The advisory board members help the department on matters such as curriculum, development of new educational and research programs, development of laboratories, and long range planning.The current members of the board are as follows:.

Paul J. Besl is a Parallel and Distributed Systems engineer with Intel’s Software Solutions Group with a focus on automotive software applications. Prior to joining Intel, he worked for General Motors both as R&D scientist & IT Program Manager. He’s also worked for Alias, Structural Dynamics Research Corporation (SDRC), Bendix Aerospace. He co-founded Pointstream, now part of Arius3d. He has authored a book, several book chapters, and numerous papers in the computer vision field. He co-invented the patented iterative closest point algorithm used in many software packages worldwide. 

He graduated summa cum laude in physics from Princeton University, holds a Ph.D. in computer, information, and control engineering from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, and has been a member of both the IEEE and the ACM for over 20 years.

Jerry L. Chapin is manager, Strategic Developments with Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC), where he is responsible for Future Combat Systems (FCS) production, fielding, sustainment, and spinouts.  Prior to joining SAIC, he was with Army for 36 years beginning 1968. In his last 17 years of Army service he was a member of the Army's Senior Executive Service serving for 9 years as the Deputy Program Executive Officer for Armored Systems Modernization, 5 ½ years as the Director of the Tank-Automotive Research Development and Engineering Center (TARDEC), and 2 ½ years as the Deputy Commander of the Tank-automotive and Armaments Command (TACOM). He received the Presidential Rank Award for efforts in support of the Abrams and Bradley Programs during Desert Storm (Oct 1992) -- from President George
Bush, Senior, and the Department of the Army Decoration for Exceptional Civilian Service while serving as the Deputy Commander of TACOM - from Secretary of the Army Brownlee.

He graduated from the School of Engineering at Oregon State University in 1968. In 1970 graduated from Texas A&M with a Masters in Engineering as a part of an Army Program. 

Rich Chutorash is currently the Global Electronics Product Director managing the Advanced Project Portfolio and Intellectual Property Strategy for Johnson Controls Automotive Business. He has been in automotive industry for 27 years and has held positions at Chrysler, Ford, Volvo, United Technologies, and Lear. He holds an MBA, and MS and BS degrees in Engineering from the University of Michigan. Rich is a board member of the Consumer Electronics Association’s Mobile Electronics Division and a member of the Connectivity sub-committee. He has taught physics and robotics at the college level. Rich is also a Michigan State University certified Advanced Master Gardener.

Keith Ensroth is senior director, Internet Systems, Kelly Services. Prior to joining Kelly Services, he served as director of client services, Healthcare Division, Computer Sciences Corporation (CSC). He had previously worked as information systems manager at Kmart. He holds an MS in computer science from Wayne State University and a BA in philosophy from Michigan State University.

Amjad Hussain is Vice President of Information Technology at Handleman Company. He has over 14 years of experience working with global manufacturing, distribution, entertainment and software technology corporations. He is leading an enterprise wide ERP implementation at Handleman. His other key focus is to leverage business intelligence and innovative technologies to provide his customers accurate and timely insight into the dynamics of the Handleman supply chain.  In his previous corporate leadership position, he worked as the Managing Director for the e-Business specialist Idea Integration. 

He is an Honors Electrical Engineering graduate. He earned his Masters in Controls & Information Technology from UMIST and a Project Management Certificate from MIT. He regularly participates in the executive management programs at business schools of MIT, Harvard and Stanford. Most recently, he completed the Advanced Management College at Stanford. He is a senior member of IEEE. He is a board member for the MIS department at University of Arizona and RIM at Detroit Medical Center. He has been recognized in Crain's Detroit 2002 top 40 executives under the age of 40.

Dr. Uttam Mukhopadhyay graduated in Electrical Engineering from Jadavpur University, Calcutta, in 1975 with the University Gold Medal. He received his PhD in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of South Carolina in 1985. His dissertation in the field of Distributed Artificial Intelligence first introduced the concept of agent-referral for document retrieval, now being incorporated into a number of popular internet-based search engines. He joined the research staff of General Motors Research Labs and worked in the areas of schedule optimization, statistical pattern recognition and automated engineering design from 1985-1997. He received several awards from General Motors, including the Charles Kettering award, the McCuen award and the extraordinary accomplishment award.

He is the Chairman of Deep View Systems, LLC, which he co-founded in 1997. Headquartered in Colorado Springs, CO, Deep View develops decision logic software for financial institutions at its Michigan office.

Theresa Rowe is currently the Chief Information Officer (CIO) at Oakland University. She joined Oakland University in 1990 and since then has held positions of increasing responsibility in the information technology area. She also serves on the Board of Directors of the Merit Network, Inc., and is a member of the Executive Advisory Group for the Research and Education Networking – Information Sharing and Analysis Center (REN-ISAC), focused on providing a strong security information infrastructure for higher education networks. She is also a Constituent Group Leader, Educause CIO Group, 2006 to present. She is also involved with numerous committees inside and outside the university including the Michigan Council of Women in Technology.  She holds a Master of Public Administration (MPA) degree from Oakland University, and a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from the University of Michigan-Dearborn.

He is the Chairman of Deep View Systems, LLC, which he co-founded in 1997. Headquartered in Colorado Springs, CO, Deep View develops decision logic software for financial institutions at its Michigan office.

Dr. Ramasamy Uthurusamy is currently General Director of Emerging Technologies, Information Systems and Services Division of General Motors Corporation. He received his Ph.D. from Purdue University. Prior to joining General Motors he was with Exxon Production Research Company where he was involved in applied AI research. He has taught at Purdue University and at the University of Idaho.

At GM, he leads the emerging technologies initiatives in the Global Technology Management Group headed by Fred Killeen, GM Chief Technology Officer. Currently his research interests and expertise spans four major areas: Knowledge Discovery in Databases and Data Mining (KDD); Artificial Intelligence (AI); Knowledge Management; and Advanced Web Technologies. He assesses, evaluates, pilots, and develops GM specific proof-of-concepts of promising new information technologies as part of his responsibilities. He works with and leverages his extensive internal and external contacts in academia, industry, government, and relevant organizations. His professional activities include serving on the editorial board of journals, reviewing technical publications, and serving on conference steering committees. He is a Co-Editor of the book on KDD titled "Advances in Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining" published by MIT/AAAI Press in 1996. He Co-Edited two special issues for the Communications of ACM on data mining. He is the Secretary-Treasurer of the International Joint Conferences on AI (IJCAI).

He received the "Distinguished Service Award" from ACM SIGKDD for his active involvement in KDD from the beginning. He received the Charles McCuen Special Achievement Award from General Motors R&D Center for part of his work in GM-specific applications in these areas. He was one of the 2002 Winter Olympics Torchbearers.

Lawrence C. Wehmer is director, Embedded Solutions, EDS Applied Engineering Solutions. Before joining EDS, he was a General Motors project engineer in the Advanced Engineering Systems organization. He has been a Certified Manufacturing Engineer by the Society of Manufacturing Engineers. He is a member of the M-TEC Advisory Board and Programming and Curriculum Committee. He holds a BS in electrical engineering, an MS in electrical engineering and an MBA, all of the University of Michigan.

Dr. Donald J. Welch has been the President and CEO of Merit Network, Inc. since joining Merit in July 2006. www.merit.edu. Prior to his arrival at Merit, Don was the Director of Enterprise Technology (CTO) and Merchandising Applications for H-E-B, a $12 B retailer in Texas and northern Mexico. He had responsibility for enterprise architecture, integration, infrastructure and security as well as delivering and supporting Merchandising applications. Before joining H-E-B, he served for 25 years in the U.S. Army attaining the rank of Colonel. His last tour was as the Associate Dean for Information Technology (CIO) and Professor of Computer Science at West Point. As such he was responsible for the computer operations and infrastructure used to educate future Army officers. He built West Point’s wireless network, one of the first large and secure wireless networks, which was the recipient of a Computerworld “best practices in mobile and wireless” award for security. He is also a recipient of the Apgar award for innovation in teaching for his work in the classroom. He has been active in information assurance and software engineering research with over 25 publications and a dozen invited talks in those disciplines. His other Army assignments include the Chief of Software Engineering for Delta Force, the Army’s premier counter-terrorist unit, Human Resource Manager for the Army’s professional IT workforce, and commander of five infantry units. He earned a B.S. from the United States Military Academy, at West Point, a M.S. in Computer Science from California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo, and a Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland.