Professor Kunnath’s research interests include performance-based seismic engineering, nonlinear modeling of structural behavior, computational methods and software development for seismic analysis of structures, damage mechanics, fatigue behavior of structural materials, and experimental methods in support of model-based simulation.
Professor Kenneth was the former department chair of the Civil and Environmental Engineering department at UC Davis.
Prof Kunnath was the primary author and developer of the IDARC series of computer programs which was a pioneering effort within the National Center for Earthquake Engineering Research Center (now known as MCEER) during 1986-1991 to assist in model-based seismic simulation of reinforced concrete structures.
Prof. Kunnath has received funding for his research from the National Science Foundation, the Multidisciplinary Center for Earthquake Engineering Research Center (formerly NCEER), the Florida Department of Transportation, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), the FEMA-SAC Phase II Research Project, the California Strong Motion Instrumentation Program (CSMIP) and the California Department of Transportation (CALTRANS).
Prof Kunnath is currently a part of the Executive Committee of the Technical Activities Division for the Structural Engineering Institute of ASCE. He formerly chaired the ASCE Technical Administrative Committee on Dynamic Effects and is a member of several technical committees of ACI and ASCE. A Fellow of the American Concrete Institute, Prof. Kunnath was the 2001 recipient of the ACI Structural Research Award for his work on cumulative seismic damage of circular bridge columns, the 2008 recipient of the ASCE Raymond Reese Research Prize for his co-authored paper on modal adaptive pushover analysis of building structures and the 2009 ASCE Richard Torrens Award for his service contributions as Editor of the Journal of Structural Engineering.