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Steel Center at Missouri University of Science & Technology Named in Honor of Dr. Kent Peaslee
06/18/2013 - A new center for steel manufacturing research at Missouri University of Science and Technology has been renamed to honor the legacy of the late Dr. Kent D. Peaslee, a metallurgical engineering professor who helped establish the center.
A new center for steel manufacturing research at Missouri University of Science and Technology will be renamed to honor the legacy of the late Dr. Kent D. Peaslee, a metallurgical engineering professor who helped establish the center.
Naming of the Kent D. Peaslee Steel Manufacturing Research Center at Missouri S&T was approved on 14 June 2013 by the University of Missouri System Board of Curators during the board’s meeting on the University of Missouri-Columbia campus.
Peaslee was the F. Kenneth Iverson Chair of Steelmaking Technology and Curators’ Teaching Professor of metallurgical engineering. He died on 17 May 2013, at age 56.
“Kent was one of the nation’s leading authorities in steelmaking research, and he had the vision to establish this steel manufacturing center on our campus,” says Dr. Wayne Huebner, chairs of materials science and engineering at Missouri S&T. “He also worked diligently to obtain industry support for the center.
“After Kent’s sudden passing, the first order of business at the initial meeting of the center’s advisory board was a unanimous vote to honor his legacy by renaming the center in his honor,” Huebner says.
Peaslee worked for two years to obtain more than US$550,000 in funding for the center from 12 companies, Huebner says. The center will bring those companies together with university researchers to address steel casting and manufacturing issues, including product development, environmental issues and safety issues.
Peaslee joined the Missouri S&T faculty as an assistant professor in 1994. He was a manufacturing and process metallurgist with research interests in waste and metals recycling, steelmaking, inclusion engineering, continuous casting, steel manufacturing energy optimization, metal-refractory interactions and environmental aspects of metals manufacturing.
Promoted to associate professor in 2000 and professor in 2005, Peaslee was named a Curators’ Teaching Professor in 2006 and became the university’s first Iverson Chair in 2007. The chair was established through a US$2 million gift from Nucor.
In 2007, Peaslee received the Governor’s Award for Excellence in Teaching from former Missouri Gov. Matt Blunt. At Missouri S&T, he received numerous Faculty Excellence Awards and Outstanding Teaching Awards, as well as the Dean’s Teaching Scholar Award. He also received the Class of 1942 Excellence in Teaching Award from the Miner Alumni Association.
Prior to joining the university, Peaslee worked in the steel industry for 13 years and was general manager of technical services for Bayou Steel (now ArcelorMittal LaPlace). He served as president of the Association for Iron & Steel Technology and was associate chair of undergraduate studies in the Missouri S&T materials science and engineering department.
He was a member of the American Society of Engineering Educators, American Foundry Society, Sigma Xi, Tau Beta Pi and Kappa Mu Epsilon.
Peaslee earned a Ph.D. in metallurgical engineering from Missouri S&T in 1994. He earned a Bachelor of Science degree in metallurgical engineering from the Colorado School of Mines in 1978.
