Aute to Receive ASHRAE Distinguished Service Award

Associate Research Scientist Vikrant C. Aute has been named an American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE) Distinguished Service Award recipient for 2017. According to ASHRAE, this award recognizes members who have served faithfully and with distinction on committees or have otherwise given freely of their time and talent on behalf of the society.

In his recognition, ASHRAE noted, “it is the volunteer effort of people such as Dr. Aute, which allows ASHRAE to contribute technological advances for the benefit of the industry and public.” Dr. Aute is chairman of the society’s TC 1.13 committee, which is concerned with identifying, developing and disseminating optimization techniques that enhance the performance of HVAC&R components, systems and building systems that are not application or tool specific. He has also taught a short courses and led workshops for ASHRAE including, “Mathematical Optimization Techniques and their Applications to HVAC&R Systems and Components”.

Dr. Aute serves as the director of the Modeling and Optimization Consortium (MOC) within the Center for Environmental Energy Engineering (CEEE). He researches the development of simulation and optimization software for thermal systems, and his current research focuses on approximation assisted multi-objective multidisciplinary optimization and its application to the design of thermal systems.

He is one of the primary researchers on the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E)-funded project RoCo, the Roving Comforter being created in CEEE.

Aute received his Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from the University of Maryland in 2010.

He will receive the award during the ASHRAE Annual Conference held June 24, 2017 in Long Beach, Calif.

Published April 6, 2017