William F. Baker Jr., structural engineering partner at architect Skidmore, Owings and Merrill LLP, is among 78 U.S. and overseas engineers elected to the National Academy of Engineering, the profession’s top distinction. He was cited for his innovative structures for global high-rise buildings.

Also elected were Armen Der Kiureghian, Taisei civil engineering professor at the University of California, Berkeley, for contributions to earthquake engineering innovation; Chris T. Hendrickson, engineering professor at Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, for transportation and green design leadership; Michael R. Hoffmann, environmental science professor at California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, for advances in water contaminant removal; and Henry Z. Kister, Fluor Corp. senior fellow, for leadership in distillation engineering.

The academy also elected Amadeo R. Odoni, professor of aeronautics and astronautics as well as civil and environmental engineering at MIT, Cambridge, Mass., for global leadership in airport systems; Karsten Pruess, senior scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, Calif., for advances in assessing subsurface heat and mass transport processes; Joan B. Rose, endowed chairwoman of water research at Michigan State University, East Lansing, for contributions to water quality and public health; and Mark D. Zoback, geophysics professor at Stanford University, Palo Alto, Calif., for technology advances in carbon dioxide sequestration.

Industry and academic engineers from Canada, the U.K. and Sweden were elected as “foreign associates” for their contributions in civil engineering, oil-sands production, water quality and nuclear technology, among other areas.