Faculty Profile

Bio

Duncan T. Moore has led a distinguished 40-year career in academia, research, business, engineering, and government. Since joining the University of Rochester in 1974, he has been the principal investigator on grants and contracts totaling nearly $43 million in sponsored funding support. He has written or co-written six books and more than 100 articles and publications, presented at hundreds of events and conferences, and holds 18 U.S. patents focusing on solar cells and gradient index materials. From 2002 until 2004, he served as the President and Chief Executive Officer of the Infotonics Technology Center. From 1995 to 1997, Dr. Moore was Dean of Engineering and Applied Sciences at the University. From 1997 until 2000 he served as Associate Director for Technology, White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, Executive Office of the President. In 2016, he was awarded the University’s Lifetime Teaching Award.<br><br>Dr. Moore was appointed Vice Provost for Entrepreneurship at the University in 2007. In this role, he oversees the Ain Center for Entrepreneurship and managed the Kauffman Campus Initiative, a $3.6 million Kauffman Foundation grant with a $7.2 million match from the University over five years. Dr. Moore is also the Rudolf and Hilda Kingslake Professor of Optical Engineering and Professor of Business Administration at the University of Rochester. He is an expert in gradient-index optics, computer-aided design, optical system manufacturing, medical optics, and optical instrumentation. He is highly regarded for promoting technical entrepreneurship at the University and for creating a Technical Entrepreneurship course that matches engineers with business students. This course, offered since 1988, continues to provide an exciting range of business concepts, driven by an interdisciplinary focus. In 2009, Dr. Moore launched the Technical Entrepreneurship and Management (TEAM) master’s program, designed for students with a background in science, technology, engineering and mathematics to learn entrepreneurship and business skills. The TEAM degree is jointly conferred by the Simon School and the Hajim School of Engineering and Applied Sciences.<br><br>Under Dr. Moore’s direction, the Ain Center for Entrepreneurship offers and supports a variety of university-wide programs and events, including entrepreneurs-in-residence office hours, five business plan competitions, and the student incubator. Three student-run businesses that completed the incubator program – Health Care Originals, LightTopTech Corp., and Ovitz – have raised more than $1 million dollars each in startup funding. Recently, the Ain Center was awarded an NSF I-Corps Site grant and an NSF I-Corps Node grant, the latter in partnership with Cornell University and Rochester Institute of Technology to form the Upstate New York I-Corps Node. These programs are designed to explore the market opportunity of university research and technology. The Ain Center was also established as a University Center through a grant from the Economic Development Administration, launching programming to support urban and rural entrepreneurship. The Center recently received a fourth grant from the Romanian-American Foundation to host Romanian faculty in Rochester and share best practices in establishing a university-wide entrepreneurship initiative. Additionally, the Ain Center supports the Kauffman Entrepreneurial Year (KEY) program, a fifth tuition-free year for undergraduates to pursue an entrepreneurial endeavor.