PeopleofSuperintelligence

Researcher

Raghunathan Rengaswamy

Also known as Raghu Rengaswamy, Raghunathan Rengasamy

Raghunathan Rengaswamy is a chemical engineering professor at IIT Madras who brings machine learning and AI into process engineering, from fault diagnosis to reinforcement-learning design of microfluidic networks. A BTech from IIT Madras in 1990 and a PhD from Purdue University in 1995 began his career, and the Indian National Academy of Engineering gave him its Young Engineer Award for 2000. He coauthored a three-part review of process fault detection and diagnosis in 2003, co-founded the technology company Gyan Data in 2011, and published the textbook Data Science for Engineers with Resmi Suresh in 2022. Since February 2020, he is Dean of Global Engagement at IIT Madras, where he helped bring about the IIT Madras Zanzibar campus that opened in 2023.

Badges

Timeline

  1. 1990–1995

    IIT Madras and Purdue degrees

    He earns a BTech in chemical engineering at IIT Madras in 1990 and a PhD in chemical engineering at Purdue University in 1995.

  2. 2000–2005

    Fault diagnosis reviews and prizes

    The Indian National Academy of Engineering gives him its Young Engineer Award for 2000, which goes to outstanding engineers under the age of 32. In 2003, he coauthors the three-part review A review of process fault detection and diagnosis in Computers and Chemical Engineering with Venkat Venkatasubramanian, Surya N. Kavuri and Kewen Yin. A paper he coauthors wins the International Federation of Automatic Control Best Paper Prize for 2002–2005 in Engineering Applications of Artificial Intelligence, in the category of application-oriented papers on symbolic AI approaches.

  3. July 2011

    Co-founding Gyan Data

    He co-founds Gyan Data Pvt. Ltd with Shankar Narasimhan of IIT Madras. The high technology service and product development company, based in the IIT Madras Research Park, has existed since July 2011.

  4. February 2020

    First Dean of Global Engagement

    IIT Madras establishes its Office of Global Engagement in February 2020, and he is appointed its Dean, the first to hold the post. The office facilitates international collaborations across the institute.

  5. 2021–2022

    CDiNN and Data Science for Engineers

    In March 2021, he and Parameswaran Sankaranarayanan post CDiNN on arXiv, a neural network architecture that learns a function as a difference of polyhedral convex functions from data. In 2022, CRC Press publishes his book Data Science for Engineers, written with Resmi Suresh.

  6. 2022–2023

    Reinforcement learning and SciBERT

    In 2022, he and Mohammad Shahab publish the paper Reinforcement-Learning designs droplet microfluidic networks in Computers and Chemical Engineering. In 2023, he, Arun Muthukkumaran, Shrayas Raghunathan and Arjun Ravichandran publish a study in AIChE Journal on perovskite-based electrocatalyst discovery and design using word embeddings from a retrained SciBERT language model.

  7. 2023

    IIT Madras Zanzibar campus

    He leads a delegation to Zanzibar and is among those present at the signing of the campus agreement in July 2023. IIT Madras Zanzibar is inaugurated in November 2023 with BS and MTech programs in Data Science and Artificial Intelligence, and he chairs its Advisory Council.

  8. As of October 2026

    Professor and Dean at IIT Madras

    He is a professor in the Department of Data Science and AI at IIT Madras, holds the Marti Mannariah Gurunath Chair in the Department of Chemical Engineering, and serves as Dean of Global Engagement. His earlier posts include assistant professor at IIT Bombay, associate and full professor at Clarkson University, and professor and co-director of the Process Control and Optimization Consortium at Texas Tech University.

Career

  1. Since 2020IIT MadrasDean, Chair of Advisory Council
  2. From 2011Gyan Data Private LimitedCo-founder
  3. IIT BombayAssistant Professor
  4. Clarkson UniversityAssociate Professor
  5. Texas Tech UniversityProfessor
  6. Process Control and Optimization ConsortiumCo-director

Education

  1. 1995Purdue UniversityPhD in chemical engineering
  2. 1990IIT MadrasBTech in chemical engineering

From the biography.

  1. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology trained or employed 44 of the 187 AI major-prize winners, more than any other universityIncludes Raghunathan Rengaswamy. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology trained or employed 44 of the 187 AI major-prize winners, more than any other university. We compare doctorate and 5+ year employment links, career timing and current workplaces for 187 major-prize and 1,111 best-paper winners.
  2. 11% of AI doctorate holders from 2010 to 2016 founded or led a company or lab by 10 years after graduationIncludes Raghunathan Rengaswamy. We estimate how often AI doctorate holders founded or led a company or lab by 10 years after graduation, how waiting times compare between founders and top jobs, and which universities trained the most.
  3. The United States employs an estimated 48% of people shaping AIIncludes IIT Madras. We estimate where the people shaping AI work today, how universities, companies and research institutes split across countries, and how country shares have changed since the 1960s.
  4. More people shaping AI studied at Massachusetts Institute of Technology than at any other institutionIncludes IIT Madras. We estimate where the people shaping AI studied and where their careers led. Massachusetts Institute of Technology leads with 467 former students, including 291 recorded doctorates.

Colleagues

People named in this biography, and people with dated positions at the same organization in the same years.

Sources and credits

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  1. Prof. Raghunathan Rengaswamy | Faculty | IIT Madras Zanzibar iitmz.ac.in. Checked 22 October 2026.
  2. Raghunathan Rengaswamy | Wadhwani School of Data Science and Artificial Intelligence wsai.iitm.ac.in. Checked 22 October 2026.
  3. Department of Chemical Engineering | Indian Institute Of Technology Madras , Chennai che.iitm.ac.in. Checked 22 October 2026.
  4. To Zanzibar, With love – Rendezvous ge.iitm.ac.in. Checked 22 October 2026.
  5. “Everyone who is successful wears multiple hats” | Prof. Raghunathan, Dean, Global Engagement | Best Place To Build bestplacetobuild.com. Checked 22 October 2026.
  6. [2103.17231] CDiNN -Convex Difference Neural Networks arxiv.org. Checked 22 October 2026.
  7. IIT Madras Zanzibar Campus inaugurated by His Excellency Dr. Hussein Ali Mwinyi, President of Zanzibar | Indian Institute of Technology Madras iitm.ac.in. Checked 22 October 2026.
  8. Raghunathan Rengaswamy | Centre for Responsible AI cerai.iitm.ac.in. Checked 22 October 2026.