide. The Systems Engineering Graduate Program, with more than 500 graduates, includes 400 Boeing engineers, contributes to the research challenges of systems engineering imposed by today’s complex adaptive, distributed, cooperative, and dynamically changing engineering systems. The first Ph.D. was granted in summer 2007.

Housed in the engineering management and systems engineering department at Missouri S&T, the program builds on sound engineering undergraduate education and experience, and maintains engineering specialization diversity in its graduates at both the master’s and Ph.D. levels.