Heidi A. Diefes-Dux is a Professor in Biological Systems Engineering at the University of Nebraska - Lincoln (UNL).

She received her B.S. and M.S. in Food Science from Cornell University and her Ph.D. in Food Process Engineering from the Department of Agricultural and Biological Engineering at Purdue University. She was an inaugural faculty member of the School of Engineering Education at Purdue University. She now leads the Discipline-Based Education Research (DBER) Initiative in the College of Engineering at UNL and is the graduate chair for the PhD in Engineering – Specialization in Engineering Education Research program. Her research focuses on the development, implementation, and assessment of activities with authentic engineering contexts. She has been doing research on reflection in engineering courses for over 10 years and is the Principal Investigator for the IUSE project Enhancing Engineering Students’ Ability to Think Deeply about their Learning Through Formal and Continuous Reflection (NSF 2235227). To date, reflection has been implemented in courses from first- to senior-year in two engineering undergraduate degree programs with over 800 unique students.