Dr. Vijay Kumar is the Nemirovsky Family Dean of Penn Engineering at the University of Pennsylvania, with appointments in the Departments of Mechanical Engineering and Applied Mechanics, Computer and Information Science, and Electrical and Systems Engineering. He earned his Bachelor of Technology from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, and his Ph.D. from The Ohio State University in 1987. Since then, he has been a distinguished faculty member in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Pennsylvania.
Dr. Kumar has held numerous leadership roles at Penn and served as the Assistant Director of Robotics and Cyber Physical Systems at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (2012–2013). His pioneering work in robotics has led to the founding of multiple startups, including Exyn Technologies. He is a Fellow of both the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) and the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE).
Dr. Kumar’s editorial contributions include serving on the boards of IEEE Transactions on Robotics and Automation, IEEE Transactions on Automation Science and Engineering, ASME Journal of Mechanical Design, and the Springer Tract in Advanced Robotics (STAR). He was the Chief Editor of the ASME Journal of Mechanisms and Robotics. His research excellence is reflected in numerous best paper awards at leading conferences such as DARS 2002, ICRA 2004, ICRA 2011, RSS 2011, RSS 2013, ICRA 2014, BICT 2015, and MARSS 2016. He has also mentored doctoral students who have received prestigious Best Student Paper Awards at ICRA 2008, RSS 2009, and DARS 2010.
Dr. Kumar’s accolades include the 2012 ASME Mechanisms and Robotics Award, the 2012 IEEE Robotics and Automation Society Distinguished Service Award, a 2012 World Technology Network award, a 2013 Popular Mechanics Breakthrough Award, the 2014 Engelberger Robotics Award, the 2017 IEEE Robotics and Automation Society George Saridis Leadership Award, the 2017 ASME Robert E. Abbott Award, the 2018 IEEE Robotics and Automation Pioneer Award, and the 2020 IEEE Robotics and Automation Field Award. He is an elected member of the National Academy of Engineering (2013), the American Philosophical Society (2018), the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2022), and the National Academy of Inventors (2022).