Prior to joining NUS, he was a post doctoral fellow (2005-2008) in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at The John Hopkins University. He earned his PhD in Civil Engineering from Indian Institute of Technology-Bombay in 2002. Aster a short stint as a visiting scientist at University of Stuttgart (2002), he worked as a research engineer at GE-India Technology Center in Bangalore, India (2003-2005). His current research focuses on computational and experimental mechanics of strengthening and failure in advanced microstructures over a range of length and time-scales to enable designing light-weight materials with impressive mechanical behaviors. Shailendra enjoys playing amateur squash.