Message from the Director

Welcome to the Center for Advanced Vehicular Systems, one of the premier university automotive research centers in the world. I am proud to lead a group of over 300 staff and researchers in addressing some of today’s most pressing challenges. Together with our government and industry partners, we are developing solutions to enhance transportation safety, improve vehicle efficiency, increase the productivity of our workforce, and enable a brighter future.

CAVS is a strong partner at the state, national, and international level; with academic partnerships in place across multiple continents, we form collaborations which help us work smarter, faster, and more efficiently. Through the Institute for Systems Engineering Research (ISER), co-located with the US Army’s Engineering Research and Development Center in Vicksburg, MS, CAVS serves our national interests with expertise in systems engineering and big data management. CAVS Extension arm has a 15-year history of enhancing our state’s manufacturing operations and aiding economic development, and the Institute for Imaging and Analytical Technologies (I2AT) provides cutting-edge services to industry across the region.

We welcome you to tour our website, learning more about the exciting things that we are doing at CAVS and at Mississippi State University.

Go Dawgs!
Clay Walden, Executive Director
Center for Advanced Vehicular Systems

Mission Statement

CAVS strives to be a world-class center of excellence for research, technology and education equipped to address engineering challenges facing US mobility industries. Utilizing high performance computational resources and state-of-the-art analytical tools for modeling, simulation, and experimentation, CAVS will provide a distinctive, interdisciplinary environment wherein next-generation engineers and scientists train alongside field experts to investigate, design, and verify novel solutions in materials, propulsion, and design for efficient human and vehicle mobility. Harnessing our broad impact research along with our state, national, and international industrial alliances, CAVS will support economic development and outreach activities throughout the State of Mississippi.

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Leadership Team

Clay Walden Executive Director
Sara Fuller Associate Director
Reuben Burch Associate Director, Human Factors and Athlete Engineering
Daniel Carruth Associate Director, Advanced Vehicle Systems
Hongjoo Rhee Associate Director, Engineering Mechanics and Materials Science
Shanti Bhushan Associate Director, Computational Fluid Dynamics
Tonya Stone Associate Director, Computational Engineering Mechanics
Criss Bell Research Administrator
Cheryl Woody Business Manager