Fotis Sotiropoulos, Dean of the Stony Brook University College of Engineering and Applied Sciences, has been selected to receive the 2017 Hunter Rouse Hydraulic Engineering Award by the American Society of Civil Engineers’ (ASCE) Environmental and Water Resource Institute (EWRI). The annual award recognizes an individual who has made outstanding contributions to hydraulics and waterways. Sotiropoulos will accept the award in May at the EWRI World Congress in Sacramento, CA.
The award acknowledges Sotiropoulos’ leadership in waterways research and application, and for generating a quantum leap forward in the development and application of computational fluid dynamics for waterways.
“Dr. Sotiropoulos’ groundbreaking research in hydraulics has set the standard for how people will treat modeling of riverine flows for decades to come,” said ASCE-EWRI Director Brian Parsons. “He dramatically raised the bar for what pioneering research in hydraulic engineering should look like, and his insights can help solve real-world problems.”
At Stony Brook University, Dr. Sotiropoulos, together with faculty and students, research offshore wind and tidal energy resources. Working with Verdant Power Inc., which develops marine and hydrokinetic technologies, they aim to create the first grid-connected, tidal-energy research project in New York City’s East River. Turbines will be installed at the river-bottom to harvest the tidal energy and produce electricity to power Manhattan. The plan is to have a commercial-scale turbine array deployed in the river by 2020.
“Fotis Sotiropoulos exemplifies what it means to be a leader in academia,” said Stony Brook University President Samuel L. Stanley Jr., MD. “His insight into hydraulics and its real-world impact on our environment and economy, combined with his role as dean and educator, will help train the next generation of innovative engineers investigating this crucial issue.”
Sotiropoulos’ research focuses on simulation-based engineering science for fluid mechanics problems in renewable energy, river hydraulics, geophysical, and biological applications. Funded by the National Science Foundation, the Department of Energy, the National Institutes of Health, National laboratories, private industry, and other state and federal agencies, Sotiropoulos has raised more than $34M for research and research facility development and renovation during the past 10 years.
“We are immensely proud of Fotis Sotiropoulos for receiving the Rouse Hydraulic Engineering Award, a much-deserved recognition for his extraordinary accomplishments in his field,” said Stony Brook University Provost Michael A. Bernstein. “Fotis’ cutting-edge work sets a high standard for research at Stony Brook University. Congratulations to Fotis on this tremendous national honor.”
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