Anew professor has been named and another reappointed to prestigious UCF trustee chair professorships honoring faculty scholars of national and international acclaim in teaching, research and service.

New appointee Subith Vasu and reappointee Alain Kassab are professors in the College of Engineering and Computer Science (CECS). They are among an elite list of UCF faculty members to receive the five-year trustee chair appointments, which were created in 2003 to help retain and attract exceptional faculty. The designation carries an annual stipend for honorees to advance their scholarship, part of which can be used as a salary supplement.

Deans nominate candidates for the appointments. A trustee chair review committee evaluates them, and they are affirmed by UCF’s president and provost to take effect in August.

Vasu and Kassab share a passion for teaching and promoting student success, and they have an array of impressive accomplishments as scholars and researchers.

Vasu joined the university in 2012 and is an expert in optical diagnostics and spectroscopy for energy and aerospace. His research group at UCF has produced more than 500 articles for journals and conferences about using diagnostic sensors for various applications, including propulsion, power generation, transportation and spacecraft air quality monitoring. His various national and international early career awards include the 2020 U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) Director’s Fellowship, 2018 DARPA Young Faculty Award and the 2017 American Society of Mechanical Engineers Dilip R. Ballal Early Career Award, an international award given to only one person each year. His UCF honors include earning a Reach for the Stars Award, which recognizes highly successful research and creative activity by early-career professionals, and a UCF Luminary award.

In nominating him for the trustee chair appointment, CECS Dean Michael Georgiopoulos described Vasu as “among the top scholars in the U.S. and the world” who plays a critical role in the college’s core energy and propulsion research.

“His work on understanding the fundamentals of chemical weapon simulants destruction using shock tubes has brought international attention to UCF,” Georgiopoulos said. “The work was featured in a United Nation’s documentary, Combustion Man. This is a rare and once-in-a-lifetime achievement for all scientists and engineers.”

Kassab joined UCF in 1991 and directs the biomedical engineering program at UCF’s Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering. He has long distinguished the university nationally and internationally through research, partnerships and the advancement of the mechanical and aerospace engineering curriculum. For instance, his work on treatment planning for congenital heart disease has drawn national attention and the support of the American Heart Association and other research foundations. His research engages several disciplines and includes computational methods in heat transfer and fluid flow, inverse problems, boundary element, meshless methods and in bioengineering, generating more than 400 scientific publications. Kassab is a Pegasus Professor, the highest designation a faculty member can earn at UCF, and his lengthy list of honors includes being elected a Fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering.

In nominating Kassab for reappointment, Georgiopoulos wrote: “Dr. Kassab is a highly productive researcher with an international reputation in computational methods in heat transfer, fluid flow and bioengineering. He has made highly significant and consistent contributions to UCF developing and growing academic programs. He is an outstanding educator in his own right. In my opinion, he has achieved the extraordinary levels of accomplishments in teaching, research and service expected of a UCF Trustee Chair.”

Both appointments align with UCF’s strategic plan goals of retaining and recruiting outstanding faculty.