Pramod P. Khargonekar is the Vice Chancellor for Research and Distinguished Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at the University of California, Irvine. An expert in control systems engineering, Dr. Khargonekar has served in a variety of administrative roles in academia and federal funding agencies. Most recently, he served as Assistant Director for Engineering at the National Science Foundation (2013-2016), and as Deputy Director for Technology at the Advanced Research Projects Agency – Energy (ARPA–E, 2012–13). From 2001 through 2009 he was the Dean of the College of Engineering at the University of Florida. History Dr. Khargonekar was born in Indore, Madhya Pradesh, India. He earned his bachelor's degree at the Indian Institutes of Technology, Bombay. In the late 1970s, he moved to Gainesville, Florida, where he studied under the guidance of Rudolf Kálmán. At the University of Florida, Dr. Khargonekar received a master's degree in mathematics in 1980, and a doctorate in electrical engineering in 1981. Later in 1981 he joined the University of Florida faculty as an assistant professor of electrical engineering. In 1984, he moved to the University of Minnesota as an Associate Professor, and then was appointed full Professor in 1988. In 1989 he joined the University of Michigan faculty, where, in 1997, he was appointed Chair of the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, and in 2000 became the Claude E. Shannon Professor of Engineering Science. In 2001 he returned to his alma mater to become Dean of the College of Engineering and Eckis Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering. During his tenure as Dean (2001-2009), the number of Ph.D.s awarded (189 during his final year) enjoyed a nearly 100 percent increase. As Dean, he also developed an ambitious strategic plan to elevate the ranking of the College of Engineering, and succeeded in moving it up to 25 (15 among public universities) from 35 (20 among public universities). In collaboration with the College's faculty, in 2002 he also created a Biomedical Engineering Department, which in 2009 moved into the new interdisciplinary Biomedical Sciences Building, which he collaborated with the UF College of Medicine to create. Among his other accomplishments during his tenure as Dean, total research expenditures at the College of Engineering grew from about $65 million to more than $109 million. Research Dr. Khargonekar's research interests focus on systems and control theory and its applications. Control systems are ubiquitous in modern technological