Charbel Farhat and his Research Group (FRG) develop mathematical models, advanced computational algorithms, and high-performance software for the design,
analysis, and digital twinning of complex systems in aerospace, marine, mechanical, and naval engineering. They contribute major advances to Simulation-Based
Engineering Science. Current engineering foci in research are on reliable autonomous carrier landing in rough seas; dissipation of vertical landing energies
through structural flexibility; nonlinear aeroelasticity of N+3 aircraft with High Aspect Ratio (HAR) wings; pulsation and flutter of a parachute; pendulum
motion in main parachute clusters; coupled fluid-structure interaction (FSI) in supersonic inflatable aerodynamic decelerators for Mars landing; flight dynamics
of hypersonic systems and their trajectories; and advanced digital twinning. Current theoretical and computational emphases in research are on high-performance,
multi-scale modeling for the high-fidelity analysis of multi-component, multi-physics problems; discrete-event-free embedded boundary methods for CFD and FSI;
efficient Bayesian optimization using physics-based surrogate models; modeling and quantifying model-form uncertainty; probabilistic, physics-based machine
learning; mechanics-informed artificial neural networks for data-driven constitutive modeling; and efficient nonlinear projection-based model order reduction
for time-critical applications such as design, active control, and digital twinning.
Biosketch
Charbel Farhat is the Vivian Church Hoff Professor of Aircraft Structures in the School of Engineering at Stanford University. From 2008 to 2023, he chaired the
Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics at Stanford, and from 2022 to 2023, he chaired this department as
the inaugural James and Anna Marie Spilker Chair of Aeronautics and Astronautics. He is also Professor in the Institute for Computational and Mathematical Engineering.
From 2014 to 2024, he directed at Stanford University the Stanford-King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology Center of Excellence for Aeronautics and Astronautics;
from 2017 to 2023, he served on the the Space Technology Industry-Government-University Roundtable; from 2015 to 2019, he served on the
United States Air Force Scientific Advisory Board (SAB);
from 2008 to 2018, he served on the United States Bureau of Industry and Security's Emerging Technology and Research Advisory Committee (ETRAC) at the United States
Department of Commerce; and from 2007 to 2018, he served as the Director of the Army High Performance Computing Research Center at Stanford University. He was
designated by the US Navy recruiters as a Primary Key-Influencer and flew with the Blue Angels during Fleet 2014. .
He is designated as an ISI Highly Cited Author in Engineering by the Institute for Science Information (ISI) Web of Knowledge
(ISIHighlyCited.com) and an elected Member of three academies: the
National Academy of Engineering; the
Royal Academy of Engineering (UK); and the
Lebanese Academy of Sciences. He is a recipient of a
Vannevar Bush Faculty Fellowship; and
three Docteur Honoris Causa degrees from Ecole Normale Superieure Paris-Saclay, Ecole Centrale de Nantes, and Ecole Nationale Superieure d'Arts et Metiers. He is also a Fellow of
seven international societies: the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA); the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME); the International Association of
Computational Mechanics (IACM); the Society of Engineering Science (SES); the Society of Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM); the United States Association of Computational
Mechanics (USACM); and the World Innovation Foundation (WIF). He was knighted by the Prime Minister of France in the Order of Academic Palms and awarded the Medal of Chevalier dans
l'Ordre des Palmes Academiques. He was designated by the US Navy recruiters as a Primary Key-Influencer and flew with the
Blue Angels during Fleet Week 2014.
Charbel Farhat is also the recipient of several other professional and academic distinctions including the Lifetime Achievement Award and the Spirit of St Louis Medal from the American Society of Mechanical Engineers; the Ashley Award for Aeroelasticity, the Structures, Structural Dynamics and Materials Award, and the Collier Aerospace HyperX/AIAA Structures Award from the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics; the John von Neumann Medal, Computational and Applied Sciences Award, and R. H. Gallagher Special Achievement Award from the United States Association of Computational Mechanics; the Grand Prize from the Japan Society for Computational Engineering and Science; the Gauss-Newton Medal, IACM Award, Computational Mechanics Award, and Computational Mechanics Award for Young Investigators from the International Association of Computational Mechanics; the Gordon Bell Prize and Sidney Fernbach Award from the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Computer Society; the Olof B. Widlund Prize from Domain Decomposition Methods; the Modeling and Simulation Award from the Department of Defense; the IBM Sup'Prize Achievement Award; the CRAY Research Award; and the United States Presidential Young Investigator Award from the National Science Foundation and the White House.
