Photo: From left, Veera Gnaneswar Gude; Avinash Prasad

Two Indian Americans have been honored and named Fellows by the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE).  

The Fellows include Veera Gnaneswar Gude and Avinash Prasad. While Gude is an associate professor of environmental engineering in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Mississippi State University, Prasad is an engineer and land surveyor with more than 25 years of professional experience in civil engineering and management. He is currently a PhD candidate at New York University

ASCE members elected to Fellow status have made celebrated contributions and developed creative solutions that have enhanced lives. Just three percent of society members hold this prestigious honor, the society said.

Gude has over 18 years of academic, industry and research experience in the environmental engineering field, including six years with Du Pont Singapore and a startup company in Seattle, Wash. While in the industry, he provided many innovative solutions for industrial wastewater and stormwater management and treatment. He has been a team member of numerous process design and environmental engineering projects ranging from $5,000 to over $70 million, according to his bio on ASCE’s website.

Gude’s research efforts were funded by the NSF, EPA, USGS and others. His efforts have resulted in industry collaborations, two patents, and over 150 scholarly publications, including 75 highly regarded discipline-specific journal articles and five books.

Gude received a B.S. from Osmania University, India, an M.S. from National University of Singapore and a PhD from New Mexico State University.

Prasad’s ongoing doctorate major at New York University is in bridge asset management. The main topic of research is the development and evaluation of a risk assessment degradation model for bridge asset management. The model will use field inspection data and observed changes of structural conditions for the condition rating of the bridge, his bio notes.

The research will identify bridge degradation indicators that are measured over time for assessment of the current bridge condition rating and its time-dependent development.

Prasad’s doctorate degree minors are structural engineering and technology management. He has a double master of science degrees, in civil engineering and engineering management, from the New Jersey Institute of Technology.

Being a structural evaluator of bridges (particularly suspension bridges) as a registered professional engineer and land surveyor in multiple states (NJ, NY, CT, MA, RI) for over a decade, Prasad has gained proficiency in bridge asset management. He has performed visual inspection (including hands-on inspection) of thousands of bridges in the states of NJ, NY, CT, MA and RI through different accesses like free climbing, rope climbing, bucket truck, ladder/extension ladder, man lift, snooper and other specialized equipment.