Dr Sathiskumar Anusuya Ponnusami has been awarded the 2027 Global Young Investigator Award by the American Ceramic Society, the largest professional body in the field.

This award is presented annually to an outstanding early-career researcher from the international ceramics community. Dr Ponnusami will win $1,500 and will subsequently give a keynote lecture at the Society’s flagship conference, the 51st International Conference and Expo on Advanced Ceramics and Composites (ICACC 2027) in Florida, where the award will also be presented.

Ceramics are used in some of the harshest environments we engineer, inside jet engines, power plants and spacecraft, because they can withstand temperatures where most other materials cannot. The challenge is that they are brittle, and predicting when and how they will fail is still difficult. Dr Ponnusami’s research focuses on developing computational models and frameworks to help design advanced ceramics and composites, including materials with capabilities such as self-healing, and to predict their failure more quickly and reliably.

Dr Ponnusami’s work began while working at TU Delft through his PhD, and continued at University of Oxford, and now continues at Queen Mary University of London, where he leads research in this area. His keynote speech, titled From Fracture Mechanics to Mechanics-Guided AI: Predictive Modelling and Design of Advanced Ceramics and Composites’, will draw on his research. Throughout his career he has collaborated with IISc, University of Florida, EPFL, and other industry partners.

Recently, his group has been combining machine learning with mechanics to make these simulations much faster, while preserving their reliability. This allows them to explore thousands of possible material designs rather than just a handful, and helps identify promising materials and designs for demanding applications.

Dr Ponnusami said “I am honoured to receive this prestigious award. It recognises work built over many years with brilliant students and collaborators, and it comes from the ceramics community itself, which makes it especially meaningful. I am proud to be carrying that work forward at Queen Mary, where we are bringing AI and mechanics together to design better high-temperature materials.”