Full Name
Pamir Alpay
Job Title
Vice President For Research, Innovation And Entrepreneurship
Company
University Of Connecticut
Speaker Bio
amir Alpay serves as the Vice President for Research,
Innovation, and Entrepreneurship at the University of
Connecticut (UConn) where he oversees the University’s $375
million research enterprise at UConn's main campus in Storrs
UConn Health in Farmington, the School of Law in Hartford and
UConn's four regional campuses. UConn is a national research
leader in energy, genomics, health behavior, cybersecurity,
manufacturing, materials science, and neuroscience. UConn's
expansive research enterprise yields discoveries and
innovations that contribute significantly to the economy, environmental sustainability, public
health, and quality of life.
Prior to his appointment as vice president, he served as executive director of the UConn Tech Park,
where he was the University’s chief advocate for industry-informed research and its primary liaison
between the research community and government collaborators. In this role he established
partnerships with industry, state government, and federal agencies resulting in investments of more
than $300 million for applied research. Alpay also established partnerships with small to medium-
size regional businesses as part of core outreach efforts, critical to UConn’s mission of supporting
economic growth in the state.
Dr. Alpay is also Board of Trustees Distinguished Professor of materials science & engineering and
physics. Alpay’s research is at the intersection of materials science, condensed matter physics,
and surface chemistry. As an investigator, Alpay has raised more than $45 million for research and
development from federal and state agencies and industry. Dr. Alpay has served as PI and co-PI of a
multi-year $28 million interdisciplinary Air Force Research Lab (AFRL) contract dedicated to
optimization of high value-added manufacturing technologies for aerospace components.
Dr. Alpay holds the rank of Fellow of the American Physical Society, ASM International, and the
American Ceramic Society, and he is an elected member of the Connecticut Academy of Science &
Engineering (CASE). He has authored over 200 peer-reviewed journal publications and conference
proceedings, five invited book chapters, and a book on the physics of functionally graded smart
materials.
Alpay earned his Ph.D. in materials science and engineering from the University of Maryland and his
B.S. and M.S. from Middle East Technical University in Ankara, Turkey.
Pamir Alpay