Biosketch 

Dr. Kamran Behdinan, earned his Ph.D in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Victoria in British Columbia in 1996, and has a considerable experience in both academic and industrial settings. Kamran was appointed to the academic staff of Ryerson University in 1998, tenured and promoted to the level of associate professor in 2002 and subsequently to the level of Professor in 2007 and served as the director of the aerospace engineering program (02-03), and the founding Chair of the newly established Department of Aerospace Engineering (07/2003 – 07/2011).  Kamran was a founding member and the Executive Director of the Ryerson Institute for Aerospace Design and Innovation (2003-2011). He was also a founding member and the coordinator of the Canadian-European Graduate Student Exchange Program in Aerospace Engineering at Ryerson University. Dr. Behdinan held the NSERC Design Chair in “Engineering Design and Innovation”, 2010-2012, sponsored by Bombardier Aerospace and Pratt and Whitney Canada. Dr. Behdinan joined the Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, University of Toronto, in the rank of Full Professor in September 2011. He held the NSERC Design Chair in “Multidisciplinary Design and Innovation” (2012-2023), sponsored by NSERC, University of Toronto, and thirteen companies including Bombardier Aerospace, Pratt and Whitney Canada, United Technology Aerospace Systems, Magna International, Honeywell, SPP Canada Aircraft, Ford, and DRDC Toronto. He is the founding director of the “University of Toronto Institute for Multidisciplinary Design and Innovation”, an industry-centered project-based learning institute in partnership with major aerospace and automotive companies.

Dr. Behdinan is the past President of the Canadian Society of Mechanical Engineering (CSME), served the Chair of the Design & Analysis of the CSME technical committee (2001-2022) and as a member of the technical and scholarship committees of the High-Performance Computing Virtual Laboratory (HPCVL). Professor Behdinan is a member of the Canadian Engineering Qualification Board (CEQB) and Chair of the CEQB Syllabus Committee.  He is also a member of the Design Division of the Canadian Aeronautics and Space Institute (CASI) and member of the AIAA International Strategy as well as awards committees. As a member of the Canadian National Committee of the International Union of Theoretical and Applied Mechanics (2014-2024), Dr. Behdinan represented Canada on the IUTAM General Assembly (2020-2024). Professor Behdinan is the founding director and principal investigator of the University of Toronto, Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering “Advanced Research Laboratory for Multifunctional Lightweight Structures”, funded primarily by the Canadian Foundation for Innovation (Leader’s Opportunity Fund) and the Ontario Research Fund. His research interests include “Design and Development of Multifunctional Light-weight Structures and Intelligent Manufacturing Systems” for biomedical, aerospace, automotive, and nuclear applications; “AI-based Multidisciplinary Design Optimization, and Health Monitoring of aerospace and automotive systems”; “Multi-scale Simulation of Nano/Micro-Structured Materials, Composites, Smart Structures, and Additive Manufacturing Processes”. During his academic career, Professor Behdinan has supervised 41 PhD students, 136 Masters’ students, and 60 Post-Doctoral Fellows/RAs.  He has also published more than 440 peer-reviewed journal and conference papers, 1 book and 20 book chapters.  He is the recipient of many prestigious awards and recognitions for his outstanding achievements and contributions to management and practice of the mechanical engineering, advancement of the applied science engineering profession, and engineering design education such as the Fellow of Industry Academy of the AI Industry Alliance, Fellow of the Asia-Pacific Artificial Intelligence Association, the 2022 KIT International Research Excellence Followship, 2021 Connaught Global Challenge Award, Fellow of Pratt and Whitney Canada, Fellow of the CSME, Fellow of the AAAS, Fellow of the ASME, Fellow of the Canadian Academy of Engineering, Fellow of the Engineering Institute of Canada, as well as Associate Fellow of AIAA. Professor Behdinan was the recipient of the ASME “Ruth and Joel Spira Outstanding Design Educator Award” (given to recognize a person who exemplifies the best in furthering engineering design education through vision, interactions with students and industry, scholarship, and impact on the next generation of engineers; and a person whose action serves as a role model for other educators to emulate).

Professor Behdinan has been recognized as World’s Top 2% Scientists in the whole career-long impact – in 2021, 2022, 2023, and 2024, released by Stanford University based on Elsevier, Scopus database, doi: 10.17632/btchxktzyw.3, doi: 10.17632/btchxktzyw.5, doi: 10.17632/btchxktzyw.6.