Washington: Tata Group Chairman Emeritus Ratan Tata along with eight Indian Americans has been elected to the prestigious National Academy of Engineering, which is the highest professional distinctions accorded to an engineer in the US.
The National Academy of Engineering in a statement said that Ratan Tata has been elected as one of the 11 new foreign members of the academy for his outstanding contributions to industrial development in India and the world.
The top American engineering institute also announced election of 69 new members of which eight are eminent Indian American engineers.
Election to the National Academy of Engineering is among the highest professional distinctions accorded to an engineer.
Academy membership honours those who have made outstanding contributions to "engineering research, practice, or education, including, where appropriate, significant contributions to the engineering literature," and to the "pioneering of new and developing fields of technology, making major advancements in traditional fields of engineering, or developing/implementing innovative approaches to engineering education. "
Anant Agarwal, president, edX (online learning initiative of MIT and Harvard University) and professor electrical engineering and computer science department in Massachusetts Institute of Technology has been elected for his contributions to shared-memory and multicore computer architectures.
While Murty P Bhavaraju, senior consultant PJM Interconnection has been elected for probabilistic reliability evaluation tools for large electric power systems; Ashok Gadgil, director and senior scientist, environmental energy technologies division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, has been elected for engineering solutions to the problems of potable water and energy in underdeveloped nations.
Ganesh Kailasam, research and development vice president and global research and development director, performance materials division, Dow Chemical Co, has been elected for development of processes for production of high-performance polymers including polyetherimides.
PTI