Kristina Shea is Professor for Engineering Design and Computing at ETH Zürich. Her research focuses on developing cutting-edge computational models, methods and tools that enable the design of more innovative and complex engineered systems and products. A secondary aim of the research is to automate design and fabrication processes. Her research is interdisciplinary combining engineering, design and computing and considers early conceptual design phases through to the fabrication of novel solutions. Current research topics include computational design synthesis and optimization, model-based systems engineering and design-to-fabrication. A variety of engineering areas are investigated including structures, MEMS, mechatronics, robotics and fabrication processes. These areas are then applied in a wide range of industries including automotive, aerospace, consumer products and buildings.

Professor Shea is active in the research community where she serves as Associate Editor of Artificial Intelligence for Engineering Design, Analysis and Manufacturing, is an Editorial Board Member of Advanced Engineering Informatics and has served on the Editorial Board of the Journal of Engineering Design. She was elected to the Board of Management of the Design Society in 2011. She won best paper awards for the ASCE Journal of Computing in Civil Engineering in 2003 and the First International Conference on Design Computing and Cognition in 2004. While in the UK, she won the prestigious Philip Leverhulme Prize in Engineering in 2001. She is a member of the Design Society and the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME).

Professor Shea graduated in Mechanical Engineering (BS 1993; MS 1995) from Carnegie Mellon University (US) where she also earned her PhD in 1997. Following, she worked as a post doctoral research assistant until 1999 at the Applied Computing and Mechanics Laboratory in Civil Engineering at EPFL, where she was later a Visiting Professor in 2002 and 2006. Next, she took a position at Cambridge University (UK), Department of Engineering where she worked as a University Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in Engineering Design until 2005. While at Cambridge, from 2002-2005, she also worked as a Senior Engineer in the Arup Foresight, Innovation and Incubation Group in London (UK) where she led the development of expertise in Computational Design and Optimization and applied her research to live building design projects. From 2005-2012, she was Professor for Virtual Product Development at TU München (Germany) in the Mechanical Engineering Department.