Biaz receives Provost’s Award for Excellence in Fostering Undergraduate Research and Creative Scholarship

Biaz

Saad Biaz, faculty member in Auburn University’s Department of Computer Science and Software Engineering, has been awarded the 2013-2014 Provost’s Award for Excellence in Fostering Undergraduate Research and Creative Scholarship. He will be honored at Auburn’s Faculty Awards Celebrating Excellence ceremony on Sept. 17, recognition of the highest honors the university awards to faculty.

Biaz is being recognized for a 10-year history of grant support from the National Science Foundation (NSF) and Department of Defense to host an NSF Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU), which has been hosted at Auburn for 10 consecutive summers. Biaz’s REU offers a diverse group of students from universities across the country the opportunity to conduct research and design algorithms that meet the challenge of flying six to 12 smart unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) autonomously, safely and efficiently within a limited space.

“I feel honored to receive such a distinguished recognition at the university level, and indebted to the amazing REU participants who supported my nomination,” says Biaz.

Biaz has been a member of the Auburn faculty since 2001. His research interests include wireless networking, unmanned aerial vehicles, congestion control on high speed networks and distributed systems. He earned a doctorate in electrical engineering from the Université Henri Poincaré in Nancy, France, in 1989, as well as a doctorate in computer science from Texas A&M University in 1999.