Pramod Khargonekar earned a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering in 1977 from the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay, India, and master’s degree in mathematics in 1980 and doctoral degree in electrical engineering in 1981 from the University of Florida. He has been on faculty at the University of Florida, University of Minnesota, the University of Michigan, and the University of California, Irvine. He was chairman of the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from 1997 to 2001. He held the position of Claude E. Shannon Professor of Engineering Science at the University of Michigan. From 2001 to 2009, he was dean of the college of engineering at the University of Florida and served as the Eckis Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering until 2016. From 2016 to 2025, he was vice chancellor for research at the University of California, Irvine, where he currently holds the position of distinguished professor of electrical engineering and computer science.

In addition to academic leadership roles, Khargonekar served briefly as deputy director of technology at ARPA-E, U.S. Department of Energy, in 2012-13. He was appointed by the National Science Foundation to serve as assistant director for the Directorate of Engineering in March 2013, a position he held until June 2016. In this position, Khargonekar led the ENG directorate with an annual budget of more than $950 million. In addition, he served as a member of the NSF senior leadership and management team and participated in setting priorities and policies.

Khargonekar’s research and teaching interests are centered on theory and applications of systems and control. His early work was on mathematical control theory, specifically focusing on robust control analysis and design. During the 1990s, he was involved in a major multidisciplinary project on applications of control and estimation techniques to semiconductor manufacturing. His current research and teaching interests include systems and control theory, machine learning & artificial intelligence, and applications to smart electric grid, renewable integration, and manufacturing.

Recipient of numerous honors and awards, Khargonekar has been recognized as a Web of Science Highly Cited Researcher. He is a recipient of the IEEE Control Systems Award, IEEE Control Systems Society Bode Lecture Prize, NSF Presidential Young Investigator Award, the American Automatic Control Council’s Donald Eckman Award, the Japan Society for Promotion of Science Fellowships, World Automation Congress Honor, the IEEE W. R. G. Baker Prize Award, the IEEE CSS George Axelby Best Paper Award, the Hugo Schuck ACC Best Paper Award, and the Distinguished Alumnus and Distinguished Service Awards from the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay. He is a fellow of IEEE, IFAC, and AAAS. At the University of Michigan, he received the Claude Shannon Chair and Arthur F. Thurnau Professorship. In the past, he has served as associate editor for IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control, SIAM Journal of Control, Systems and Control Letters, and International J. of Robust and Nonlinear Control, and is currently on the editorial board of the Proceedings of IEEE, Annual Reviews in Control, and Sustainability Analytics and Modeling.

Khargonekar has served on numerous committees in IEEE, IFAC, AAAS, NASEM, and other professional organizations. He currently serves on the governance board of Clean Energy Smart Manufacturing Innovation Institute; California Council of Science and Technology; the Scientific Advisory Board of NSF ERC on Internet of Things for Precision Agriculture; and Chairs the Scientific Advisory Board of the NSF STC on Science and Technologies for Phosphorus Sustainability (STEPS).