Shyam Sunder
Position
Director
Building and Fire Research Laboratory
Task
Lead Technical Investigator
Education
Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi, B. Tech., (Honors), Civil Engineering, 1977
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, S.M., Civil Engineering, 1979
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sc.D., Structural Engineering, 1981
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Dr. Shyam Sunder is Director of the Building and Fire Research Laboratory (BFRL) at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST).
BFRL has an annual operating budget of about $42 million and its staff includes about 175 federal employees and 100 research associates and guest researchers from industry, universities, and foreign laboratories.
Dr. Sunder also:
• is the lead investigator for the federal building and fire safety investigation of the World Trade Center disaster;
• oversees NIST activities as lead agency for the National Earthquake Hazards Reduction Program (NEHRP); and
• co-chairs the National Science and Technology Council’s (NSTC) Subcommittee on Buildings Technology (SBT) Research and Development.
From June 1996 to December 1997, Dr. Sunder was on assignment to the Program Office, the principal staff office of the NIST Director, first as a Program Analyst and later as the Senior Program Analyst for NIST.
Dr. Sunder was appointed Chief of the Structures Division in January 1998 and Chief of the Materials and Construction Research Division in June 2002. He was appointed Acting Deputy Director of BFRL in March 2004, Deputy Director of BFRL in June 2005, and Acting Director of BFRL in July 2006.
Prior to joining NIST in 1994, Dr. Sunder held a succession of positions at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) beginning in 1980: instructor, assistant professor, associate professor, principal research scientist, and senior research scientist.
Dr. Sunder holds a Bachelor of Technology (Honors) degree in civil engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi (1977), a Master of Science degree in civil engineering from MIT (1979), and a Doctor of Science degree in structural engineering from MIT (1981).
Dr. Sunder’s awards include the Gilbert W. Winslow Career Development Chair (1985-87) and the Doherty Professorship in Ocean Utilization (1987-89) from MIT, the Walter L. Huber Civil Engineering Research Prize (1991) from the American Society of Civil Engineers, the Equal Employment Opportunity Award (1997) from NIST, and the Gold Medal Award (2005) for his distinguished leadership of the federal building and fire safety investigation of the World Trade Center disaster from the U.S. Department of Commerce. |
