In 1998, Lehigh held a symposium honoring Fazil Erdogan, expert in fracture mechanics, professor emeritus of mechanical engineering and mechanics and former dean of engineering. Forty researchers from around the world, many of them Erdogan’s former students, presented papers.

In 2008, the Journal of Applied Mechanics published a special issue honoring Erdogan’s contributions to problems of inhomogeneous and functionally graded materials. “Professor Erdogan continues to be a source of inspiration to the mechanics community,” the journal wrote, “...and in providing selfless guidance to others.”

Erdogan joined the faculty in 1957. In the 1960s and ’70s, he and his students developed the first analytical approaches and solution techniques for the formulation and reduction of fracture mechanics problems involving layered media to systems of singular integral equations.

A member of the U.S. National Academy of Engineering, he has twice received Germany’s Alexander von Humboldt Foundation Senior Scientist Award, one of science’s top honors.