Aerospace Engineering Professor Wassim M. Haddad has been named to the newly created David Sloan Lewis Professorship for Aerospace Engineering in Dynamical Systems and Control.

Announcement of Haddad’s appointment was made by the Board of Regents on Jan 21, while Haddad was in Washington, D.C., receiving another accolade: the 2014 Pendray Aerospace Literature Award of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA).

Upon his return to the Atlanta campus, Haddad reacted to the news:

“I am honored and invigorated by the support that the Lewis Professorship will afford me, my research, and my students. This is the type of support that allows scholarship to flourish in academia and forge the future in aerospace science and engineering.”

Endowed faculty positions provide additional funding to support the recipient’s academic and research initiatives. Funded by industry leaders, friends, and alumni of Georgia Tech, they are fundamental to recruiting and retaining the best and brightest faculty from around the world.

An NSF Presidential Faculty Fellow, IEEE Fellow, and a member of the Academy of Nonlinear Sciences, Haddad has been a member of the Georgia Tech faculty for more than 20 years, where his research has focused on nonlinear dynamical systems and control. More recently, he has concentrated on nonlinear robust and adaptive control, large-scale aerospace systems, hierarchical switching control, impulsive and hybrid systems, neuroadaptive control, system thermodynamics, network systems, analysis and control for biological and physiological systems, active control for clinical pharmacology, and neuroscience.

In addition to authoring or coauthoring more than 550 archival journal and conference publications, Haddad has authored and coauthored 7 books in the areas of science, mathematics, medicine, and engineering, including Thermodynamics: A Dynamical Systems Approach and Nonlinear Dynamical Systems and Control.

“With the establishment of the David Sloan Lewis Endowed Professorship, the Lewis family legacy now supports four faculty in the School of Aerospace Engineering,” said AE Chair Dr. Vigor Yang. “This visionary generosity has emboldened AE faculty and students to push harder, reach higher, and ignore limits. It truly is a tribute to the Lewis Family patriarch, David Lewis, who graduated from our School in 1939.”

The late David Sloan Lewis, Jr. was a former chairman of General Dynamics Corporation and was instrumental in developing a huge array of military and commercial aircraft, including the F-16 Fighting Falcon. To date, approximately 5000 of these aircraft have been produced for the air forces of 24 countries, and the plane continues to serve as the active flight demonstrator for the U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds. His son, Andrew Lewis, also an AE alumnus, is an Atlanta-based entrepreneur who helps build companies through mentorship, strategy, marketing and custom engineering development.