Notable alumni

Academia

College chancellors, presidents and vice-presidents

• Peter Alfonso - Vice President for Research, University of North Dakota
• Robert Altenkirch - President of the New Jersey Institute of Technology
• Diane M. Cook - Vice President and Treasurer, University of Miami, Florida
• C. J. Chang - President of Chung Hua University, Hsinchu, Taiwan
• Anthony Joseph DiGiorgio - President, Winthrop University
• Tony Frank - Senior Vice President and Provost, Colorado State University
• Arthur G. Hansen - former President of the Georgia Institute of Technology and Purdue University
• Edwin D. Harrison - former President of the Georgia Institute of Technology
• Blake Ragsdale Van Leer - former President of the Georgia Institute of Technology
• Kenneth L. Schwab - President of Centenary College of Louisiana
• Kenneth "Buzz" Shaw - Chancellor of Syracuse University
• James J. Stukel - former President of the University of Illinois
• Richard L. Mann - Vice Chancellor for Finance and Administration, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
• Renu Khator - Chancellor of the University of Houston System and President of the University of Houston
• Dorothy Leland - President, Georgia College & State University
• Hugo F. Sonnenschein - American economist and educational administrator, President of the University of Chicago
• Robert T. Sumichrast - Dean of the Terry College of Business, University of Georgia
• Sally Mason - President of the University of Iowa, former Provost of Purdue University
• Larry N. Vanderhoef - Chancellor of the University of California, Davis
• Kim A. Wilcox - Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs, Michigan State University

Deans

• Arthur J. Bond - Dean of the School of Engineering and Technology at Alabama A&M University and civil rights activist
• Domenico Grasso - Dean of the College of Engineering and Mathematical Sciences, University of Vermont
• Brig. Gen. David A. Wagie - Former Dean of the Faculty, United States Air Force Academy, Colorado Springs, Colo.
• Carolyn Y. Woo - Dean of the Mendoza College of Business, University of Notre Dame

Professors

• Kevin Granata - Adjunct Professor, Department of Engineering Science and Mechanics and Mechanical Engineering at Virginia Tech; victim of the Virginia Tech massacre
• Markus Kuhn - German computer scientist, researcher at the University of Cambridge Computer Laboratory
• G. V. Loganathan - Professor, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Virginia Tech; victim of the Virginia Tech massacre
• Dr. Donna J. Nelson - chemistry professor and scientific workforce scholar (Postdoctorate 1980-1983)
• John C. Reynolds - American computer scientist
• Thomas B. Sheridan - Professor of Mechanical engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, pioneer of robotics and remote control technology

Science and technology

Astronauts

• Neil Armstrong - first man to walk on the Moon
• John Blaha
• Roy D. Bridges
• Mark N. Brown
• John H. Casper
• Eugene Cernan - last man to walk on the Moon
• Roger Chaffee - killed in Apollo 1 accident
• Richard O. Covey
• Andrew J. Feustel
• Guy S. Gardner
• Virgil I. Grissom - second American in space, killed in Apollo 1 accident
• Gregory J. Harbaugh
• Michael J. McCulley
• Gary E. Payton
• Jerry L. Ross - holds the US record for spaceflights
• Mark L. Polansky
• Loren J. Shriver
• Janice E. Voss
• Charles D. Walker
• Mary E. Weber
• Donald E. Williams
• David A. Wolf

Researchers

• Edward Mills Purcell - Nobel Laureate in Physics in 1952
• Ben Roy Mottelson - Nobel Laureate in Physics in 1975
• Rita R. Colwell - environmental microbiologist and scientific administrator; Director National Science Foundation
• Harry K. Daghlian, Jr. - Physics, the first peacetime fatality of nuclear fission
• Ward Cunningham - inventor of the wiki concept
• Seymour Benzer - Physicist and Biologist, winner of the Wolf Prize in Medicine in 1991
• Elwood Mead - former Head, Bureau of Reclamation; oversaw the construction of Hoover Dam
• Ian Murdock - Founder of the Debian Project
• Russell Games Slayter - Chemical engineer, inventor of fiberglass

Arts and entertainment

• George Ade - humorist
• Ted Allen - one of the "Fab Five" on Queer Eye for the Straight Guy
• Eric Dill - musician, member of the band The Click Five
• Jim Gaffigan - comedian and actor
• Mass Giorgini - punk rock bassist for Screeching Weasel
• Harold Gray - creator of Little Orphan Annie comic strip
• John T. McCutcheon - cartoonist, recipient of a Pulitzer Prize in 1931
• Karen Marie Moning - novelist
• Mark O'Hare - writer and cartoonist who has worked on various Nickelodeon and Cartoon Network programs.
• George Peppard - actor, best known for his role as John "Hannibal" Smith on The A-Team and Paul Varjak in Breakfast at Tiffany's
• Booth Tarkington - novelist
• Jim Yukich- Grammy Award Winning Music Video and Television Director.

Business and industry

• Mike Gallagher - Managing Partner, SkillStorm
• Brett W. Able - Vice President and Chief Engineer, Dow Corning
• Stephen Bechtel, Jr. - Chairman Emeritus and Director of Bechtel Group, Inc.
• Michael J. Birck - Chairman and Founder of Tellabs, Inc.
• Anthony R. Bridge - Vice President-Engineering and Technology, United States Steel Corporation
• Susan Bulkeley Butler - first female partner at Accenture and author of Become the CEO of You, Inc.
• Stephen Brand - Vice President of Business Development and Exploration for ConocoPhillips
• John A. Edwardson - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, CDW
• Thomas J. Engibous - Chairman and former Chief Executive Officer, Texas Instruments
• Michael L. Eskew - Chairman and CEO, UPS
• Jeff Fisher - Senior Vice President, NVIDIA
• Jeffrey T. Foland - Senior Vice President, United Airlines
• Gen Fukunaga - President of FUNimation
• Patricia D. Galloway - Chief Executive Officer and Principal of Nielsen-Wurster
• Gerald D. Hines (BSME 1948) - Real estate developer and principal of Hines
• Jack A. Hockema - President and Chief Executive Officer, Kaiser Aluminum
• William P. Jones, Jr. - Vice President, Raytheon
• Keith J. Krach - President of 3points LLC; Co-founder of Ariba Inc., served as Chairman and CEO
• Karl J. Krapek - President, Pratt & Whitney
• Brian Lamb - Co-founder, Chairman, and CEO of C-SPAN
• John Landis - Senior Vice President, Schering-Plough
• Rita Lane - Senior Vice President, Motorola
• Frederick J. Palensky - Executive Vice President, Research and Development 3M
• John Purdue - Founder
• Orville Redenbacher - business leader and agriculturalist, of the popcorn fame
• George M. Scalise - President of the Semiconductor Industry Association
• Edmund Schweitzer - President of Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories
• S. Yvonne Scott - Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer, GATX
• Ruth Siems - home economist with General Foods, inventor of Stovetop Stuffing
• Philippe Tartavull - President and Chief Operating Officer, Hypercom Corporation
• James A. Thomson - President and Chief Executive Officer, Rand Corporation
• Mark Wey - President and founder of the consulting company MW Global Solutions
• Jong Woo Park - President of Samsung Electronics, Digital Media Group
• Greg Wasson - President and Chief Operating Officer Walgreens Corporation

Government and law

• Joe L. Barton - U.S. Representative from 6th District of Texas (R)
• Birch Bayh - former United States Senator from Indiana (D)
• Brian Bosma - Speaker of the Indiana General Assembly
• Earl L. Butz - former Secretary of the United States Department of Agriculture (R)
• Chuck Conner - Acting Secretary of the United States Department of Agriculture
• Harry Allison Estep - Republican member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Pennsylvania (R)
• Kirk Fordice - former Governor of Mississippi (R)
• Harry G. Leslie - former Governor of Indiana (R)
• Sun Liren - Chinese Nationalist General who excelled in the Burma Campaign during World War II
• Marwan Muasher - Deputy Prime Minister, Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan
• Bart Peterson - former Mayor of Indianapolis, Indiana (D)
• Wayne Townsend - member of both houses of the Indiana legislature and the Democratic candidate for governor in 1984 (D)

Sports

Administration

• Charles G. Armstrong - President and CEO of the Seattle Mariners

Baseball

• Jermaine Allensworth - former Major League Baseball player
• Bob Friend - former MLB pitcher
• Joe McCabe - Major League baseball player

Basketball

• Brian Cardinal - professional basketball player in the NBA
• Katie Douglas - basketball player in the WNBA
• Bob Kessler - two time All American, Big Ten Medal of Honor and went on to become head of Buick Motor Division, General Motors
• Brad Miller - two-time NBA All-Star, current center for the Sacramento Kings
• Rick Mount - basketball player
• Glenn Robinson - former NBA basketball player and 1994 NCAA Player of the Year
• Amy Ruley - North Dakota State University women's basketball coach
• John Wooden - Basketball Hall of Fame honoree as both player and coach
• Carl Landry - professional basketball player for the Houston Rockets

Football

• Mike Alstott - fullback for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Purdue's all-time leading rusher
• Drew Brees - quarterback for the New Orleans Saints
• Dave Butz - 16 Year NFL Lineman with the Washington Redskins and selected to the all NFL 1980's Team
• Rosevelt Colvin - professional football player in the NFL with the Chicago Bears and NFL Champion New England Patriots
• Gary Danielson - former NFL quarterback
• Len Dawson - Pro Football Hall of Fame quarterback with the Kansas City Chiefs, Super Bowl IV MVP
• Jim Everett - NFL quarterback
• Bob Griese - Pro Football Hall of Fame quarterback with the Miami Dolphins
• Mark Herrmann - NFL quarterback with the Indianapolis Colts and San Diego Chargers
• Kyle Orton - quarterback, drafted by the Chicago Bears in 2005
• Mike Phipps - College Football Hall of Fame former NFL Quarterback
• Bernard Pollard - safety of the Kansas City Chiefs
• Darryl Stingley - Football player and NFL Wide Receiver with the New England Patriots
• Hank Stram - Pro Football Hall of Fame coach of the Kansas City Chiefs
• Taylor Stubblefield - NCAA Division 1 football career receptions leader
• Rod Woodson - 11-time Pro-Bowler and former NFL cornerback
• Anthony Spencer - linebacker drafted by the Dallas Cowboys in 2007.
• John Standeford - wide receiver of the Indianapolis Colts participated in Super Bowl XLI.
• Gilbert Gardner - linebacker of the Indianapolis Colts participated in Super Bowl XLI.
• Matt Light - left tackle of the New England Patriots from 1996-2000 participated in Super Bowl XXXVI, XXXVIII, XXXIX, and XLII

Olympics

• Ray Ewry - Ten-time Olympic champion

Other

• David A. Bednar - LDS Church Apostle; former President of BYU-Idaho
• Dick the Bruiser - Professional wrestling champion
• Ryan Newman - driver, Nascar Sprint Cup series; 2002 Nascar Winston Cup Rookie of the Year; 2008 Daytona 500 winner
• Chris Schenkel - American sportscaster: New York (football) Giants, NCAA college football, professional bowlers tour, professional boxing, horse racing, professional golf, and NBA basketball
• Jon Fitch - American Mixed Martial Artist

Notable faculty

Engineering

• Arden L. Bement Jr. - Professor of Nuclear Engineering, Director of the National Science Foundation, former Director of NIST
• Reginald Fessenden - Professor of Electrical Engineering, first wireless voice transmission
• Lillian Gilbreth - Professor of Industrial Engineering, efficiency expert
• A. Alan Pritsker - Professor of Industrial Engineering, pioneer in Simulation Modeling and creator of GERT and SLAM programs
• Rusi Taleyarkhan - Professor of Nuclear Engineering
• Mark Lundstrom - Professor of Electrical Engineering, known for ballistic transport
• Henry T. Yang - Professor of Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering, Chancellor of the University of California, Santa Barbara
• Supriyo Datta - Professor of Electrical Engineering, for understanding transport phenomena at nanoscale

Science and mathematics

• Shreeram Shankar Abhyankar - Professor of Mathematics, known for his contributions to singularity theory
• Jeffrey Bennetzen - Professor of Genetics
• Carl R. de Boor - assistant professor at Purdue University, won the John Von Neumann Prize from the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics in 1996
• Louis de Branges de Bourcia - Professor of Mathematics, proved the Bieberbach conjecture
• Herbert C. Brown - Nobel Laureate in Chemistry in 1979
• Alok R. Chaturvedi is a professor at the Department of Computer Sciences; the Director of Purdue Homeland Security Institute; and the technical lead for the Sentient World Simulation project.
• Paul Erdos - Professor of Mathematics, winner of the Wolf Prize in Mathematics in 1983/4
• Bernard J. Liska - American food scientist
• Albert Overhauser - Professor of Physics, discovered the Overhauser Effect
• Alan Perlis - Professor of Mathematics, the first person to win the Turing Award in 1966
• Michael G. Rossmann - Professor of Biological Sciences, Member of National Academy of Sciences, mapped human common cold virus, pointed out the Rossmann fold
• Julian Schwinger - Nobel Laureate in Physics in 1965
• Eugene Spafford - Professor of Computer Science and Director of CERIAS, computer security expert
• Jeffrey Vitter - Frederick L. Hovde Dean of Science
• Clarence Abiathar Waldo - Professor of Mathematics, noted for his role in defeating the Indiana Pi Bill of 1897

Other

• Louis Rene Beres - Professor of Political Science
• Robert X. Browning - Professor of Political Science
• Amelia Earhart - Women's career counselor, aviator
• William H. Gass - American novelist and short story writer
• Vernon L. Smith - Nobel Laureate in Economics in 2002
• Dorothy C. Stratton - First full-time dean of Women (1933 - 1942), Director of the SPARS during World War II
• Patricia Henley - American novelist and short story writer