Academician Wu Xiaoping and academician Cui Erjie have served as the dean of the College, and the current Dean is academician Du Shanyi. The Department of mechanics and mechanical engineering was originally called the Department of Mechanics and mechanical engineering, founded in 1958 by the distinguished scientist academician Qian Xuesen, and was its chairman until 1978; it was renamed the Department of modern mechanics in 1961 and the Department of mechanics and mechanical engineering in 1992, he was reinstated to the department of modern mechanics in 2007. The Department of Thermal Science and Energy Engineering, formerly the Department of physical thermal engineering, was founded in 1958 by academician Wu Zhonghua, who was the first head of the department.