Assistant Professor, Mechanical Engineering
composite materials, data-driven manufacturing, reactive molecular dynamics, nanostructure properties
Ph.D. Engineering Sciences and Mechanics Engineering, Pennsylvania State University, 2018
M.S. Engineering Science and Mechanics Engineering, Pennsylvania State University, 2014
B.Tech. Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology- BHU, India, 2012
Aniruddh Vashisth joins Mechanical Engineering this winter as an assistant professor. He previously held a postdoctoral research associate position at Texas A&M University working in aerospace and chemical engineering.
In his interdisciplinary research, Aniruddh works on fabrication, design, and analysis of advanced composite materials using theoretical and experimental approaches, such as computational tools across length scales. His work has applications in mechanical, aerospace, materials, and transportation industries. He develops lightweight toughened composites and uses polymer-derived ceramics for fabricating strengthened complex structures. He explores rapid manufacturing of composites using radio frequency fields, and uses atomistic simulations to understand processing-structure-property relationship for materials.
Aniruddh has filed for two U.S. patents focused on targeted heating for multi-material bonding and continuous processing of carbon fibers. He has also developed an algorithm for reactive atomistic simulations that can simulate reactive kinetics for high barrier energy reactions, this method (Accelerated ReaxFF) has been incorporated in commercially available software such as SCM-ADF and LAMMPS.