Donald Baskin

Donald Baskin is a Lecturer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), affiliated with the Department of Materials Science and Engineering in the School of Engineering. He teaches courses such as 3.371/3.171/2.281 (Structural Materials and Manufacturing) to both graduate and undergraduate students, as well as a course on structural optimization and lightweighting for vehicles. His work focuses on reducing mass in vehicle structures to enhance fuel efficiency and reduce emissions while maintaining safety and performance.

Baskin holds a PhD in Materials Science and Engineering from Northwestern University and a BS in Mechanical Engineering from the University of California, Irvine. His doctoral research centered on the fracture mechanics of brittle materials like ceramics, while his undergraduate work involved spray atomization processing of refractory structural alloys.

Prior to MIT, he worked in the automotive industry at Mercedes-Benz Materials Research Lab (Ulm, Germany) and Chrysler (Auburn Hills, Michigan), contributing to automotive body structure development, finite element analysis, and manufacturing processes. This experience led to seven high-volume vehicle launches and publications in referred journals and a book chapter on body structure lightweighting. He later joined Boston-area startups, including Xtalic, which develops corrosion-resistant coatings for electrical connectors.

Baskin’s research interests span structural materials, automotive lightweighting, ceramics, metals, computational design, and advanced manufacturing processes. He is affiliated with MIT’s Spectrum Materials Engineering lab.