By Catie Duzzny ’21, MBA ’23

Assistant Professor Martin Azese of Otterbein University’s Department of Engineering has received a Fulbright U.S. Scholar Fellowship for the 2022-2023 academic year from the U.S. Department of State and the Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board.

This highly competitive fellowship provides unique opportunities for scholars to teach and conduct research abroad. Azese will be conducting research and teaching in his native country of Cameroon.

“I feel a tremendous sense of achievement. The recognition of the Fulbright peer reviewers has rekindled my research aspirations,” said Azese.

Azese will be both teaching and researching while advising graduate student research. His fellowship is initially for 10 months, with a possibility of extending for two additional months.

“I plan to teach two graduate level courses in physics; advanced fluid mechanics, and advanced partial differential equations, while advising master’s and doctoral students in physics and engineering research work,” said Azese.

His academic work involves fluid mechanics applications with implications for medicine and industry. According to Azese, part of his research is based “on the unsteady surface tension and/or velocity-dependent external forces in encroachment dynamics within arbitrarily confined conduits having Newtonian, Non-Newtonian, and Viscoelastic liquids”.

Azese hopes his Fulbright Fellowship allows him to contribute beyond his field. He hopes to help improve intercultural relations, cultural diplomacy, and intercultural competence between the people of the United States and Cameroon through knowledge and skills.

“If the opportunity presents itself, I would like to bring a little more subtle and friendly thinking and more compassion into world affairs in hopes of increasing more awareness of the need for nations to learn peaceful and friendly relationships,” said Azese.

Already a worldly academic, Azese has a bachelor’s degree in physics and two master’s degrees in physics and applied mechanics from the University of Yaoundé 1 in Cameroon. Azese then served his academic scholarship to study in Toulouse, France. He earned his doctorate degree in mechanical engineering at Texas Tech University.