Alejandro Strachan

Reilly Professor of Materials Engineering, Purdue University

Alejandro Strachan is the Reilly Professor of Materials Engineering at Purdue University, the Director of NSF’s Intelligent Codesign Cloud Lab for Non-Equilibrium and Low-Dimensional Materials Programmable Cloud Lab, Co-Director of nanoHUB, and Purdue’s Office of Research Fellow for Intelligent Twins and Digital Innovation.

Before joining Purdue, he was a Staff Member in the Theoretical Division of Los Alamos National Laboratory and worked as a Postdoctoral Scholar and Scientist at Caltech. He received a Ph.D. in Physics from the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Prof. Strachan’s research focuses on predictive atomistic and multiscale models grounded on first principles to advance our ability to understand, design, and deploy materials. His recent work integrates machine learning and artificial intelligence with physics-based modeling to tackle critical scientific and engineering challenges in areas such as energy, electronics, and manufacturing. In addition, Strachan’s scholarly work includes cyberinfrastructure to make simulations, models, and data widely accessible and useful in research and education to accelerate innovation. nanoHUB has served over 200,000 simulation users and reached 800+ US institutions of higher education.

Prof. Strachan has published over 200 peer-reviewed scientific papers and his contributions to research and education have been recognized by several awards, including the Early Career Faculty Fellow Award from TMS in 2009, an R&D 100 award in the category of software and services for nanoHUB (2020), and the Reilly Chair Professorship in 2023.