Professor Sadayappan named 2018 Ohio State Distinguished Scholar

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On March 3, 2018, during a full CSE faculty meeting, a group of University leaders from the Office of Research and Office of Provost unexpectedly entered Dreese Lab 480 and announced that CSE Professor Sadayappan had been selected to be one the six University Distinguished Scholars this year. This annual award is given to a small number of top professors for their exceptional scholarly accomplishments. CSE faculty members were surprisingly pleased in this ceremony because they consider Saday truly deserves this award. Saday’s wife and daughter came to join the celebration.

Two major products determine the distinguished level of a university: the impact of faculty scholarships and the excellence of the graduated students. Saday has made great contributions for these two products at The Ohio State University. Saday joined the CSE department in 1983 (35 years ago) as an assistant professor. He has graduated more than 40 Ph.D. students. Many of them are academic and industrial leaders including an Intel Fellow, an IBM Fellow, and a Distinguished University Professor. Saday is also an outstanding teacher, and has received several teaching awards. Saday is internationally renowned for his research on compilers for high-performance and parallel computing. His nomination was supported by a group of distinguished experts in his field. One expert says, “Saday has established a well-deserved reputation among his national and international peers as a stellar researcher in high-performance computing who pursues innovative approaches to persisting problems of productivity and programmability in the field.” Another one states, “Saday has been one of the most highly influential, innovative and productive researchers in enhancing productivity while enabling a high level of performance in high-performance computing for over 30 years, in addition to outstanding teaching, mentoring and service to the profession and community.”

Saday is the third Distinguished Scholar since 2014 within the CSE department after Leon Wang and DK Panda. In the ceremony, Department Chair Xiaodong Zhang commented on the three distinguished colleagues by three common traits: “First, all of them grew from the grass roots as assistant professors in this department. Second, each of them is best known in their fields for significant contributions. Finally, they are all working very hard in a persistent way because they aim for big impact.” Congratulations to Saday on this honor.

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Pictured from left to right: Dr. Leon Wang, Professor in CSE; Dr. Xiaodong Zhang, CSE Department Chair; Valli Sadayappan, wife of Saday;  Dorota Grejner-Brzezinska, Assoc. Dean for Research; Shambavi Sadayappan, daughter to Saday; Janet Weisenberger, Senior Associate VP for the Office of Research Faculty;  Dr.  P. (Saday) Sadayappan; Kay Wolf, Vice Provost for Academic Policy and Faculty Resources; Dr. Randy Moses, Interim Senior VP for Research