Tara Ramani , Ph.D., PE

TTI Research Engineer
Division Head

Education

• Ph.D., Urban and Regional Planning, Texas A&M University, 2017
• M.S., Transportation (Civil Engineering), Texas A & M University, 2008
• B.E., Civil Engineering, Anna University, 2005

Short Biography

Dr. Tara Ramani is the Division Head for the Air Quality, Energy and Health Division of the Texas A&M Transportation Institute (TTI). In this role, she oversees TTI’s work in the area of transportation air quality, including the spectrum from mobile source emissions testing to mobile source emissions modeling, air quality modeling and health impact assessments, policy analyses and studies of emissions and health impacts of new transportation technologies.

Dr. Ramani also serves as Deputy Director of the Center for Advancing Research in Transportation Emissions, Energy, and Health (CARTEEH), a US Department of Transportation funded University Transportation Center. The CARTEEH consortium, over the last several years, has pioneered an interdisciplinary approach to studying transportation emissions and impacts on human health, with a focus on integrated modeling, low-cost and community-scale air quality monitoring, assessments of equity and burden of disease, investigation of innovative mitigation strategies, and study of new technologies and their impacts on emissions and health.

In her work at TTI, Dr. Ramani has been able to conduct academic research bridging several disciplines, as well as support practitioner organizations on air quality issues, especially related to mobile sources. She has worked for a range of state, federal, and local government entities to support their efforts relating to transportation conformity (regional and project-level), to assess impacts of various transportation projects, programs, and policies on air quality, and to address linkages between transportation air quality, sustainable transportation, and health.  

Dr. Ramani is active in the transportation research community, having authored several journal papers, technical reports, and book chapters; and presented her work at several venues worldwide. She is a member of the US Environmental Protection Agency's Mobile Sources Technical Review Subcommittee and is serving as a contributor to the ongoing Fifth National Climate Assessment (NCA5). She is a member of the Transportation Research Board’s (TRB’s) Standing Committee on Air Quality and Greenhouse Gas Mitigation as well as the Standing Committee on Transportation Energy. She has also previously served as vice-chair of the TRB Committee on Sustainable Transportation and as a member of the Committee on Performance Measurement. She holds an undergraduate degree in Civil Engineering from Anna University, India, and an M.S. in Civil (Transportation) Engineering, and a Ph.D. in Urban Planning, both from Texas A&M University. She is also a licensed professional engineer (PE) in Texas.