Sheila Widnall, Ph.D.

Advisory Committee

Sheila Widnall is currently Institute Professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Until October 1997, she was Secretary of the Air Force where, among other duties, she was responsible for research and development. Prior to her government service, she was Associate Provost at MIT, responsible for academic integrity, conflict of interest policy, federal relations, and international programs. She is a member and the current Vice President of the National Academy of Engineering and president-elect of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics. She has served on or chaired numerous committees of the National Academy of Engineering. She was also a member of the Columbia Accident Investigation Board. She has been a trustee of the Carnegie Corporation, the Aerospace Corporation, a director of the Draper Laboratories, Chemical Fabrics Inc., and a trustee of the Boston Science Museum. She was also a member of the Carnegie Commission on Science, Technology and Government, and is a past president of the AAAS. Her research activities have included the following: boundary layer stability, unsteady lifting-surface theory, unsteady leading-edge vortex separation from slender delta wings, helicopter noise, aerodynamics of high-speed ground transportation vehicles, aircraft-wake studies, turbulence and transition. She is currently associated with the Lean Aerospace Initiative, a partnership between industry, government/DOD and MIT that is dedicated to a vision of "significantly reducing the cost and cycle time for military aerospace products throughout the entire value chain while continuing to improve product performance.