"I am confident that GS will bring strong leadership, care, and thoughtfulness to both civil engineering and the College," Jamieson said. "I look forward to the great things that CE will accomplish in the coming years."

Jamieson also expressed thanks to Melba Crawford, associate dean of engineering for research, who has served as interim head of civil engineering during the search.

Govindaraju earned a Bachelor of Technology (Hons.) degree in civil engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur, in 1984, and a doctorate in civil engineering from the University of California, Davis, in 1989. Govindaraju came to Purdue in 1997 and was promoted to full professor in 2001. He has chaired the CE Graduate Committee since 2007.

His primary areas of research include surface and subsurface hydrology, contaminant transport, watershed hydrology, and climatic influences. He specializes in problems with uncertainty and spatial variability. He has co-authored four books, about 20 book chapters, more than 100 refereed journal articles, and 125 conference presentations.

His work has been recognized with numerous awards, including the Walter L. Huber Civil Engineering Research Prize and the Arid Lands Hydraulic Research Prize. He chairs many national level committees, and serves on the editorial boards of several international journals. He is currently the Surface Water Section Editor of Journal of Hydrologic Engineering of American Society of Civil Engineers.