She was born in New Delhi, India. She received her B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Texas Tech University (1979), and her M.S. in Electrical Engineering (1980) and Ph.D. in Applied Physics (1984) from the California Institute of Technology. She is a member of Eta Kappa Nu, Tau Beta Pi, and a senior member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers.
From 1984 to 1986, Dr. Prabhakar served as a Congressional Fellow in the Office of Technology Assessment of the U.S. Congress where she wrote on microelectronics research and development for the House Science, Research and Technology Subcommittee.
Dr. Prabhakar served for two years as Director of the Microelectronics Technology Office in the Defense Department's Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA), where she had managed advanced electronics research since 1986. She created the Microelectronics Technology Office to drive research, development, and demonstration of advanced microelectronics technologies critical to national security, with an emphasis on dual-use technologies. As Director of the office, she managed an annual budget of $300 million and contracts and collaborations with hundreds of organizations, including large electronics manufacturers, traditional defense contractors, small and medium-sized technology firms, universities, and other laboratories. Dr. Prabhakar had strategic responsibility for programs in semiconductor manufacturing technology, including SEMATECH and advanced lithography. The overall manufacturing programs were designed to stimulate and challenge the U.S. semiconductor industry to achieve cost-effective flexible manufacturing capability for high-value-added, differentiated products. Other areas of technology for which she was responsible included next-generation devices in optoelectronics, nanoelectronics, and neural networks as well as flexible manufacturing for infrared focal plane arrays.
Dr. Prabhakar was appointed tenth NIST Director by President Clinton, took office May 28, 1993. An agency of the Commerce Department's Technology Administration, NIST promotes U.S. economic growth by working with industry to develop and apply technology, measurements, and standards. As NIST Director, Dr. Prabhakar oversees a staff of approximately 3,200 and a budget of nearly $1 billion. She manages a portfolio of major programs that partner with industry in the pursuit of technology for economic growth: a competitive Advanced Technology Program that provides cost-shared awards to industry for development of high-risk technologies with significant commercial potential; a grassroots Manufacturing Extension Partnership designed to help small and medium-sized companies adopt new technologies; laboratory research and services focused on "infrastructural technologies," such as measurements, standards, evaluated data, and test methods; and the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award and an associated quality outreach program.