Thomas Wielenga, Distinguished Alumni Award Recipient
Thomas Wielenga, Distinguished Alumni Award Recipient
September 18, 2023B.S. College of Engineering and Honors College, 1978; M.S. University of Michigan, 1979; Ph.D. University of Michigan, 1984
Distinguished Alumni Award: Presented to alumni who have differentiated themselves by obtaining the highest level of professional accomplishment in their field.
He is a leader of creative engineering, an inventor, and a Spartan.
Dr. Wielenga is a mechanical engineer, inventor, and entrepreneur. He currently serves as the President of Dynamotive IP and the Wielenga Innovation Foundation. Wielenga is an Honors College graduate from the College of Engineering. After MSU, he received a master’s degree in Computer Assisted Engineering and a Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering at the University of Michigan.
Following this he worked at Mechanical Dynamics Inc and was one of the developers of the mechanical simulation program, ADAMS. Wielenga then worked as a consultant and expert in the field of vehicle dynamics and accident reconstruction. His innovations in automotive safety have saved thousands of lives around the world. Among his inventions, Dr. Wielenga invented and holds the patent for the Anti-Rollover Braking system and the After Collision Braking system.
Currently, he has patented and is developing the Wielenga Innovation Static Salt Reactor (the WISSR), a new type of inherently safe nuclear reactor that uses liquid fuel derived from the waste of existing reactors. At MSU, he established the Wielenga Creative Engineering Professorship, an endowed faculty chair designed to kick-start the next teaching paradigm in the College of Engineering. Dr. Wielenga’s generous support also launched the Wielenga Research Scholars Program. Additionally, Dr. Wielenga founded the Wielenga Innovation Foundation to study creative processes and promote innovation. He is the recipient of the Mechanical Engineering Distinguished Alumni Award and a member of the college’s Mechanical Engineering Advisory Board. His legacy of creativity, entrepreneurship, and philanthropy continues to inspire Spartans and they, he says, inspire him.
“I started out in mechanical engineering expecting to be more hands on mechanical, ended up being an expert in the simulation… I got involved in the vehicle dynamics and rollovers of sport utility vehicles. And then I invented something that prevents rollovers, and that gave me a whole lot of time to think about different things. And so then I created a way of looking at things that I call a creative process.”
Who will engineer a better future? Spartans Will.
