Posted on September 24, 2025 by Sean M. Wood
Dr. Kiran Bhaganagar with her fellowship acceptance.
Mechanical Engineering Professor Kiran Bhaganagar, Ph.D., may now add ASME Fellow to her list of accolades following her recent elevation by the American Society of Mechanical Engineers.
Fellows are required to have 10 years of active practice and 10 years of corporate membership. They must also have made significant and outstanding engineering achievements to be considered.
“Becoming an ASME fellow is an important message to female students that they should keep going on their research and educational path, regardless of the various challenges and deterrents around you,” Bhaganagar said.
She joined the faculty in 2009 and was the first woman in the mechanical engineering department. She also helped start the fluid dynamics program at UT San Antonio. An expert in turbulence, buoyancy and current flows, Bhaganagar’s group pioneered developing “virtual wind tunnel” high-performance computing algorithms to simulate turbulence in a multitude of situations.
“The greatest joy of my job is working closely with students doing research with them and close interactions with them through teaching,” Bhaganagar said. “It gives me so much energy to constantly find new research problems and working with them to find solutions. I was fortunate to contribute to diverse and new areas of aerospace, space and environmental fluid dynamics.”
— Sean M. Wood
