John Cimbala is Professor of Mechanical Engineering at The Pennsylvania State University (Penn State). He received his B.S. degree in Aerospace Engineering (1979) from Penn State. Then he obtained his M.S. degree (1980) and his Ph.D. degree (1984) in Aeronautics from The California Institute of Technology (Caltech). In 1984, Dr. Cimbala returned to Penn State as Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering. In 1990, he was promoted to Associate Professor and was granted tenure. In 1997, he was promoted to Professor.
During a sabbatical leave in 1993-94, Professor Cimbala worked at NASA Langley Research Center in Hampton, VA, where he advanced his knowledge of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and turbulence modeling. During a sabbatical leave in 2002-03, he co-authored an undergraduate textbook, “Fluid Mechanics: Fundamentals and Applications”, Y. A. Çengel and J. M. Cimbala, McGraw-Hill, New York (2006), now in its fourth edition (2018); it is used throughout the world, and has been translated into several languages. Professor Cimbala is author or co-author of several other textbooks and dozens of journal and conference papers. While on sabbatical leave during the academic year 2010-11, he worked at American Hydro Corporation in York, PA, where he used CFD to model large hydroturbines.
Dr. Cimbala conducts experimental and computational research in basic fluid mechanics, turbulence, and turbomachinery. He teaches courses in fluid mechanics; indoor air quality; instrumentation, measurements, and statistics; and air pollution. He has been an educational innovator throughout his career, such as using and promoting others to use the Internet, tablet PCs, and cell phone feedback in undergraduate and graduate courses. Awards include: College of Engineering Outstanding Teaching Award (1992), College of Engineering Premier Teaching Award (1996), George W. Atherton Award for Excellence in Teaching (1997), Teacher of the Year Award from Pi Tau Sigma (1997), and College of Engineering Outstanding Advising Award (1998). In 2009 he became a Fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers.