Celebration of life set for Dr. S.T. Wu

Dr. S.T. Wu served at UAH since 1967.

Michael Mercier | UAH

Dr. S. T. Wu, Distinguished Professor Emeritus of the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and Center for Space Plasma and Aeronomic Research, passed away on Sunday, May 21, 2017.

A celebration of Dr. Wu’s life is planned on Tuesday, May 30. Visitation is from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m., immediately followed by the celebration service from 4 p.m. to 5 p.m. The visitation and service will be held at Berryhill Funeral Home, 2305 Memorial Pkwy NW, Huntsville.

A scholarship fund is being established in Dr. Wu’s name at UAH. In lieu of flowers, his family asks for donations to the scholarship. More details will be available soon.

Dr. Wu was the founder and first Director for the Center for Space Plasma and Aeronomic Research (CSPAR) and founder and first Director of the Institute for Space Physics, Astrophysics and Education (ISPAE). He served at UAH since 1967.

He completed his doctorate in 1967 at the University of Colorado at Boulder, then spent two years at the Division of Applied Physics at Harvard University and the Plasma Laboratory of Princeton University.

Dr. Wu was known globally for his research in the areas of fundamentals of plasma dynamics and magnetohydrodynamics and their application on astrogeophysical flows; numerical simulation on solar energy thermal storage systems; heat exchange design, solar terrestrial environment; laser gasdynamics; hydrodynamics transients; heat transfer; boundary layer type flows; high speed and missile aerodynamics; numerical methods on engineering and physical systems.

He presented more than 400 talks since 1963 at international and national meetings, seminars and colloquiums, and his articles were extensively published in the fields of plasma physics, solar physics, upper atmospheric physics, MHD flows, solar energy fundamentals and numerical methods.

Among many honors, Dr. Wu in 2015 was named the U.S. national representative/coordinating group chair of the Scientific Committee on Solar Terrestrial Physics (SCOSTEP) by the U.S. National Academy of Sciences. Previously, he was the recipient of the first American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) James A. Van Allen Space Environments Award for "for pioneering work in recognizing the impact of solar events on the earth's space environment and for the initial work on numerical magnetohydrodynamic modeling of the solar-terrestrial relationships."

Dr. Wu was a Fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, vice president of the Scientific Committee of Solar Terrestrial Physics (SCOSTEP) from 2002-2006 and a member of the University Cooperation for Atmospheric Research – President’s Advisory Committee on University Relations (UCAR-PACUR) 2004 – 2010. He had chaired or served as a member of numerous national and international committees.