Head of the School of STEM, Director of IMaR Research Centre and the AgriTech Centre of Excellence, Munster Technological University
Professor Joseph Walsh is Head of the School of STEM and Director of the Intelligent Mechatronics and RFID (IMaR) Research Centre and the AgriTech Centre of Excellence (ACE) at Munster Technological University – Kerry Campus, Co Kerry, Ireland. His research experience encompasses the field of intelligent mechatronics and sensors, dairy technology, robotics and automation, autonomous systems, bio‐instrumentation and STEM education and is well published in these areas.
Professor Walsh has over 20 years research and development experience in both industry and academia and has (co-)authored over 150 scientific articles and has received over €20 million in research funding over the past 10 years. He is a Science Foundation Ireland (SFI) Funded Investigator and is actively involved in the SFI collaborative research centres, LERO the Irish Software Research and the CONFIRM Centre for Smart Manufacturing. He has also been active in many EU funded research projects and coordinated the FP7 Rotabot project on next generation milking parlours.
He currently leads an €8.96 million project called “Rethinking Engineering Education in Ireland (REEdI)” The project is supported by the Higher Education Authority in Ireland under the Human Capital Initiative. REEdI offers an agile and innovative learning programme providing personalised, flexible and tailored options to diverse learner cohorts; from school leavers to graduating apprentices, to upskilling industry professionals and mature students. REEdI combines an innovative method of content delivery with new immersive technologies to deliver a transformative programme of self-directed and self-scheduled learning for the next generation of engineers.
Professor Walsh graduated with a Ph.D in Electronic Engineering from the University of Limerick and an M.Sc (Eng) in Bio‐engineering jointly from Trinity Collage Dublin (TCD), University College Dublin (UCD) and the University of Limerick (UL). He was elected Fellow of the Institute of Physics (FinstP) and is a corporate member of the Institution of Engineers of Ireland (MIEI) and has been awarded the titles of Chartered Engineer and Chartered Physicist. He is currently leading a number of industrial targeted projects with companies such as Dairymaster, McHales, Abbey Machinery, Bons Secours Hospital Group, Liebherr and Kostal.