Krishnaswamy Ravi-chandar

Biography

Professor Ravi-Chandar received a undergraduate degree in Aeronautical Engineering with first class honors in 1976 from the Madras Institute of Technology in India and graduate degrees in Aeronautics from the California Institute of Technology (M.S. 1977, Ph.D. 1982). He began his academic career at the University of Houston in 1983 and moved to the University of Texas at Austin in September 2000. Dr. Ravi-Chandar's research interests lie in the general area of mechanical behavior of solids with a particular emphasis on high strain rate fracture behavior. His current thrusts are in the areas of dynamic fracture, inelastic behavior of polymers and composites, and wave propagation in shape memory alloys. While interest in these problems is motivated by their enormous practical importance, the focus of the research is on the generation of a fundamental understanding of the way in which materials deform and fail. This requires a well integrated experimental and theoretical study, conducted at various spatial and temporal resolution. Accordingly, our laboratory facilities are geared toward performing experiments specially designed to elucidate these characteristics of material behavior. Dr. Ravi-Chandar's scholarly contributions are well recognized; he has presented a number of invited lectures at national and international meetings. He has also been a consultant to a number of companies dealing with problems of structural integrity.

Research Interest

Experimental Mechanics, Dynamic Fracture Mechanics, Mechanical Behavior of Polymers