Kambiz Farahmand

Kambiz Farahmand, Ph.D., P.E., is Professor and Chair of Industrial and Manufacturing Systems Engineering at North Dakota State University (NDSU), where he also serves as ABET Coordinator for the Industrial Engineering and Management and Manufacturing Engineering programs, Transfer Coordinator, and International Agreement Liaison. His career combines academic leadership, engineering education, applied research, industrial consulting, and technology development across industrial and manufacturing systems engineering.

Dr. Farahmand’s technical work is distinguished by its breadth and its consistent emphasis on solving complex, real-world systems problems. His research and professional activities span productivity and process improvement, lean manufacturing, simulation and modeling, engineering data analysis, optimization, human factors and ergonomics, quality systems, healthcare systems engineering, transportation and logistics, energy systems, advanced manufacturing, Industry 4.0, artificial intelligence and machine learning applications, aerospace and defense systems, non-destructive testing, sensing, and human performance in demanding environments.

He has held significant academic leadership responsibilities throughout his career. At NDSU, he has served as Professor and Chair, Director of the Veterans Engineering Resource Center (VERC), ABET Coordinator, transfer coordinator, and international-program liaison. He previously served as Professor and Chair at NDSU from 2005 to 2011. Before joining NDSU, he was Professor and Graduate Coordinator, Director of the Industrial Engineering Program, Director of the Maquiladora Program, and Industrial Assessment Center Coordinator at Texas A&M University–Kingsville. His administrative work has included strategic planning, accreditation and continuous improvement, enrollment management, curriculum and degree-plan development, faculty and staff leadership, budgeting, fundraising, laboratory development, research growth, industry partnerships, and international academic agreements.

A major theme of Dr. Farahmand’s career has been university–government–industry collaboration. He has conducted research and engineering work with the U.S. Department of Energy, Department of Veterans Affairs/Veterans Health Administration, U.S. Army, U.S. Navy, NASA, and numerous industrial organizations. At the Veterans Engineering Resource Center, he directed research addressing clinical-space optimization, scheduling, patient flow, care integration, reusable medical equipment, and healthcare process improvement. His Army work included lean manufacturing, process-flow and facility analysis, rotary-wing aircraft sustainment, non-destructive testing, and quality-management systems at Corpus Christi Army Depot and Letterkenny Army Depot.

His aerospace and human-performance research includes work with the Naval Air Warfare Center on environmental physiology, human factors, protective ensembles, thermal stress, respiratory heat and mass transfer, instrumentation, and crew-system safety. He designed and developed oral and nasal probes for measuring heat and moisture transport in the human respiratory system and contributed to patented instrumentation for temperature and humidity measurement. Most recently, he has also developed a patent application for a Transformer Modular Drone with reconfigurable quadcopter-to-hexacopter architecture and modular mission, power, and propulsion interfaces.

Dr. Farahmand’s manufacturing and systems research includes lean enterprise, Six Sigma, quality management, simulation optimization, facility design, supply chains, freight transportation, agricultural logistics, smart-grid instrumentation, Industry 4.0, and socio-technical systems. His more recent scholarship includes Industry 4.0 adoption and socio-technical design practices among Upper Midwest manufacturers, web scraping and innovation, risk-based quality decision making, and transportation infrastructure planning. Earlier work includes neural-network applications, smart-grid PMU placement using genetic algorithms, healthcare analytics, CFD modeling of the human respiratory tract, and simulation-based manufacturing improvement.

He has extensive professional expertise in ISO 9001 quality management, ISO 14001 environmental management, AS9110 aerospace maintenance quality systems, occupational health and safety management systems, and lean manufacturing. His work at Letterkenny Army Depot contributed to quality-system implementation and continuous-improvement efforts associated with the depot’s Shingo recognition. He also coordinated Department of Energy Industrial Assessment Center activities in South Texas, providing technical recommendations to more than 100 companies in energy, waste reduction, and productivity improvement.

Dr. Farahmand is the author of Ergonomic Workstation Design, Third Edition (2023), and Evaluation of Engineering Data, Second Edition (2022), and has an extensive record of refereed journal articles, conference papers, technical reports, and scholarly review activities. His editorial and peer-review service includes Sustainability, the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, IGI Global publications, and special issues in network biology, machine learning, and bioinformatics.

His honors include the Chamber of Commerce NDSU Distinguished Faculty Service Award (2022), induction as an Inventor Member of the National Academy of Inventors, recognition by the Minn-Dak Manufacturing Association for support of regional manufacturing, honorary visiting professorships in China, Texas A&M University–Kingsville awards for teaching and research, and multiple research recognition awards from the Naval Air Warfare Center–Aircraft Division.

Dr. Farahmand earned his Ph.D. in Industrial Engineering from the University of Texas at Arlington in 1992, with emphasis in manufacturing production, simulation, and computer-integrated manufacturing systems; an M.S. in Industrial Engineering from the University of Texas at Arlington in 1990, with emphasis in ergonomics, workstation design, and design for automation; and a B.S. in Petroleum Engineering from the University of Oklahoma in 1982, with emphasis in drill-bit design and testing for deep drilling operations. He is a registered Professional Engineer in North Dakota.