The mission of Manufacturing Mind and Physics Laboratory (MINDS Lab) has been focusing on advancing the fundamental knowledge for innovative manufacturing processes and systems, particularly in the areas of machining, machine tools, additive manufacturing, and industrial production, to serve the manufacturing community and enable next-generation Advanced Manufacturing. Our approach is to perform fundamental research in support of this goal, while taking care to consider its integration with manufacturing engineering education, workforce development, and practical implementation. Through this combined agenda, students at many levels are trained to have strong problem-solving capabilities by learning physics-based modeling paradigms (first principles) coupled with fundamental experimental techniques and data analytics skills, and therefore a beautiful manufacturing mind.

Research Interests:

Manufacturing Processes, Systems and Factories

• Subtractive manufacturing: machining, machine tools, vibration theory and applications

• Additive manufacturing: additive friction stir deposition, wire arc additive manufacturing

• Hybrid manufacturing: additive manufacturing and/or forging combined with machining

• Machine-tool-process-materials convergence, mechanics and materials processing

• Design and operations of manufacturing processes and systems for smart machines and factories

Methodologies

• Modeling: physics-based (analytical/numerical) and data-driven (statistical/machine learning)

• Experiments: experimental techniques, metrology, materials characterization, data analytics

• Dynamics, bifurcation theory and stability analysis, systems and control theory, automation

• Algorithm design and analysis, scientific computing, optimization, operations research

Biography: Dr. Tony Shi is an Assistant Professor of Industrial and Systems Engineering, and Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering (by courtesy) at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.  He is the Founding Director of Manufacturing Mind and Physics Laboratory. He is also an Affiliated Faculty of Machine Tool Research Center and Institute of Advanced Materials and Manufacturing. Prior to joining UT Knoxville in 2022, he was an Assistant Professor of Engineering Management at UT Space Institute. He was a Postdoctoral Research Associate in the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering at the University of Wisconsin-Madison from 2017 to 2019.  He received his B.S. in Pure and Applied Mathematics from China University of Geosciences, Beijing in 2011 and his Ph.D. in Management Science and Engineering from Peking University in 2017. Dr. Shi is a member of SME, ASME, IEEE, IISE, INFORMS and iSoGO.