BS in Mechanical Engineering at Boston University

As a student studying mechanical engineering at Boston University, you will learn how robots move, bubbles burst, airplanes fly, and big data enables big ideas. You will learn about technological innovations that enable sustainable energy, engineer biological tissues, create new materials, and advance scientific pursuits at the nanoscale and at the scale of our solar system. You will design and create engineering solutions to real-world challenges. The College of Engineering’s goal is to create the societal engineer—a student who will take their engineering education and experiences and improve our society.

Our students can specialize their mechanical engineering studies by concentrating on aerospace engineering, manufacturing, energy technologies & sustainability, nanotechnology, the Grand Challenges, machine learning, or technology innovation. Outside of the classroom, our mechanical engineers lead student-run groups that launch rockets (Rocket Propulsion Group, BURPG), design drones (BU UAV), and build electric and gas-powered racecars (BU Racing; BU Baja SAE). Students perform experimental, computational, and interdisciplinary research with professors who design biomedical devices, build soft robots, study graphene, fold origami, control the flight of drones, utilize additive manufacturing, and levitate drops and bubbles. As a mechanical engineering student, you will design and build products, machines, and research prototypes in the Engineering Product Innovation Center (EPIC), characterize your creations in the shared facilities of the Photonics Center, turn your ideas into reality at the BUild Lab (Innovate@BU), and collaborate with students in the Questrom School of Business to understand how practicing engineers thrive in industry.

Most of the engineering science courses come from the two major stems of mechanical engineering: (1) energy and fluids, and (2) structures and motion in mechanical systems. During their sophomore and junior years, students take four first-level courses from the structures/motion stem (including two courses in engineering mechanics, mechanics of materials, and materials science) and three first-level courses from the energy/fluids stem (including fluid mechanics, thermodynamics, and heat transfer). In their senior year, students take a systems-level instrumentation course and capstone design experience, and have the opportunity to broaden and deepen their technical background through four advanced elective courses.

Students in the mechanical engineering program gain experience in laboratory settings through experiments associated with all of their natural science courses (in the freshman and sophomore years) and with most of their engineering science courses (in their sophomore and junior years). Laboratory experience culminates in the senior year with an intensive mechanical measurements and instrumentation course.

The required mechanical engineering design experience is integrated throughout the curriculum, beginning in the sophomore year and increasing in scope in each subsequent year. In the sophomore year, one engineering science course per semester requires a design project, and exposure to design is gained through a course in CAD. Students are introduced to machining in our EPIC center through a 2-credit core design course. In the junior year, design projects are required in multiple engineering science and design courses. A 2-credit fundamentals of manufacturing course helps to enable the design experience by feeding into a 4-credit product design course that formalizes design methodologies and covers the professional aspects of engineering, including safety considerations and professional ethics. The instrumentation course incorporates a major measurement design project. In the senior year, the design experience culminates in a capstone design sequence that builds on previous coursework and in which small student teams work on major design projects. As part of the design experience, the professional aspects of engineering are stressed, including professional ethics, teamwork, and oral and written communications.

Computer experience for mechanical engineering students begins in the freshman year with the required, college-wide introductory computer course. It then continues throughout the curriculum through its use in some homework, projects, and laboratories in most subsequent engineering courses. Students gain experience in programming in MATLAB and C; and using commercial software packages for CAD, spreadsheet analysis, finite element analysis, and graphical-interface-driven laboratory systems for data acquisition, data analysis, and instrument control.

The degree also requires four advanced elective courses, which allow for pursuit of specialized interests within engineering. These courses enable the completion of a concentration (optional), and a number of options at the undergraduate and introductory graduate level are available.