J. S. Chen is William Prager Chair Professor and Distinguished Professor of Structural Engineering Department, Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Department, and the Founding Director of Center for Extreme Events Research at UC San Diego. Before joining UCSD in 2013, he was the Chancellor’s Professor of UCLA Civil & Environmental Engineering Department where he served as the Department Chair during 2007-2012. J. S. Chen’s research is in computational mechanics and multiscale materials modeling with specialization in the development of meshfree methods. J. S. Chen earned his undergraduate degree in Civil Engineering from National Central University in Taiwan, MS in Civil Engineering and Ph.D. in Theoretical and Applied mechanics from Northwestern University.
John von Neumann Medal, US Association for Computational Mechanics, 2025.
Yushan Fellow, Ministry of Education, Taiwan, 2024.
Raymond D. Mindlin Medal, ASCE Engineering Mechanics Institute, 2024.
Computational Mechanics Award, Japan Association for Computational Mechanics (JACM), 2021.
Grand Prize, Japan Society for Computational Engineering and Science (JSCES), 2020.
The Belytschko Medal, U.S. Association for Computational Mechanics (formerly USACM Computational Structural Mechanics Award), June, 2017
Ted Belytschko Applied Mechanics Award, ASME Applied Mechanics Division, November, 2016.
President of ASCE Engineering Mechanics Institute (EMI), 2015 - 2017.
The Computational Mechanics Award, International Association for Computational Mechanics (IACM), 2012.
The ICACM Award, International Chinese Association for Computational Mechanics (ICACM), 2011.
President, US Association for Computational Mechanics, 2010-2012.
Outstanding Alumnus of National Central University, Taiwan, 2007.
Chancellor's Professor, UCLA, 2006-2013.
James Lightners Faculty Fellowship, The University of Iowa, 2001.
Faculty Scholar Award, The University of Iowa, 2000.
Carver Scientific Research Initiation Award, The University of Iowa, 1996.
GenCorp Technology Achievement Award, GenCorp, 1991.
Fellow of USACM, IACM, ASME, EMI, SES, ICACM, and ICCEES.