On October 18, 2010, the Dean of MIT’s School of Engineering, Dr. Subra Suresh was confirmed as the new head of America’s National Science Foundation.
With 1,700 employees and a $7 billion budget, the federal agency funds over 20 percent of all government research and development in the United States. Suresh is a native of India and a graduate of the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras located in Chennai, India. This week the President of India honored Suresh’s career accomplishments by conferring upon him the Padma Shri award. He is one of about 80 awardees this year and the probably most well known American to receive the accolade this year.
Another Indian American and fellow Southern California resident is among the awardees this year. In 1973, IIT Kharagpur graduate and physicist Dr. Mani Lal Bhaumik demonstrated the use of the excimer laser while working for the Northrop Corporation Research and Technology Center here in the southland. He is a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers as well as of the American Physical Society. Today he is also a recipient of the Padma Shri award.
