PhD, Aerospace Engineering, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, India 2005 (Savita Chaudhury Memorial
Best Thesis Award). Area: Unsteady Aerodynamics, Title: Incompressible viscous flow past an oscillating airfoil
M.Sc (Engg.), Aerospace Engineering, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, India 2000.
Area: Nonlinear Dynamics, Title: Dynamics of flexible structures with nonlinear joints
Bachelor of Engineering, Jadavpur University, Kolkata, India 1997 (Prof. S. Niyogi Memorial Award)
Experience
Professor at the Department of Aerospace Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Madras, July 2018-present
Associate Professor at the Department of Aerospace Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Madras,
July 2012-July 2018
Assistant Professor at the Department of Aerospace Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Madras,
June 2007-July 2012
Visiting Scientist at Department of Mathematical Sciences, Chalmers University of Technology,
Gothenburg, Sweden, May-July 2010
Rubicon Fellow, Department of Aerospace Engineering, Technical University of Delft, Netherlands, April
2006 - May 2007
Post Doctoral Researcher, Department of Aerospace Engineering, Technical University of Delft,
Netherlands, February 2005 – March 2006
Professional activities and recognitions:
Administrative role at IIT MADRAS: Chair and ViceChair of National Entrance Examination 2021-23
Counselling role: Faculty advisor for Student Wellness activities at IIT Madras, 2021-2023
Co-organised Direct In-person Colloquium on Vortex Dominated Flows, Breckenridge, USA, 2023
Co-Organised High Performance Computing (HPC) workshop, at IIT Madras, July 2020 on Basics of HPC and
applications http://www.cse.iitm.ac.in/~rupesh/events/hpcworkshop2020/
High Performance Computing (HPC) Center, IIT Madras, Core group member 2020-present
Bio-mimetic & Dynamics Lab featured in Aerodynamic Women twitter page 2020.
High Performance Computing (HPC) Center, IIT Madras focuses on Sunetra Sarkar’s research group
in HPC Highlights
Research on `chaos in flapping flight’ (Biomimetics & Dynamics Lab) featured in IIT Madras’ Tech
magazine `Immerse’, 2018. The article
Joint Industry Program with industry partner DNV-GL on collaborative project on Fluid structure interaction, 2019-2020.
Participated as an academic partner in the Joint Industry Initiative on Compressor Dense Gas Aeroelasticity 2013-2017. Industry partners: Shell, NL, GE Oil & Gas, Germany, MAN Diesel & Turbo, Siemens, Germany, and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Japan. Academic partners: Prof. H. Bijl and Prof. R. Dwight from Aerospace Engineering, Technical University of Delft, Netherlands and Netherlands Organization for Applied Scientific Research (TNO), Delft.
Article in Physics of Fluids selected as editor’s pick : Investigating chaotic wake dynamics past a flapping airfoil and
the role of vortex interactions behind the chaotic transition, 30(4), 047101, 2018, co-author: Chandan Bose, IIT
Madras.
Dr. Sunetra Sarkar’s research on chaos in flapping flight from her lab (Biomimetics and Dynamics Lab) was featured
in IIT Madras’ annual technical magazine`Immerse’, 2018.
Participated as the Indian academic partner for the Shell-NWO FOM initiative under Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) and Foundation for Fundamental Research on Matter (FOM) partnership with Shell (industry partner) on fundamental research to investigate on Transient and High- Dimensional Uncertainty Quantification of Electrical Power Grids 2015. Collaborators: Dr. J. A. S. Witteveen (main academic partner from Center for Mathematics and Computer Science, CWI, Amsterdam), Ir. G. Bloemhof and Ir. R.A.C.T. de Groot (industry partners from DNV GL Energy).
Active industrial collaboration with Aeronautical Development Agency, DRDO, Bangalore, India.
Participated in discussions and delivered invited talks in private inductries like Airbus Industries, Airbus Group India, Bangalore, GE India, Bangalore .
Visited and delivered lectures in various DRDO labs including DRDL Hyderabad, ITR Chandipur, NAL Bangalore, ADA Bangalore.
Rubicon Fellowship awarded by Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research
(NWO), National Research Council of Netherlands, 2006-2007.
Savita Chaudhury Memorial award for best thesis at Aerospace Engineering
Department, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, India, 2005.
Amelia Earhart Fellowship award for academic excellence by Zonta International
Foundation, Chicago, USA, 2003.
Received First MIT Conference Fellowship Award, 2001, awarded by the MIT Conference on
Computational Fluid and Solid Mechanics, Massachusettes Institute of Technology, Cambridge,
USA.
Prof. S. Niyogi Memorial award for academic excellence, Jadavpur University,
Kolkata, 1996.
Select Invited Lectures
Invited talk at 2nd Direct in-Person Colloquium on Vortex Dominated Flows, DisCoVor2023, Breckenridge,
Colorado
Invited talk at IUTAM Symposium on Nonlinear Dynamics for Design of Mechanical Systems across different
length/time scales, Tsukuba, Japan, August 2023
Invited lecture at the Madras Chamber of Commerce and Industry (MCCI) on “Drones, A Ubiquitous Reality –
Applications, Policies and Trends” 2021.
Aeroelasticity and Biomimetic UAV panel speakers at Vaishwik Bharatiya Vaigyanik (VAIBHAV) Global
Summit by Govt. of India, 2020
Delivered invited webinar on Fluid structure interaction at Schlumberger, India, December 2019
Delivered invited lecture `Input noise and fluid structure interaction’ at the 2nd International Conference on Advances
in Aerospace Structures, Systems and Technology, Croydon, London, UK, May, 2019.
Invited lecture (withdrawn) `Effect of noise on the dynamics of flexible flapping system’ at 4th Indian Conference on
Applied Mechanics, Indian Institute of Science Bangalore, India, July 2019.
Delivered invited lecture `Aperiodicity and chaos in flapping flight’, at the Aerospace Engineering department,
Swansea University, Swansea, UK, May 2019.
Delivered invited lecture `Vibration and fluid structure interaction problem of biomimetic flapping wings’ at 13th
International Conference on Vibration Problems (ICoVP), IIT Guwahati, India, 2017.
Invited speaker at Airbus Industries, Airbus group India, on the topic Uncertainty Quantification, Bangalore, 2016.
• Invited researcher at Centre for Mathematics and Computer Science (CWI), Amsterdam, under Shell-NWO FOM
program on Computational Sciences for Energy Research (CSER), 2015.
Organised mini-symposium or VII European Congress on Computational Methods in Applied Sciences and
Engineering (ECCOMAS), Crete, 2016: ERCOFTAC SIG-45: Uncertainty Quantification in CFD and Fluid Structure
Interaction.
Organised a AICTE workshop under Centre for Continuing Education on Computational Fluid Structure Interaction,
2014. Co-organisers: Prof. S. Gupta and Prof. S. F. Ali, Department of Applied Mechanics, IIT Madras, 2014
Invited speaker at Advanced Instability Methods Networks, an Indo-UK collaborative program, on the topic
Stochastic Modelling of Fluid Flow Problems at IIT Bombay, Mumbai 2012.
Invited lecture on Unsteady Aerodynamics delivered at Defense Research Development Laboratory (DRDL), 2011.
Invited speaker at the Indo-US Micro Aerial Vehicle program, on the topic Aerodynamics of Flapping Wings at
National Aerospace Lab (NAL), Bangalore, 2008.