New department heads include Dinesh Bhatia MS’87, PhD’90 in electrical and computer engineering, Dr. G. Andrés Cisneros in physics and Dr. Kelli Palmer in biological sciences. Dr. Heidi Rae Cooley is the new program head of arts, technology, and emerging communication and of critical media studies. She was an associate professor of media arts and film and media studies at the University of South Carolina before joining UTD in 2018. He also oversaw the electrical and computer engineering (ECE) graduate program for six years and most recently served as co-interim department head. Bhatia has interdisciplinary interests related to computer engineering, focusing on high-performance computing, electronic design automation and medical devices.