Arun Majumdar

Dr. Arun Majumdar is the Jay Precourt Professor at Stanford University, a faculty member of the Department of Mechanical Engineering and co-director of the Stanford Precourt Institute for Energy. In October 2009, President Obama nominated Arun and the Senate confirmed him as the founding director of the Advanced Research Projects Agency–Energy (ARPA-E), where he served until June 2012. Between March 2011 and June 2012, Arun was also the acting under secretary of energy and a senior advisor to Secretary of Energy Steven Chu. After leaving Washington, DC and before joining Stanford, Arun was the vice president for energy at Google, where he created several energy technology initiatives, especially on the electricity grid, and advised the company on its broader energy strategy. Prior to joining the Department of Energy, Arun was the Almy & Agnes Maynard Chair Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science & Engineering at University of California–Berkeley and the associate laboratory director for energy and environment at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Arun serves as the Vice Chairman of the U.S. Secretary of Energy’s advisory board, the councils of the National Academy of Engineering and the Electric Power Research Institute, the science policy committee of SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory and Oak Ridge National Laboratory. He is a member of the international advisory panel for energy of the Singapore Ministry of Trade & Industry and the U.S. delegation for the U.S.–India Track II dialogue on climate change and energy. The U.S. State Department recently appointed him as a U.S. science envoy with an emphasis on energy and innovation in Poland and the Baltic region. Arun is a member of the National Academy of Engineering and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He earned a bachelor’s degree at the Indian Institute of Technology–Bombay in 1985 and his Ph.D. from U.C.–Berkeley in 1989, both in mechanical engineering. Dr. Arun Majumdar became the first Director of the Advanced Research Projects Agency – Energy (ARPA-E), the country’s only agency devoted to transformational energy research and development, in October 2009. He also serves as the Acting Under Secretary of Energy. Prior to joining ARPA-E, Dr. Majumdar was the Associate Laboratory Director for Energy and Environment at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and a Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science and Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. He helped shape several strategic initiatives in the areas of energy efficiency, renewable energy, and energy storage. He also testified before Congress about how to reduce energy consumption in buildings. Dr. Majumdar received his Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering at the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay in 1985, and his Doctorate of Philosophy from the University of California, Berkeley in 1989.