Özgüner wins IEEE Outstanding Research Award

Ohio State Electrical and Computer Engineering Professor Emeritus Ümit Özgüner was recently honored for his important contributions to the field of intelligent transportation systems (ITS).

The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) presented Özgüner with the Intelligent Transportation Systems Society’s “Outstanding Research Award” earlier this fall. He also received a $1,000 cash prize. Winners were announced at the IEEE ITS Conference held in September.

By winning, Özgüner follows his own mentor, Robert Fenton, who pioneered ITS research at Ohio State from the 1960s to the 1990s. The first-ever IEEE ITS Outstanding Research Award was presented to Fenton in 2006. Ohio State is now the only university to have two professors win the award.

“Professor Fenton and his team, certainly put Ohio State on the map for autonomous ground vehicles," Özgüner said. "Getting to be the second name listed from Ohio State certainly makes me proud.”

He was also quick to share the spotlight.

“This is a team effort. So many, many graduate students have contributed through the years,” Özgüner said. “Some, like Professor Keith Redmill and Dr. Arda Kurt, still continue leading the way at Ohio State, in autonomous and intelligent vehicles.”

As an Ohio State professor for more than two decades, Özgüner focused much of his career on the intelligent control of large, decentralized systems, automotive control, intelligent vehicle highway systems and vibration damping in flexible structures.

The IEEE award marks the second honor he has earned since stepping down. Özgüner was among a short list of winners in the National Science Foundation’s “Smart City” intelligent transportation research award in September.

The ITS awards were established to recognize, promote and publicize major research contributions and application innovations that have made a real-world impact in the field.

contributions from Ryan Horns, Dept. of Electrical and Computer Engineering