James Bernard (engineer)

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James Edward Bernard, born in 1943, is an American mechanical engineer. He grew up in Royal Oak, Michigan, near Detroit, and became interested in cars early. He earned his BS (1966), MS (1968), and PhD (1971) in engineering mechanics from the University of Michigan, where he later did research.

He joined Michigan State University as a mechanical engineering faculty member in 1976, then moved to Iowa State University in 1983 and chaired the department until 1990. From 1999 to 2010 he held the Anson Marston Distinguished Professorship of Engineering at ISU. He was elected a fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers in 2003.

In 2008, Bernard was named interim dean of ISU's College of Engineering and served until Jonathan Wickert was appointed. He founded the Iowa Center for Emerging Manufacturing Technology and led its successor, the Virtual Realities Application Center, until 2003. The VRAC conference room was named for him.

Through VRAC, he served on the boards of Engineering Animation Inc. (1989–1995), Mechdyne (since 2003), and Demonstratives Inc. (since 2008). In 2000 he helped start Iowa State's human–computer interaction program. He retired in 2011 and became emeritus.

Bernard and his wife, whom he married in 1966, raised four children. After retiring, they moved to Colorado.