Dr. Stan Atcitty is a member of the Navajo Tribe and he received his BS and MS degree in electrical engineering from New Mexico State University in 1993 and 1995, respectively. In 2006, he was the first American Indian male to receive a Ph.D. in electrical and computer engineering from Virginia Tech University. He is presently a Distinguish Member of Technical Staff at Sandia National Laboratories in the Energy Storage Technology and Systems department. He leads the power electronics subprogram as part of the DOE Energy Storage Program and has gained international recognition for its state-of-the-art research and development under his leadership.

Five of his projects have won the prestigious R&D 100 award from the Research & Development magazine. His interest in research is power electronics necessary for integrating energy storage and distributed generation with the electric utility grid. Stan has over 50 publications and holds four patents and another two pending. In 2007, he received the American Indian Science and Engineering Society Technical Excellence Award for his American Indian community involvement and technical achievement.

He was recently featured in a middle school level children’s book titled “Energy Basics – Energized!” published by Sally Ride Science book in 2012. In 2013, he coauthored a book titled Power Electronics for Renewable and Distributed Energy Systems. In addition, President Barack Obama presented Stan with the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientist and Engineers on July 31, 2012. This is the highest honor bestowed by the US government for outstanding scientist and engineers who show exceptional leadership at the frontiers of scientific knowledge during the twenty-first century.