André McDonald, PhD, BS Law, PEng, CEng, PE, FASM, FIMMM, FIMechE, is currently the Associate Vice President (Strategic Research Initiatives and Performance) and Professor of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Alberta. He received his BSME from the City College of New York (CCNY) in 2001. He was awarded his MSME from that same institution in 2002. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Toronto in 2007, under a collaborative research project with the National Research Council Canada in Boucherville, Québec.

Dr. McDonald has nearly twenty years of experience in the fabrication, development, and performance assessment of thermal- and cold-sprayed coatings. His current research involves the development of flame-sprayed multi-functional coatings that provide wear and erosion resistance and heating and structural health monitoring to a variety of structures. In the area of cold spraying, he has been working to develop metal matrix composite coatings with alumina, tungsten carbide, or boron carbide as the reinforcing particulate material phase. He conducts modelling work to predict and analyze the performance of coatings.

He has received several awards including the Jules Stachiewicz Medal from the Canadian Society for Mechanical Engineering for Heat Transfer, Fellow of The Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining, Fellow of ASM, the Mentorship Award from the Faculty of Engineering (University of Alberta), and the Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of Alberta’s Early Accomplishment Award.

Dr. McDonald currently leads the Experiential Learning in Innovation, Technology, and Entrepreneurship (ELITE) Program for Black Youth (eliteprogram.ca) – a funded university-government-industry-community collaboration to support hands-on learning and work-integrated training of Black Youth in STEM fields and in entrepreneurship.