Vance Coffman Faculty Chair Professor of Aerospace Engineering Dr. Valery Levitas has been named Anson Marston Distinguished Professor in Engineering at Iowa State University, one of the highest honors for faculty in the College of Engineering.
The title of Anson Marston Distinguished Professor honors exemplary performance in research and/or creative activities as reflected by a national or international reputation in the nominee’s discipline. The awardee retains the title for the remainder of his or her career at Iowa State.
In addition to his faculty position in Aerospace Engineering, Levitas holds a secondary professorship in Mechanical Engineering and is a Faculty Scientist at the Ames Laboratory.
Levitas has developed a strong multidisciplinary research program at the intersection of advanced mechanics, physics, material science, chemistry, and applied mathematics and collaborates with the leading researchers over the world in these fields. He is considered a founder of the theoretical high-pressure mechanochemistry. He has had research results published in many of the world’s leading scientific journals, in numerous types of disciplines. He has presented numerous plenary and keynote lectures at various international conferences, as well as numerous invited lectures at various organizations over the world. He organized multiple international multidisciplinary symposia on phase transformations and mechanochemistry. Levitas has published more than 390 scientific papers, three books, ten book chapters, 245 referred journal papers and holds 11 patents.
Recent research awards include the Khan International Medal for outstanding contributions to the field of plasticity (2017) and the Iowa State University Award for Outstanding Achievement in Research (2016).
Learn more about Dr. Levitas, his background and research achievements on his Department of Aerospace Engineering web page.
Anson Marston, the award’s namesake, was an educator and engineering department head at Iowa State University, and was influential in the development of the College of Engineering and the Iowa State campus.
The honor will be conferred on Levitas at the University Awards Ceremony in September of 2018.