On February 9, the National Academy of Engineering announced the latest list of academicians, adding a total of 111 academicians and 22 foreign academicians. Among them, Elon Musk was also included in the list.
Musk is involved in many cutting-edge technologies, and is the co-founder of PayPal, the founder of SpaceX, the founder of The Boring Company, the co-founder of SolarCity, OpenA, NeuralinkI, and the CEO of Tesla. In September 2021, he topped the world's richest man with a wealth of $270 billion.
Founded in 1964, the National Academy of Engineering is one of the highest academic societies in the American engineering community, and the top three awards of the American engineering community are selected by the National Academy of Engineering. It is also internationally renowned.
Inducted as a Fellow of the National Academy of Engineering, one of the highest professional honors in the engineering community, recognizes those who have made outstanding contributions to engineering research, practice, or education, including those who, where appropriate, made significant contributions to the engineering literature, and "those who have pioneered new and developing technological fields, made significant advances in traditional engineering fields, or developed/implemented innovative approaches to engineering education."
At present, there are only 2388 academicians of the National Academy of Engineering, and the number of international academicians has reached 310.
Musk was named to the list and also tweeted: Thank you very much! I usually describe myself as an engineer. It's basically something I've been doing since I was a kid.
But interestingly, the reason for Musk's selection is not Tesla, but the space program SpaceX, which the National Academy of Engineering said: Musk's SpaceX has made significant breakthroughs in the design, engineering, manufacturing and operation of recyclable launch vehicles and sustainable transportation and energy systems.
In terms of space exploration, on May 31, 2012, the Dragon capsule of Musk's company SpaceX successfully docked with the International Space Station and returned to Earth, opening the era of private operation of space delivery. On February 7, 2018, SpaceX's Falcon Heavy carrier rocket was successfully launched for the first time at the Kennedy Space Center in the United States, and successfully completed the complete recovery of two first-stage booster rockets. A new milestone was laid for the recyclable launch vehicle.