Arati Prabhakar
| Arati Prabhakar | |
|---|---|
20th director of DARPA
|
|
| Born |
February 2, 1959 New Delhi, India |
| Citizenship | American |
| Institutions |
NIST U.S. Venture Partners DARPA |
| Alma mater |
Texas Tech University California Institute of Technology |
| Notable awards | IEEE Fellow |
| Children | 2 |
Arati Prabhakar (born February 2, 1959) is an American engineer and the former head of DARPA, the United States Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, a position she held from July 30, 2012 to January 20, 2017.
She headed National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) from 1993 to 1997, and was the first woman to head NIST.
Prabhakar immigrated to the United States from her birthplace of New Delhi, India at age three; her mother was seeking an advanced degree in social work in Chicago. Prabhakar grew up in Lubbock, Texas, from age ten. Her mother encouraged her to pursue a PhD from a very early age.
She has a 1979 bachelor of science in electrical engineering from Texas Tech University in Lubbock, Texas. She earned a Master of Science in electrical engineering in 1980 and a PhD in applied physics in 1984, both from the California Institute of Technology. She was the first woman to earn a PhD in applied physics from Caltech.
After receiving her PhD, she went to Washington, D.C. on a 1984 to 1986 congressional fellowship with the Office of Technology Assessment. Prabhakar subsequently worked at DARPA from 1986 to 1993, initially as a program manager but later as founding director of DARPA's Microelectronics Technology Office.
At the age of 34, Prabhakar was appointed the head of National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), a position she held from 1993 to 1997. After NIST, she was the Chief Technology Officer and senior vice president of Raychem from 1997 to 1998. She was then the vice president and later president of Interval Research from 1998 to 2000.
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