Three Auburn Engineering professors earn university Faculty Awards
Published: Nov 17, 2025 7:40 AM
By Joe McAdory
Three Auburn Engineering faculty members will be recognized for exemplary leadership, innovative research, scholarship, creative work and dedicated service to the university and community at the 19th annual Auburn University Faculty Awards ceremony on Tuesday, Nov. 18.
Jeffrey LaMondia, the Elton and Lois Huff Professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Virginia Davis, the Daniel F. and Josephine Breeden Professor in the Department of Chemical Engineering and Xiao Qin, professor and director of graduate programs in the Department of Computer Science and Software Engineering, are among 15 distinguished faculty members from seven colleges to be honored.
“We are extremely proud of Drs. LaMondia, Davis and Qin for their outstanding contributions to impactful research, excellent teaching and skillful leadership that help shape the future of Auburn University,” said Mario Eden, dean of engineering. “Their steadfast commitment to innovation, discovery, instruction and service continues to elevate our college, inspire our students and drive meaningful advancements within our laboratories, classrooms and beyond.”
Presented annually and coordinated through the Office of the Provost, the Faculty Awards highlight individuals whose efforts advance the university's academic distinction and uphold the highest standards of professional achievement. Honorees are recognized across multiple categories, including teaching, research and creative scholarship, leadership, outreach and service to the profession and community.
LaMondia will be presented with the President’s Award for Distinguished Faculty Leadership, the only Auburn University faculty member to earn this distinction in 2025.
Since joining the Auburn faculty in 2010, LaMondia has built his career around connecting people, disciplines and ideas to make both engineering and education more human-centered. As director of Auburn University’s Common Book Program, LaMondia helps guide campus-wide conversations that bring students, faculty and staff together around shared stories and social themes. Housed in the Office of the Provost, the program encourages meaningful dialogue designed to reach people beyond the classroom.
His efforts extend through Live Well Alabama: Thriving Communities, a partnership with the Alabama Cooperative Extension System that applies transportation and infrastructure research to improve quality of life and economic opportunity in rural areas. In association with Live Well Alabama, LaMondia secured a five-year, $4.4 million grant from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in 2024 to promote safe, accessible active travel across the state and improve access to healthier foods.
Davis will be honored with the Creative Research and Scholarship Award in the Sciences, Biomedical Sciences, Engineering and Agriculture category.
A member of the Auburn faculty since 2005, Davis leads pioneering interdisciplinary research in nanomaterials self-assembly, rheology, lyotropic liquid crystals, additive manufacturing, polymers, nanocomposites and STEM identity formation. Her work has resulted in nearly 90 scholarly publications, has been cited more than 6,700 times, with influential articles appearing in Nature Nanotechnology, Science, Macromolecules and ACS Nano. Her collaborative research efforts have attracted more than $45 million in funding.
In 2024, Davis was elected a Fellow of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, recognizing her sustained excellence in research and professional service.
Beyond the laboratory, Davis serves as principal investigator on Project FARM (Fostering Agricultural Research and Mentoring), a three-year, $500,000 U.S. Department of Agriculture-funded initiative aimed at increasing agricultural literacy and career interest among Alabama middle school students. The project integrates food, water, and forestry topics into science curricula and fairs, and involves collaboration across multiple Auburn colleges and the Alabama Cooperative Extension System.
Qin will be recognized with the Gerald and Emily Leischuck Endowed Presidential Award for Excellence in Teaching. A nationally respected expert in data science, cybersecurity and high-performance computing, Qin has dedicated nearly two decades to advancing research that bridges theoretical innovation with real-world applications.
As director of the Data Science and Engineering Laboratory, Qin has fostered impactful collaborations across academia, industry, and government to address complex computational challenges through advanced, data-driven approaches. His record includes more than 140 peer-reviewed publications, thousands of citations and more than $4 million in external funding.
Qin's leadership extends to mentoring, having supervised 17 doctoral students and numerous master's and undergraduate researchers. His dedication to student success and research excellence embodies Auburn's mission to advance knowledge, innovation and global impact through teaching and discovery.
This past October, Qin was among four Auburn University faculty members selected to the 2025-26 SEC Academic Leadership Development fellowship cohort.
Media Contact: , jem0040@auburn.edu, 334.844.3447
From left, professors Xiao Qin, Jeffrey LaMondia and Virginia Davis.
