Venkat Chandrasekaran

Venkat Chandrasekaran is the Kiyo and Eiko Tomiyasu Professor at the Computing and Mathematical Sciences and Electrical Engineering divisions within the Division of Engineering and Applied Science at the California Institute of Technology.

• B.A., Rice University, 2005
• B.S., Rice University, 2005
• M.S., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2007
• Ph.D., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2011

As an applied mathematician, Chandrasekaran's work focuses on optimization and the information sciences. His group develops mathematical foundations for applications in science and engineering, spanning convex optimization, statistical inference, inverse problems, graphs and combinatorial optimization, and applied algebra and geometry.

His publications from 2024–2004 demonstrate expertise in mathematical optimization, statistical modeling, and graphical representation. Themes include convex geometry, high-dimensional data analysis, and environmental systems modeling, with applications in hydrology, machine learning, and signal processing.

• INFORMS Optimization Society Prize
• Sloan Research Fellow
• AFOSR Young Investigator Award
• NSF CAREER Award
• Okawa Research Grant
• Young Researcher Prize

Chandrasekaran has advised students and postdocs including Armeen Taeb (University of Washington), Yong Sheng Soh (National University of Singapore), and Kevin Shu (Caltech Postdoc). His courses include Mathematical Optimization, Mathematics of Electrical Engineering, and Great Ideas in Data Science.