Dr. Kshitiz Upadhyay is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Aerospace Engineering and Mechanics at the University of Minnesota. His research interests lie broadly in the mechanics of soft materials, with a focus on constitutive modeling, experimental solid mechanics, data-driven methods, and injury biomechanics. His work is supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF), the Office of Naval Research (ONR), the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the Louisiana Board of Regents (LABoR), and the University of Minnesota.

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Dr. Upadhyay has received multiple awards for his research, including the Early Career Research Award from the World Council of Biomechanics (2022), the Best Dissertation Award from the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at the University of Florida (2020), and the Gator Engineering Attribute Award for professional excellence from UF (2020).

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Prior to joining UMN, he served as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering at Louisiana State University (2022–2025), and as a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Hopkins Extreme Materials Institute at Johns Hopkins University (2020–2022). He earned his Ph.D. and M.S. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Florida (2020, 2019), and a B.Tech. in Mechanical Engineering from the National Institute of Technology, Bhopal, India (2014).