Howard Stone named University Professor at Princeton

Howard Stone, a leading engineering scholar and pioneer in fluid dynamics research, has been named University Professor, Princeton’s highest honor for faculty.

Stone, the Neil A. Omenn ’68 University Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, has been widely recognized for his original research in fluid dynamics and its applications at the interface of engineering, chemistry, physics and biology. His appointment became effective Sept. 28.

“Howard Stone has been an outstanding leader at Princeton and throughout the world,” said Dean of the Faculty Gene Jarrett. “He is an award-winning scholar of fluid mechanics, a talented teacher who has impacted generations of students, and a wonderful citizen who has advanced the careers of faculty, researchers and teachers in remarkable directions. His appointment as a University Professor is well-deserved.”

“To be honest, I am still in shock that this has happened,” said Stone, who has served as the Donald R. Dixon ’69 and Elizabeth W. Dixon Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering since 2009 and was department chair from 2014 to 2023. “Obviously, I am very honored and feel very fortunate.”

He continued: “I have been blessed with a career where I have been able to work with many talented students (graduate and undergraduate) and postdocs, and many collaborators around the world who have made my intellectual life richer. I have also been able to teach courses that I enjoy and share the ideas and approaches of engineering and applied mathematics with the next generation, who hopefully have benefited in some way and will go forward to have many wonderful impacts on the world.”

Stone joined the faculty of the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences at Harvard University in 1989, where he became the Vicky Joseph Professor of Engineering and Applied Mathematics. He received both the Joseph R. Levenson Memorial Award and the Phi Beta Kappa Teaching Prize in 1994, the only two teaching awards given to faculty in Harvard College. In 2000, he was named a Harvard College Professor for his contributions to undergraduate education.

Among his many honors, Stone has received the National Science Foundation Presidential Young Investigator Award. He is a fellow and an elected councilor of the American Physical Society and is past chair of the APS Division of Fluid Dynamics. In 2008, Stone was named the first recipient of the G.K. Batchelor Prize in Fluid Dynamics, and he was the 2016 recipient of the APS Fluid Dynamics Prize. He is an elected member of the National Academy of Engineering, the American Academy of Arts &  Sciences, the National Academy of Sciences, the Royal Society of the U.K. (foreign member) and the American Philosophical Society.

For 10 years Stone served as an associate editor for the Journal of Fluid Mechanics, and he is currently on the editorial or advisory boards of the journals Physical Review Fluids, Langmuir, and Soft Matter. He also is co-editor of the Soft Matter book series. 

Stone received a B.S. in chemical engineering from the University of California-Davis in 1982 and a doctorate in chemical engineering from Caltech in 1988. He then spent a postdoctoral year in the Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics at the University of Cambridge before joining Harvard.

Princeton currently endows 25 University Professorships. University Professors are recognized for demonstrating scholarly preeminence in their professional accomplishments, as well as making exceptional contributions to the University’s research and teaching community. 

The Neil A. Omenn '68 University Professorship was made possible by a gift from Princeton University alumni Gilbert S. Omenn, Class of 1961, and Martha A. Darling, a 1970 graduate alum, in memory of Gil Omenn's brother, Neil, of the Class of 1968.