Dr. Narendra D. Joshi
B.Tech., 1979, Mechanical Engineering

Dr. Narendra D. Joshi is currently Chief Scientist, General Electric Global Research Center and Advanced Propulsion Technologies Leader.

He graduated from IIT Bombay in 1979. He earned his PhD in Mechanical Engineering from the State University of New York at Stony Brook in 1984.

Dr. Joshi started his career studying flames in microgravity before switching to gas turbine combustion systems working on innovative gas turbine concepts for power generation in a small company. Here he developed his expertise on combustion systems. He moved to General Electric Aircraft engines and was tasked with the development of the DLE combustion systems for the LM series of engines. Nitrogen oxides are formed in the high temperature regions of gas turbine combustion chambers. Dr. Joshi led a team that redesigned these chambers to effect 90% reduction in emissions of nitrogen oxides while developing the Dry Low Emissions combustion technology for the General Electric aeroderivative gas turbine engines such as the 40MW class LM6000. The team developed the world’s first, lean premixed, triple annular combustion system, which utilized another world first, an active acoustic control for combustion dynamics.

He gained additional insight into the deployment of combustion systems while leading the combustion team working on the GE90 engine, which powers the Boeing 777 aircraft. Following these assignments, he moved over to the aeroderivative business and was responsible for the advancement of aeroderivative engines. In this position, he helped develop the SPRINT systems which increased power output of the LM6000 engines upto 25% on hot days. He was also responsible for the development of the concept of the world’s first intercooled aeroderivative gas turbine engine the LMS100 which is based on the CF6-80C2 and the 6FA gas turbine engines. He was a part of the team that developed and introduced this 100 MW class power-plant.

After the commercial introduction of the LMS100 power plant, Dr. Joshi moved to General Electric Global Research (GEGR) to lead advanced technology programs for propulsion. At GEGR Centre, he is responsible for a comprehensive portfolio of programs, developing technologies from the nacelle and fan of a turbo-fan engine to the combustion and turbine components as well as electric hybrid propulsion.

Dr. Joshi is a member of the AIAA and ASME. Within the AIAA, he is a member of the Gas Turbine Engine Technology, the Energy Optimized aircraft, Green Engineering and the Pressure Gain Combustion committees. He Joshi has over 12 publications and 56 issued patents to his credit.

He has been awarded the GE Energy DTI Growth Champion in 2005, GE Energy Intellectual Property Value Award and General Electric Lewis Latimer Award in 2004, GE Aircraft Engines Sanford Moss award for LM6000 Field intro in 1996 and AIAA Dayton/Cincinnati Chapter award for outstanding achievement in 1995.


Special Memories

One of the memorable events was the All India Machine Tools Design and Research conference in 1978. IIT Bombay hosted a number of events. Among the things we did was making a number of displays in the machine tools lab working for Prof. Ramaswamy and hosting lunches in the foyer of Convo.