Hemanth Vundavilli is thrilled to expand his research, teach students and make as much of an impact at Coastal Carolina University as possible.
Joining Coastal’s department of Marine Science as an assistant professor of coastal oceanography, Vundavilli will be teaching MSCI 416 (Hydrogeology).
Vundavilli’s brilliance is no secret with accomplishments, awards and international recognition as an oceanography research scientist.
He was recently awarded the Pritchard Outstanding Physical Oceanography Paper Award by the Coastal & Estuarine Research Federation. The award itself is notable recognition, but especially as an early career researcher such as himself. His award-winning paper titled “The Influence of River Plume Discharge and Winds on Sediment Transport into a Coastal Mangrove Environment,” was published in 2024, just one year after earning his doctorate degree.
Vundavilli is excited for the opportunity to work with faculty in the marine science department, notably Paul Gayes, to collaborate and find sustainable preventatives to east coast flooding catastrophes.
“My expertise are not from, ‘oh, let’s just build this dam’ or ‘let’s just build this break’ or whatever. My thing is actually using nature as a solution,” Vundavilli said. “So, let’s actually build a few plants. That way, we are getting the ecosystem benefits while we are also able to thrive.”
However, extending his knowledge by working with upperclassmen and experts in this field is not his only goal.
“I intend to work with Sea Grant [The S.C. Sea Grant Consortium] to actually get more of high school students to understand a lot of oceanography,” he said. “So, all the K9-K12 students to actually come in and actually understand the really nuanced aspects of marine oceanography, which they might not be able to get it everywhere.”
Vundavilli said that he participated in similar work when working at Louisiana State University prior, and he wants to bring it to CCU.
He explains why working with students along with experienced scientists is an important goal for him by quoting one of his biggest academic influences, Richard Feman.
“He said this once, ‘if you can’t teach this in the most basic terms, you don’t know the subject enough.’ Like, if you can’t explain it to a really basic audience, that means you really don’t know and you’re just basically winging it,” Vundavilli said.
While Vundavilli has a passion for teaching and experience as a research associate that also taught core oceanography at LSU, he states that this opportunity to teach at CCU is one he will embrace as a new challenge.
“This actually gives me a really good challenge to learn how to break it down to individual levels,” he said. “Like, I’m not an expert on teaching. I’m an expert in physical oceanography. So, for me, this is also a really good learning curve.”
With this adjustment, Vundavilli feels confident in CCU student’s ability to work with him and put his own knowledge to the test. Based on a guest lecture he presented to a class of master students as well as undergrads, he was very impressed.
“There’s a bit of a brevity to the students and they’re like, always thinking a little bit ahead of what I have noticed in the other places,” Vundavilli said. “I did really notice that a lot because I was teaching on coastal hurricanes, and people were like on point, like really, really on point, which is something — it was very refreshing to see.”
