Montana State mechanical engineer to discuss composite materials in everyday life as part of Provost’s Distinguished Lecturer Series

BOZEMAN - Douglas Cairns, a distinguished professor of mechanical engineering at Montana State University, will deliver a public presentation Tuesday, March 24, as part of the Provost's Distinguished Lecturer Series. Cairns, who is also the Lysle A. Wood Distinguished Professor of Mechanical Engineering, has spent nearly a half-century doing research and development of advanced composite materials and structures. Composite materials are engineered materials made by combining two or more distinct materials.

The free event will begin at 7 p.m. in the Hager Auditorium at the Museum of the Rockies. A reception will follow. MSU's 13th Provost's Distinguished Lecturer Series recognizes outstanding faculty for their creative scholarship and leadership. The presentations in this series are suitable for professionals and the public alike.

In his talk, "The Sum of the Parts: A Fireside Chat on Composite Materials and Structures," Cairns will give an overview of some of the materials and structures in which he was "intimately involved," he said. Some of these laypersons may be familiar with, and others are from the Cold War that at one time were classified. The former includes materials and structures with which he was involved during his work as lead engineer for composite materials in the wake of the Challenger space shuttle disaster.

"Composite materials are the go-to materials in the 21st century," Cairns said. "They impact our lives in ground, water and air transportation; energy systems; recreational equipment and biomechanical systems - just about anything that requires maximum performance with tailorable, multifunctional material properties."

Other topics Cairns is likely to touch upon include aircraft structures, including that of the supersonic F/A 18 Hornet; space structures including the "fix" for the spherical aberration that famously crippled the Hubble Space Telescope; formerly classified "spy stuff," he said, including spy satellites and deep submersible autonomous underwater vehicles that hunt for submarines; and sporting goods such as Trek bicycle frames and biomechanical implants such as composite fiber hip implants.

For more than 25 years, Cairns worked on manufacturing and testing new materials for wind turbine blade structures, and is now characterizing new materials for other aerospace, civil and marine structural applications. Other areas of interest include manufacturing process modeling, computational structural mechanics, and design methodology research. He serves on the board of directors for Radius Engineering in Salt Lake City, and consults for several other industrial and private-sector partners, he said, with an emphasis on transferring research to the production environment.

"The long-term goal of this research is to understand the material, manufacturing and structural performance hierarchical links for multifunctional composite materials," Cairns said.

He is a member of several professional organizations, including the American Society of Mechanical Engineers where he serves on the Composite Materials Subcommittee, and the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, where he previously chaired the Materials Technical Committee. He is the certifying officer for the MSU aerospace minor program. He currently has a contract for more than $39 million with the Army for future vertical lift advanced technologies, which is focused on replacing the aging rotorcraft for the U.S. Department of Defense.

Prior to coming to MSU in 1995, Cairns served as manager of composites technology at Hercules Materials Co., where he conducted research on composite materials applied to primary structures. He holds a B.S. and M.S., both in mechanical engineering from the University of Wyoming. He earned his doctorate in aeronautics and astronautics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The Provost's Distinguished Lecturer Series recognizes outstanding MSU faculty for their creative scholarship and leadership. More information and the full lineup for the 2025-26 series can be found at https://www.montana.edu/news/24752.