UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Ashwin Renganathan, professor of aerospace engineering at Penn State, has been selected as a member of the 2027 Class of Associate Fellows of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA), the world’s largest aerospace professional society.
The AIAA Associate Fellow grade recognizes individuals who have accomplished important engineering or scientific work, conducted original work of outstanding merit or made significant contributions to the arts, sciences or technology of aeronautics or astronautics. Only 17% of AIAA members have ever been selected for the grade, according to the AIAA website.
Renganathan was recognized for his contributions to developing approaches for data-efficient aerospace design and decision-making, including surrogate and multifidelity modeling, Bayesian optimization and uncertainty quantification. His research addresses challenges in aerospace engineering where traditional simulations can be computationally expensive, high-dimensional and subject to uncertainty.
“Being named an AIAA Associate Fellow provides an important platform to broaden the visibility and impact of our research,” Renganathan said. “Much of my work sits at the intersection of aerospace engineering, computational science and artificial intelligence, where progress increasingly depends on collaboration across disciplines, institutions, government and industry.”
Beyond his research, Renganathan has contributed to the aerospace engineering community through invited talks, open-source software, student mentorship and service on AIAA technical committees. His work connects aerospace engineering with statistical and machine-learning methods to support more efficient, uncertainty-aware design and decision-making.
“This recognition strengthens those connections and creates new opportunities to bring our ideas to a wider aerospace community,” Renganathan said. “Most importantly, I see it as an opportunity to amplify the work of my students and collaborators and to translate our research into methods and technologies that can address some of the most challenging problems facing the future of aerospace engineering.”
The 2027 Class of Associate Fellows includes aerospace professionals from universities, government agencies and industry across the United States and seven countries. The class will be formally recognized during the AIAA Associate Fellows Induction Ceremony and Dinner on Jan. 13, 2027, during the AIAA SciTech Forum in Orlando, Florida.