Invited Speakers

Ambarish D. Khot Cummins Technical Center India

Ambarish D. Khot is a technical advisor at Cummins Technical Center India (CTCI), Pune, with more than 19 years of experience in simulation-driven product development supporting global emissions and powertrain programs. His expertise spans single-phase flow, conjugate heat transfer, multiphase flow involving spray and deposit formation, phase-change phenomena (freezing and melting), system-level modeling, and noise, vibration, and harshness (NVH)-related aeroacoustics.

Throughout his career, Khot has led and contributed to the development of advanced simulation methodologies that improve engineering predictability, accelerate product development, and enhance decision-making across global programs. His work bridges fundamental physics, high-fidelity simulation, testing, and product engineering to address complex challenges in emissions compliance, durability, performance, and system optimization. He is also an inventor with eight patents granted across the United States, China, and India.

K. Durga Prasad Physical Research Laboratory, India

Dr. K. Durga Prasad is a senior scientist and associate professor in the Planetary Sciences Division at the Physical Research Laboratory (PRL), Ahmedabad. His multidisciplinary research spans laboratory experiments in simulated planetary environments, numerical modeling, and satellite payload development and instrumentation. His core expertise includes planetary heat flow, surface science, and specialized instrumentation for planetary exploration.

Dr. Prasad served as the PRL's Principal Investigator for the Chandra’s Surface Thermophysical Experiment (ChaSTE) payload aboard the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO)'s Chandrayaan-3 mission, contributing to the study of in situ temperature profiles and geotechnical characteristics of the lunar surface. He is also leading the development four payloads planned for future missions to the Moon, Mars, and Venus, including the Lunar Polar Exploration Mission (LUPEX).

Vamshi Krishna Chitikase Lam Research Corporation

Vamshi Krishna Chitikase is an engineering professional with over 18 years of experience in thermal engineering, heat transfer, and aerodynamics. He earned a master’s degree in thermal engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Madras and a postgraduate diploma in leadership from the Indian School of Business (ISB) Hyderabad.

Chitikase has held roles at leading global organizations, including Caterpillar Inc., General Motors, Bombardier Transportation, and Alstom. He currently leads the computational modeling team in the Deposition Products Group at Lam Research. His career highlights include filing a patent application at Lam Research, leading thermal and aerodynamic engineering efforts for India’s first rapid transit system at Alstom, and presenting technical work at leading conferences.

Sanjeev Kumar Indian Institute of Science

Dr. Sanjeev Kumar is professor and chair of the Department of Chemical Engineering at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru, where he also earned his PhD. He uses modeling to improve and intensify long-established processes, drawing insights from experimental observations that remain unexplained, whether from his own group’s work or from findings reported in the literature over the years. His models are deliberately lean, retaining only the phenomena that govern a system and helping reveal how processes and systems might be designed differently.

Drawing on population balances, continuum modeling, and CFD, Dr. Kumar has worked on agitated dispersions, foams and emulsions, nanoparticle synthesis, and electrochemical energy storage and sensing. His work on discretization methods for population balance equations includes some of the most highly cited papers in Chemical Engineering Science, and he has long served on the steering committees of International Conferences on Population Balance Modeling. He also enjoys teaching an unconventional modeling course for engineers across disciplines.

Regiva Abisekaraj DRDO-NSTL

Regiva Abisekaraj is the head of the Acoustic Sensors Group in the Naval Science & Technological Laboratory (NSTL), part of the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), Visakhapatnam. He completed his MSc in physics from Bishop Heber College, Tiruchirappalli, in 1999 and worked as an assistant professor in physics from 2001 to 2004.

At DRDO–NSTL, his work focuses on the design and development of underwater acoustic transducers, including the multiphysics simulation of tonpilz transducers and transducer arrays. He has more than 50 publications in national and international conferences and journals, with research interests such as array interactions, acoustic transducer design methodologies, and experimental validation of hexagonal head tonpilz transducers.

Dr. Prasad Patnaik BSV Indian Institute of Technology Madras

Dr. Prasad Patnaik BSV is currently a professor in the Department of Applied Mechanics & Biomedical Engineering at the Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Chennai. He specializes in computational fluid dynamics (CFD), in particular the development of tools for fluid–structure interaction (FSI) in the broad field of fluid-thermal systems. His group is involved in the development of tools and design solutions for bluff body wakes, control of vortex-induced vibrations, rod bundle heat transfer, blast loading of structures, and more. Dr. Patnaik's current interests involve enabling understanding of blood flow in the cardiovascular and cerebral circulatory systems. He has been actively collaborating with surgeons to develop solutions of clinical relevance.