University Centres
The School of Mechanical, Industrial and Aeronautical Engineering is proud to work together with a diverse array of centres based at Wits University.
A University centre performs the following functions:
- Facilitating inter-disciplinary formal teaching and research
- Facilitating service learning and other comparable activities on the part of the university students
- Encouraging professional, vocational and community based programmes
- Creating a focus for contract research and consultancy activity in any sector of the University
- Assisting with attracting outside funding
- In special cases, providing a structure for the delivery of academic programmes
Working together with the centres, the School aims to continue providing outstanding contributions to the University, community and South Africa as a whole.
| National Aerospace Centre |
Eskom EPPEI Centre for Combustion Engineering |
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The centre strives to improve understanding of local coal impact and predicting of the effects on coal-fired power plants. Learn more about the centre.
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The centre engages with government, industry, academia and research institutions, locally as well as internationally, in promoting sector competitiveness and developing human capital. Learn more about the centre. |
Our School encourages collaborative work with industry
Collaboration can take many forms and may not necessarily involve funding. If any of the following opportunities (or perhaps even others that are not listed) interest you, please contact us.
- Undergraduate laboratory projects offer opportunities to assess the viability of certain projects.
- Postgraduate projects offer the opportunity to investigate thoroughly more complex problems over a period of one to three years.
- The School may enter into contractual research in order to investigate problems that require the expertise of our staff and the facilities available at Wits.
- Our academic staff may undertake consulting work in specialist fields.
- Our facilities are also available for industrial testing on a rental arrangement on projects that may not have investigative elements.
- Academic staff are able to present courses to members of the public or organisations.
- Funding and partnerships with research groups can be used to fund postgraduate students and is a high-impact human social development activity
Industry Advisory Board
The main objectives of the Board are to advise on strategic matters such as the industrial relevance and suitability of the academic curricula of the School, and to further improve the quality of our contributions to industry and society in general.
They also provide input on the School’s overall strategy, including research, and foster higher levels of industry involvement.

Research Units and Groups
The School proudly hosts research units and entities which contribute to the development of industry and policy. These include:
E-mail: michael.lucas@wits.ac.za
Industrial Engineering
E-mail: bernadette.sunjka@wits.ac.za
E-mail: claudia.polese@wits.ac.za
Thermo/Fluids
E-mail: craig.law@wits.ac.za
Residual Stresses
E-mail: robert.reid@wits.ac.za
Intelligent Systems and Control
E-mail: chioniso.kuchwa-dube@wits.ac.za
Air Traffic Management
E-mail: craig.law@wits.ac.za
Vortices and Vorticity in Flows
E-mail: craig.law@wits.ac.za
Aerospace Propulsion and Power
E-mail: craig.law@wits.ac.za
TUNRA Bulk Solids Africa
E-mai: terrance.frangakis@wits.ac.za
Biomechanics
E-mail: kamran.hassani@wits.ac.za
Materials Research
E-mail: john.jones@wits.ac.za
Systems Engineering
E-mail: abotha5@toyota.co.za, duarte.paulo.goncalves@gmail.com