Vietnamese-American engineer wins US award meant for ethnic Asians

Dr Pham Khanh, 48, a senior engineer at the Air Force Research Laboratory-Space Vehicles Directorate at Kirtland Air Force Base in New Mexico, the U.S., will receive the Professional Achievement Award at a ceremony in Pennsylvania next week.

This is the second time that Khanh is recognized by the society for his contributions to Air Force research and the science/engineering community. He was honored with Engineer/Scientist of the Year in the Government Category last year.

Khanh is the first ethnic Vietnamese winner of the awards, which were founded in 2007 to honor scientists and engineers of Asian heritage in education and employment.

The awards are given in two main categories, leadership and achievement.

Nominees should be a highly experienced, mid-career (with 10 to 22 years of experience) professional who has made significant discoveries or important advances in their chosen career, and acknowledged as a leader of large initiatives.

Born in Ho Chi Minh City, Khanh left Vietnam with his entire family for the U.S. in December 1990 when he was a second-year student of electrical engineering at the Ho Chi Minh University of Technology and Education.

He learned English after landing in the U.S. In the late 1990s he got bachelor's and master's science degrees in electrical engineering from the University of Nebraska, and in 2004 completed a doctorate at the University of Notre Dame.

Khanh joined the Air Force Research Laboratory's Space Vehicles Directorate in 2004 and has been involved in a number of researches with the Department of Defense, academia and industry.

"Khanh has made pioneering contributions in the fields of satellite command and control autonomy and military communications," Major General William Cooley, AFRL commander, was quoted as saying in a post on the AFRL’s website in May when Khanh won the 2018 Arthur S. Flemming award in Basic Science.