Cantwell and Street elected to National Academy of Engineering

By Dawn Levy

Two Stanford professors have been elected to the National Academy of Engineering (NAE). Brian J. Cantwell, the Edward C. Wells Professor in the School of Engineering, and Bob Street, the William Alden and Martha Campbell Professor in the School of Engineering, were among 76 new members announced by the NAE on Feb. 13. Their election brings the number of Stanford academy members to 80 plus two foreign associates.

"The School of Engineering is delighted that Brian and Bob have been elected to the NAE," said Jim Plummer, the Frederick Emmons Terman Dean of the School of Engineering and the John M. Fluke Professor of Electrical Engineering, who is himself an NAE member . "While their election is based primarily on the tremendous contributions each of them has made to their technical fields, they have both also served the school and the university in many different ways. They are both consummate university citizens -- spectacular researchers, terrific teachers and people who always step up to contribute when their departments, the school or the university needs them. All of us are honored to have them as our colleagues."

The NAE promotes the technological welfare of the nation by marshaling the knowledge and insight of eminent members of the engineering profession. Total U.S. membership is 2,174 with 172 foreign associates.

Election to the NAE is one of the highest professional distinctions that can be accorded an engineer. Academy membership honors those who have made "important contributions to engineering theory and practice" and those who have demonstrated "unusual accomplishment in the pioneering of new and developing fields of technology."

Cantwell, chair of the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics and a faculty member in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, was cited "for studies of the space-time structure of turbulent flows and for the development of fast-burning fuels for hybrid propulsion."

His research has identified a new class of clean, fast-burning fuels for application in novel propulsion systems promising low-cost access to space. He has employed computation and experimentation to study wing-flap configurations that increase lift-to-drag ratio while reducing noise. And he has investigated vortex breakdown, a phenomenon that plays an important role in combustion systems for power generation.

In 1989, the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) named Cantwell "engineering educator of the year." He is a fellow of the AIAA and of the American Physical Society and the Royal Aeronautical Society. He is co-author of three books on computation of complex turbulence flows and author of a book on symmetry analysis.

Street, a faculty member in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering who holds a courtesy appointment in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, was lauded "for contributions in groundwater transport, computational and turbulence closure schemes for environmental fluid dynamics, and river restoration."

His recent research includes a federally funded project to develop a computer code that can track waves that begin on the ocean floor, gather strength as they surface and contain enough energy to move pollutants, debris and even boats. His analytic techniques and software tools have helped build better computer models of air quality and weather.

Street is author of The Analysis and Solution of Partial Differential Equations and co-author of Elementary Fluid Mechanics. He was elected a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 1993 and received the 2002 Hilgard Hydraulic Prize from the American Society of Civil Engineers in 2002. He has served as chair of the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department and associate dean of engineering and in other senior administrative positions at the university.