PROFILE of Dr AKSHAI RUNCHAL

runchal@ACRiCFD.com ◙ +1 310 471 3023 ◙ +91 94 1822 0963

CEO & Founding Partner, ACRi Group (USA, France, India)

MD & Founder, CFD Virtual Reality Inst., Dharamsala

Member, Advisory Council, IIT Gandhinagar

Ex-Chairman, IIT Kanpur Foundation

Ex-Professor, IIT (Kanpur), Imperial College (London)

Adjunct: UCLA (Los Angeles), Cal Tech (Pasadena)

Distinguished Alumnus (PEC)

ASME Fellow

Dr. Akshai K. Runchal has over 50 years of experience in CFD and simulation of flow, heat and mass transport processes in engineering and environmental sciences, He obtained his Ph.D. in 1969 from Imperial College (London) under the guidance of Prof. D, B. Spalding. He was a key member of the 3-person team led by Spalding that invented the Finite Volume Method (FVM) of Fluid Dynamics (CFD) in mid 1960's. He started his professional career as a faculty at IIT Kanpur in 1969 and has taught as regular or adjunct faculty at IIT(Kanpur), Imperial College (London), University of California (Los Angeles), Cal Tech (Pasadena), and Cal State (Northridge). In 1979, Dr. Runchal established the ACRi group of companies (www.acricfd.com) that now has offices in Los Angeles (USA), Nice (France) and Bangalore (India). Core expertise of ACRi is Engineering, Environmental and Space Sciences. Over the past 40 years. ACRi has provided advanced technology and CFD Simulation services to over 200 clients that include major corporations, R&D organizations, and governments in over 20 countries.

For the past 50 years, Dr Runchal, has consulted extensively on projects related to flow, heat and mass transfer, combustion, environmental impact, management of air, surface and ground water resources, safe disposal of hazardous and nuclear waste, and, policy and decision analysis. He is the principal author of the ANSWER®, PORFLOW®, TIDAL®, and RADM™ CFD Software Tools that are widely employed by commercial, academic and R&D organizations. He obtained a Bachelor's in Engineering with Honors from Punjab Engineering College (Chandigarh) in 1964. He is the author or co-author of 12 books and over 200 technical publications. Dr. Runchal has received professional honors and awards and has delivered keynote and invited talks at more than 100 international conferences and seminars. He is a Fellow of the ASME, a member of ASTFE and has served as Chairman of the IIT Kanpur Foundation Board. He was a member of the IIT Gandhinagar Advisory Board from 2012 to 2019. He has acted as an Advisor to Government of India and the Indian Army and, a number of educational institutes in their R&D and Industrial Relations Programs.

Dr. Runchal grew up in the scenic hill town of McLeod Ganj, Dharamsala that is now on the world map as the hometown of His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Since 2006 he has been deeply engaged in reviving the lost heritage of Kangra Miniature Paintings through Kangra Arts Promotion Society based in McLeod Ganj. In 2011, Dr. Runchal founded a non-profit CFD Virtual Reality Institute (www.CFDVRi.org) to further the cause of CFD education, training and R&D. He divides his time between Los Angeles and McLeod Ganj and is actively engaged in promoting education, training and R&D in CFD and related disciplines.