Professor establishes engineering scholarship at NC State

A North Carolina State University engineering professor and his wife have established a $25,000 scholarship endowment for undergraduate students in the College of Engineering.

The gift from Dr. K. Linga Murty and his wife, Ratnaveni, will provide scholarships for students enrolled in either nuclear engineering or materials science and engineering at NC State.

The Murtys, who grew up in the same town in India, married in 1969 and have a son and daughter who attended NC State. K. Linga Murty comes from a philanthropically active family — the college he attended in India, Lingamurty College, was named after his grandfather — and the couple’s gift carries on that tradition.

“NC State has been good to us,” said Murty, who joined the faculty in 1981. “We have been very happy with what we have achieved here, and we felt like it was time to give back.”

Murty, a professor of nuclear engineering and materials science and engineering, is a leading researcher in nuclear materials and fuels. His work has proven pivotal to engineers’ understanding of how radiation affects deformations and fractures of materials used in nuclear power plants. He has also developed new, non-destructive ways to test the conditions of nuclear materials currently in service.

His work has earned him numerous honors, including the American Nuclear Society’s (ANS) Mishima Award and NC State’s Alcoa Foundation Research Achievement Award. He is a Fellow of ANS and ASM International.

Murty received his PhD in applied physics from Cornell University in 1970.