Roger Simpson honored with emeritus status
Roger Simpson, the Jack E. Cowling Professor of Aerospace and Ocean Engineering in the College of Engineering has been conferred the “professor emeritus” title by the Virginia Tech Board of Visitors.
The title of emeritus may be conferred on retired professors and associate professors, administrative officers, librarians, and exceptional staff members who are specially recommended to the board of visitors by Virginia Tech President Charles W. Steger. Nominated individuals who are approved by the board of visitors receive an emeritus certificate from the university.
A member of the university community for 29 years, Simpson is widely known for his work in experimental fluid mechanics and state-of-the-art instrumentation development. He brought international visibility to the university with his many complete data sets and information on unsteady and 3-D turbulent flows, which were the first of their kind to determine models for practical cases and are used as test cases by turbulence modelers.
Simpson is a Fellow in the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA), the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, and the Institute of Diagnostic Engineers. Additionally, he authored or co-authored more than 250 peer-reviewed journal articles, conference papers, book chapters, and reviews. He also obtained more than $15 million in research funding.
During his tenure, Simpson directed 40 master’s degree and more than 20 doctoral students and served on more than 100 graduate degree committees. He also served on science advisory panels and proposal review panels for the U.S. Office of Naval Research and the National Science Foundation.
Among Simpson’s many professional honors and awards are Dean’s Awards for both Research Excellence and Service Excellence, and the AIAA Sustained Service Award.
He received his bachelor’s degree from the University of Virginia and his master’s degree and doctoral degree from Stanford University.
Dedicated to its motto, Ut Prosim (That I May Serve), Virginia Tech takes a hands-on, engaging approach to education, preparing scholars to be leaders in their fields and communities. As the commonwealth’s most comprehensive university and its leading research institution, Virginia Tech offers 240 undergraduate and graduate degree programs to more than 31,000 students and manages a research portfolio of $513 million. The university fulfills its land-grant mission of transforming knowledge to practice through technological leadership and by fueling economic growth and job creation locally, regionally, and across Virginia.
