Autonomous Vehicle Innovation

Dr. Kevin McFall, an associate professor of mechatronics engineering in the Southern Polytechnic College of Engineering and Engineering Technology (SPCEET), and Dr. Mohammed Aledhari, assistant professor of computer science in the College of Computing and Software Engineering (CCSE), teamed up in 2019 to advance autonomous vehicle technology and train KSU undergraduate students to use it.

Dr. McFall, who also serves as assistant dean for research in SPCEET, explores research topics on autonomous vehicles and deep learning, directing numerous student teams to develop sensor systems and actuation control for self-driving cars and robots.

Dr. Aledhari, who is also director of the Smart and Autonomous Systems Center (SASC) at KSU, has research interests in data science, machine learning, computer vision for medical imaging and autonomous systems, and big data problems in computational biology and bioinformatics.

Just about every new car today is sold with autonomous features like adaptive cruise control, lane keeping, and automatic braking for collision avoidance. Autonomous vehicle technology combines sensors, control systems, mechanics, machine learning, and computer vision.

Dr. McFall and Dr. Aledhari combined their expertise to advance autonomous vehicle technology and improve transportation safety, convenience, and mobility for all. Their work is paving the way for more completely autonomous vehicles, and training undergraduate students to compete in the rapidly growing job market for robotics, automation, and artificial intelligence.