Professor Demetrios D. Raftopoulos earned his B.S. degree with honors (1959) in Civil Engineering from Widener University, Chester, PA; and accepted a position as Sr. Highway Engineering in the Delaware Highway Department, Dover, DE. In 1961, he became Instructor of Engineering at Widener University, receiving National Science Foundation awards to study at Stevens Institute of Technology, Hoboken, NJ (1961), and at the University of New Mexico (1962). In 1963, he earned his M.S. degree in Civil Engineering from the University of Delaware. A Ford Foundation Scholarship and “Forgettable Loan” (1964) enabled him to earn his Ph.D. in Engineering Mechanics after two years at Penn State in December 1966.

As an Associate Professor at the University of Toledo, Ohio, Prof. Raftopoulos developed, with US Army support, a ballistics research laboratory to investigate penetration problems. Profs. Raftopoulos, Scavuzzo, and Bailey received grants from the US Atomic Energy Commission to study earthquake engineering problems, and the US Navy supported Profs. Scavuzzo and Raftopoulos to investigate acoustics and underwater shock waves. NSF awards supported Dr. Raftopoulos’ studies at Virginia Polytechnic Institute (1967) and Syracuse University (1968). As a Full Professor, Prof. Raftopoulos spent the 1973-74 academic year with Prof. Theocaris at the Technical University of Athens studying the effects of dynamic loading during fracture of transparent and non-transparent materials.

When Prof. Raftopoulos lost his 17-year-old son, Dionysios, from Osteogenic Sarcoma in 1978, he devoted his future studies to bioengineering in memory of his son; and in 1979, he accepted an appointment as an adjunct Professor of Orthopedic Surgery at the Medical College of Ohio developing laboratories, publications, and patents in bioengineering. He was elected Fellow of the Society for Design and Process Science (1999), and received a Fulbright Scholar Award to lecture at universities and hospitals in Greece (1995). Prof. Raftopoulos published over 200 articles in biomechanical engineering, fracture mechanics, stress waves in solids, earthquake engineering acoustics, and underwater shock waves and vibrations. Particularly noteworthy is his development of a device for precise diagnosis of abnormalities in joints and expandable pins used to support fractures.

NOTE: Two of our Centennial Fellows are spotlighted each week.