Resume of Career

Dr. Ashok Kumar is a Professor of Materials Science in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of South Florida (USF), Tampa. Dr. Kumar received his Ph.D. degree in Materials Science & Engineering with minor in Electrical Engineering from North Carolina State University (NCSU), Raleigh. Dr. Kumar joined as an Assistant Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of South Alabama (USA). Since joining the USA in 1993, Dr. Kumar established many state-of-the-art research laboratories in the area of thin film coatings for multi functional applications. He successfully directed as a Cluster Leader of Advanced Materials program (USA as lead institution) to win a 3.5 million dollars grant for the State of Alabama from NASA EPSCoR program. His duties as Cluster Director was to supervise the statewide ‘Advanced Materials’ research program comprising of five major universities and six small colleges with two HBCU’s.

Dr. Kumar has published more than 90 reviewed articles and has presented approximately 60 papers in regional and national conferences. He has been an invited speakers and session organizer at many national and international meetings. Dr. Kumar is a member of the Materials Research Society, American Physical Society, ASM International, TMS, American Vacuum Society, American Ceramic Society, and IEEE. He is the secretary of Thin Film Interfaces Committee and Advisor to Journal of Metals for TMS society. He has edited three books for TMS and two books for MRS conferences as lead symposium organizer. Dr. Kumar received ‘NSF CAREER’ award , which is the highest honor given by the NSF to young university faculty in science and engineering.

Current Research Interests

Sensor Development, Energy Storage.

Publications and Presentations