Dr. Mohamed ElGawady, a professor of civil engineering at Missouri S&T, has been named S&T’s interim chair of civil, architectural and environmental engineering beginning Sept. 1. 
 
“Missouri S&T has some of the strongest civil, architectural and environmental engineering programs in the country, and this is evidenced by our department’s outstanding research and our students’ tremendous success in the field after graduating,” ElGawady says. “To lead the department as interim chair will be a true honor, and I am excited to carry on the great work of my predecessor.” 
 
As interim chair, ElGawady will take the department’s reins from Dr. Joel Burken, who has been chair since 2016. Burken, a Curators’ Distinguished Professor and Mathes Endowed Chair of Environmental Engineering, will remain on the S&T faculty.  
 
“Dr. ElGawady will bring a great deal of experience as interim chair of the department,” says Dr. David Borrok, vice provost and dean of S&T’s College of Engineering and Computing. “He is well respected by his students and colleagues, and it is clear he will work hard to continue the department’s forward momentum as we look for a permanent chair.”  
 
S&T will continue with a national search for the permanent position during the upcoming academic year.  
ElGawady joined the Missouri S&T faculty in 2012 as an associate professor and was promoted to professor in 2018. At S&T, he has won multiple awards for his excellence both as a researcher and in the classroom.  
 
He also serves as S&T’s Alard and Sheri Kaplan Faculty Scholar and was previously interim director of the Center for Infrastructure Engineering Studies.  
 
ElGawady is currently on sabbatical with the U.S. Department of Defense, where he is serving as the deputy lead of the Nuclear Portfolio in the Operational Energy-Innovation (OE-I) office, under the deputy assistant secretary of defense for energy resilience and optimization.  

ElGawady earned a Ph.D. in structural engineering from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology at Lausanne and both a master’s degree in structural engineering and a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering from Cairo University in Egypt.  
 
Before coming to S&T, ElGawady held academic positions in locations throughout the world, including Egypt, Switzerland, New Zealand, Australia, Japan and the United States.  
 
His research focuses on the resiliency and sustainability of infrastructure, addressing both human-made and natural hazards and incorporating the use of recycled materials. He is currently leading a national study on the dynamic performance of bridges under vehicle impacts and their potential repair options.  
 
An analysis published by Stanford University ranks ElGawady among the researchers cited most in his field in 2022 and throughout his career. He is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). 
 
For more information about S&T’s civil, architectural and environmental engineering programs, visit care.mst.edu. 

About Missouri S&T

Missouri University of Science and Technology (Missouri S&T) is a STEM-focused research university of over 7,000 students located in Rolla, Missouri. Part of the four-campus University of Missouri System, Missouri S&T offers over 100 degrees in 40 areas of study and is among the nation’s top public universities for salary impact, according to the Wall Street Journal. For more information about Missouri S&T, visit www.mst.edu.