Davood B. Pourkargar | Assistant Professor
Ph.D. – 2015, Pennsylvania State University
Chemical Engineering
M.S. – 2010, Sharif University of Technology
Process Simulation and Control
B.S. – 2008, Sharif University of Technology
Chemical Engineering
Contact information
2017 Durland Hall
dbpourkargar@k-state.edu
Professional experience
Davood B. Pourkargar joined the Tim Taylor Department of Chemical Engineering as an assistant professor in 2020. He is also a graduate faculty member at the Food Science Institute and a faculty researcher at the Johnson Cancer Research Center. Before joining K-State, he served as a senior engineer at ExxonMobil Research and Engineering, 2019-2020; a postdoctoral associate in the Department of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science at the University of Minnesota, 2016-2019; and a postdoctoral researcher at the Catalysis Center for Energy Innovation – a DOE Energy Frontier Research Center at the University of Delaware, 2015-2016. He earned his doctoral degree from Pennsylvania State University in 2015 and his M.S. and B.S. degrees from Sharif University of Technology in 2010 and 2008, respectively.
Research
His research interests include computational multiscale modeling for digital twin development, applied artificial intelligence, optimization-based control of complex process networks, cyber-process systems, advanced manufacturing, and smart materials synthesis. In particular, he focuses on physics-informed machine learning modeling, optimal control, and automation of sustainable energy and chemical production in combined cycles and intelligent manufacturing systems for chemicals, functional materials, and bio-based food products. At K-State, his research group develops enabling technologies to enhance control and real-time decision-making for integrated process systems. Although primarily computational, his work also includes designing experiments to test hypotheses, validate model predictions, and generate high-fidelity data for physics-informed machine learning. He is expanding his laboratory into robotic additive manufacturing and autonomous biomanufacturing, supported by several research infrastructure grants.
Academic highlights
Pourkargar has (co-) authored more than 45 refereed papers in journals and conference proceedings and has presented his research over 60 times at international conferences, research institutes, and universities. His contributions have received several significant recognitions, including the 2024 Carl R. Ice College of Engineering Outstanding Assistant Professor Award, NSF EPSCoR Research Fellowship, 2023 Kansas EPSCoR First Award, AFOSR Faculty Fellowship, Big XII Faculty Fellowship, Robert F. Smith School Distinguished Junior Researcher Award from Cornell University in 2017, O. Hugo Schuck Best Paper Award from the American Automatic Control Council in 2014, the Walter R. and Aura Lee Supina Graduate Fellowship in Chemical Engineering from Pennsylvania State University in 2011, and Best Presentation awards at the American Control Conferences in 2013 and 2015, as well as at the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE) Annual Meetings in 2015 and 2017. He is a senior member of AIChE and a member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) and the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM).