Subramaniam D. Rajan

Professor

I am a Professor of Civil Engineering in the School of Sustainable Engineering and the Built Environment (SSEBE) as well as Professor of Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering in the School for Engineering of Matter, Transport and Energy (SEMTE).

I graduated with a Bachelor of Technology (Hons) degree in civil engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology (Kharagpur) and moved to the University of Iowa in 1978.

I obtained my MS and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Iowa before accepting a faculty position in the civil engineering department at Arizona State University.

I enjoy teaching and mentoring undergraduate and graduate courses as well as interacting with the local junior high and high school students in STEM-related activities.

My research interests include a wide variety of areas such as structural analysis via finite element method, design via numerical optimization techniques, understanding material behavior via experimental methods and constitutive modeling, and software development via object-oriented programming and parallel processing.

I have worked on a variety of sponsored projects from such government agencies as the National Science Foundation (NSF), National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), US Army Research Laboratories (ARL), Arizona Department of Transportation and private companies such as Honeywell, Motorola etc. with applications in aerospace, civil, mechanical, semiconductor packaging, biomechanics, and the defense industries.

Office Location

Inset map of the Tempe campus at Arizona State University. Features an arrow pointing to the ISTB2 building, near the corner of McCallister and University.

My office may be a little hard to find. Head to ISTB2 and up to the second floor. Enter through the door marked 219 and look for my office within 219 in room marked 201A.

Degrees

  • Ph.D., University of Iowa, 1983
  • M.S., University of Iowa, 1979
  • B.Tech (Hons), Indian Institute of Technology (Kharagpur), 1978

Positions Held

  • 1995 onwards: Arizona State University, Professor
  • 2009-2012: Graduate Program Chair, School of Sustainable Engineering and the Built Environment
  • 2006-2009: Associate Chair for Graduate Studies, Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering
  • 1989-1995: Arizona State University, Associate Professor
  • 1983-1989: Arizona State University, Assistant Professor
  • 1978-1983: University of Iowa, Graduate Assistant

Patents, Awards and Service

BEST PAPER AWARD: S.D.Rajan, V.Sarihan and M.Mahalingam, “Methodology for Automated Design of Electronic Components with a Case Study”, ASME/JSME Conference on Electronic Packaging, San Jose, CA, Vol. 1, 33-42, 1992.

BEST TEACHER AWARDS: ASCE Student Chapter, 1995 and 2000.

PATENT: Rajan, Mobasher and Hall, “Method and Apparatus for Automated Simulation and Design of Corneal Refractive Procedures”, US Patent Office, Patent Number 5,891,131, April 6, 1999.

CEE Nominee, ASU President’s Professor Award, 2005, 2009.

PATENT PENDING: Belegundu, Rajan and St. Ville, “Parametrized material and performance properties based on virtual testing”, US Patent Office, Patent Application: 20070075450, filed Oct 2005.

Top 5% Instructors in the School of Engineering, 2008.

Faculty Advisor, Bridges to Prosperity, 2009-2012.

Outstanding Engineering Educator of the Year, Greater Phoenix Area Engineer’s Week, 2010.

Faculty Expert and Board Member, Indo-Universal Collaboration for Engineering Education, 2010-onwards.

Board Member, Resource Center for Global Ecohappiness, Mesa, AZ, 2011-2015.

Member, Educator Advisory Board, Kno Corporation, California. 2011-2013.

BEST PAPER AWARD: M. Sirigiri and S.D. Rajan, “A Flipped Classroom Approach to Teaching Engineering Mechanics Courses”, 2nd International Conference on Transformations in Engineering Education, Bangalore, India, January 2015.

BEST PAPER AWARD: Goldberg, Carney, DuBois, Hoffarth, Rajan and Blankenhorn, “Incorporation of Plasticity and Damage Into an Orthotropic Three-Dimensional Model With Tabulated Input Suitable for Use in Composite Impact Problems”, NASA/TM-2015-218849, NASA Ceramic and Polymer Composites Branch, 2015.

Associate Editor, ASCE Journal of Materials in Civil Engineering, 2015-2021.

HONORABLE MENTION: Joseph Harrington, Canio Hoffarth, Subramaniam Rajan, Robert K. Goldberg, Kelly S. Carney, Paul DuBois, and Gunther Blankenhorn, “Using Virtual Tests to Complete the Description of a Three-Dimensional Orthotropic Material”, ASCE Journal of Aerospace Engineering, 2018.

Faculty Advisor, Vertical Flight Society Student Club, Arizona State University, 2019-onwards.

NASA Group Achievement Award, 2020: The award recognizes the Team of 353 gov’t and non-gov’t partners “For outstanding contributions to the Advanced Composites Project which successfully demonstrated and transitioned to industry technologies to reduce the timeline to develop and certify lightweight composite structures.”