Dr. Bob Schutz Elected to National Academy of Engineering

Dr. Bob E. Schutz has been elected to the National Academy of Engineering (NAE), one of the highest professional distinctions bestowed upon an engineer. Schutz is a professor in the department of Aerospace Engineering and Engineering Mechanics (ASE/EM). He is one of four Cockrell School of Engineering professors to be elected to the prestigious academy this year.

Bob Schutz, a professor in the department of Aerospace Engineering and Engineering Mechanics, was one of four Cockrell School of Engineering professors elected to the National Academy of Engineering this year.

Academy membership honors those who have made outstanding contributions to engineering research, practice or education. Schutz was elected for his contribution to the use of satellite laser ranging and GPS tracking to study Earth system dynamics.

Schutz’s research interests lie in space geodesy and its applications, space geodetic instrumentation, orbital mechanics, mission planning and computational techniques. He was the science team leader for NASA’s Geoscience Laser Altimeter System (GLAS), an instrument used to measure topography that operated on the Ice, Cloud, and land Elevation Satellite (ICESat) in Earth’s orbit for seven years.

Schutz has served on the ASE/EM faculty since 1969. He is a fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, the American Geophysical Union and the American Astronautical Society. He holds the Joe J. King Chair in Engineering and the FSX Professorship in Space Applications and Exploration.

He is one of 67 new members and 11 foreign associates to join the academy in 2014. UT Austin reported the highest number of new members elected to the academy this year among universities across the United States.

The academy also elected Gregory L. Fenves, executive vice president and provost of The University of Texas at Austin, Thomas F. Edgar, director of the Energy Institute and professor in the McKetta Department of Chemical Engineering and Yale N. Patt, professor in the Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering.

“Provost Fenves and Professors Edgar, Patt and Schutz are exactly the type of UT Austin faculty who change the world every day,” said Bill Powers, the university’s president. “Their research and their distinguished careers as teachers have shaped generations of engineering students and enhanced our understanding of the world.”

Source: http://www.ae.utexas.edu/news/features/694-bob-schutz-nae-14