Maitreyee Sharma Priyadarshini

Maitreyee Sharma Priyadarshini is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Aerospace and Ocean Engineering at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech). She holds a Ph.D. in Aerospace Engineering from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (2022), an M.S. in Aerospace Engineering from the same institution (2017), and a B.E. in Mechanical Engineering from PES Institute of Technology, India (2015). Her research focuses on hypersonics, physics-informed modeling, machine learning, computational materials discovery, and energy applications.

Dr. Priyadarshini’s academic journey includes postdoctoral research at Johns Hopkins University (2022–2024) and prior roles as a graduate research assistant and teaching assistant at UIUC. She has contributed to NASA Ames Research Center as a visiting scholar and intern. Her work bridges computational methods with aerospace engineering challenges, emphasizing chemically reacting flows and materials innovation.

Research interests center on advancing hypersonic aerodynamics, developing machine learning frameworks for materials discovery, and modeling non-equilibrium flows. Her recent projects include reinforcement learning for feature selection in materials modeling and closed-loop approaches for multi-principal element alloys.

Honors include the Mark O. Robbins Future Faculty Award (2024), CAS Future Leaders Top 100 (2024), and Rising Stars in Aerospace (MIT, 2021). Professional memberships span the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, American Institute of Chemical Engineers, and American Chemical Society.

Teaching includes courses AOE 3164 (Aerothermodynamics and Propulsion) and AOE 6124 (Hypersonic Aerodynamics). She leads the Aadhaar Research Group, exploring interdisciplinary solutions in energy, aerospace, and materials science.