For 60-year-old Subhash Chander, teaching at Penn State was more than just a job -- it was a passion.

"I know he loved to teach," Ankit Chander said about his father who passed away Sunday. "He really enjoyed the actual teaching of it beyond just preparation. I know he enjoyed his time at Penn State."

Chander died Sunday at Mt. Nittany Medical Center after experiencing some discomfort while taking a walk, according to Sarma Pisupati, one of his co-workers at Penn State. The cause of death is still unknown.

As a professor of mineral processing and geo-environmental engineering, Chander was respected by many of his colleagues.

"He didn't say much, but when he did, it was very wise," Sarma Pisupati, associate professor of energy and geo-environmental engineering, said. "He wasn't a loud person who liked to make jokes. He just liked to listen."

Pisupati said Chander will be missed in more places than just the classroom.

"He and I are both from India, so I saw him very active in the community," he said. "He was always a very pleasant person."

Chander joined Penn State's mineral processing faculty in 1983 after he spent time at University of California-Berkeley, and the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur.

He became a full professor at Penn State in 1989. This semester he was teaching GEOEE 404 (Surface and Interfacial Phenomena in Geo-Environmental Systems) and has taught various mineral processing courses in past semesters.

He was a founding member of the Geo-Environmental Engineering

program and served as the first director of Penn State's Center for Sustainable Mining with Penn State's Alliance for Earth Sciences Engineering and Development in Africa.

"He had been to Africa," said Ankit, who lives in Baltimore. "He had a recent trip planned, but he won't get to go. He's been all over the world to every continent except Antarctica. There's been a lot of international people emailing me. He had friends almost everywhere."

Associate professor of mineral processing Mku Ityokumbul said Chander displayed a very unselfish attitude while working with other faculty members in the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences' Energy and Geo-Environmental Engineering Department.

"He was always willing to help other people," Ityokumbul said. "I would work on projects and he would discuss them with me. He would have an idea and he would look at how he could work on it with others rather than taking credit for something himself."

Ankit said his father was well-liked by the students he taught and received Penn State's Wilson Distinguished Teaching Award.

"His students loved him. Both my sister [Charu] and I went to Penn State," Ankit said. " I never had him in class. I'm not crazy. His classes are hard."

Chandler is also survived by his wife, Neera.

Contributions in his memory may be sent to Mineral Processing Division Scholarship Fund, SME, 8307 Shaffer Parkway, Littleton, CO 80127 or CARE, P.O. Box 1871, Merrifield, VA 22116-9753.