CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — Three University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign faculty members have been elected members of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, one of the oldest honorary societies in the United States. Deana McDonagh, Kenneth Suslick and Tandy Warnow are among the 252 inductees for 2026.
Founded in 1780, the Academy recognizes scientists, artists, scholars and leaders who have distinguished themselves in the public, private and nonprofit sectors.
McDonagh is a professor of industrial design in the School of Art and Design, a Health Innovation Professor in the Carle Illinois College of Medicine and the director of the (dis)Ability Design Studio at the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology at the U. of I. She is an empathic design research strategist who focuses on enhancing the quality of life for all through more intuitive and meaningful products, leading to emotional sustainability. Her research concentrates on emotional user-product relationships and how empathy can bring the designer closer to users’ authentic needs, ensuring both functional and emotional needs are met in the material landscape.
Suslick works at the forefront of chemical sensing as the Marvin T. Schmidt Professor Emeritus of Chemistry and CEO of Iridescent Sensors in the U. of I. Research Park. He developed a device for artificial olfaction, the “optoelectronic nose,” capable of detecting harmful substances in the air such as poisonous gases, toxins and explosives. He also is a leading expert on the chemical and physical effects of ultrasound, including sonochemistry and sonoluminescence. Among his other recognitions, he is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and fellow of the National Academy of Inventors, the American Chemical Society, the Royal Society of Chemistry and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Tandy Warnow is a professor and the associate director of the Siebel School of Computing and Data Science and Grainger Distinguished Chair in Engineering. She is a leading expert in designing mathematical and computational methods for estimating complex large-scale evolutionary history in biology and historical linguistics, where she combines computer science, statistics and discrete mathematics to obtain high accuracy and scalability. Her methods have been used in international collaborations to produce bird and plant phylogenies, among others. Some of her major honors include election as fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and receipt of a David and Lucile Packard Foundation Award, Radcliffe Institute Fellowship and John Simon Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship. She is affiliated with the Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology and the National Center for Supercomputing Applications as well as several other U. of I. departments.
The new Academy members will be inducted in an October ceremony in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The complete list of members elected to the Academy is available on its website.
