The award-winning professor taught civil and environmental engineering at Virginia Tech, a university in Virginia, USA, where he had been working for 15 years. He was educated at Madras University and the Indian Institute of Technology-Kanpur.

He received an award for excellence in teaching last year besides numerous other recognitions and was considered one of the department's top ten teachers.

Loganathan's colleague Professor Mallikarjun Kumar told the media, "One of the classrooms he was teaching in were involved in the shootout we didn't know exactly what was going on. His wife called up saying we didn't hear anything from my husband and are trying to locate him. So we tried the local hospitals and tried to locate whether he is there or not and we could not find him. Soon after that, news broke out that he was among the victims."

Loganathan is survived by his wife and two daughters. Though there was no official word on his death, the family is understood to have been informed by the authorities.

"The family was informed by the authorities and condolences were paid by friends and students at their residence on the campus," Ranjana Chachra, a neighbour, told PTI.

Reports say that an Indian student, Meenal Panchal from Mumbai, has also been reported missing and her fate is not known.

"As of now, we haven't heard any bad news about the Indian students. But the situation will be clear once the authorities release the list of the victims," Ajit Pal Singh Raina, president of the Indian Student Association at Virginia Tech, told rediff.com over the telephone.

Raina said communication was a problem as students who are on the campus are not allowed to leave the premises.

"The situation is under control. We heard that whoever was responsible (the gunman) has been shot. Getting in touch with all the students is not possible just now," he said.

"The only way information flows now is through our web site," Raina said.

About 700 Indian students study at Virginia Tech.

The university web site: http://www.isa.org.vt.edu/

With PTI inputs; picture courtesy Virginia Tech