Category: Featured

Alumni Spotlight: Dr. Eleftheria (Ria) Kontou
February 17, 2020Dr. Ria Kontou was encouraged to take transportation courses by great mentors while pursuing a bachelor’s degree in Civil Engineering from the National Technical University of Athens. During her studies, she worked to complete her undergraduate thesis on bus-to-depot allocation a decision that helped her down the transportation engineering road. Ria’s fascination with the potential […]
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Dr. Nithin Agarwal Appointed UFTI T2 Center Director
January 30, 2020Dr. Nithin Agarwal has been appointed Director of the UFTI Technology Transfer (T2) Center, effective February 21, 2020. Dr. Agarwal has served as the Assistant Director of the T2 Center for over a year. Dr. Agarwal also manages the UFTI’s Transportation Safety Center where he also leads efforts to evaluate emerging technologies utilizing the UFTI’s […]
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Student Spotlight: Asean Davis
December 12, 2019Asean Davis is a charismatic second-year Ph.D. student. Academically, Asean likes to focus his energies looking at the issues surrounding autonomous freight transportation. Specifically, he is interested in how driving on a road with autonomous freight affects the behavior of non-autonomous vehicle drivers and how perceptions about autonomous freight play a role in driver behavior. […]
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Saving Lives by Studying Intersections Where Near-Misses Occur
December 11, 2019Video Based Machine Learning for Smart Traffic Analysis and Management Dr. Sanjay Ranka (PI), Dr. Anand Rangarajan (co-PI), Dr. Sivaramakrishna Srinivasan (co-PI), Dr. Lily Elefteriadou (co-PI), and Daniel Hoffman (co-PI)Funding Source: NSF This project explores a fairly new area of research: looking at near-misses as a metric of safety. Researchers at the UFTI are collaborating […]
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Student Highlight: Ala Alobeidyeen
November 4, 2019Our students are an important part of the UF Transportation Institute and we’re excited to be able to feature some of them in our newsletter. This month we’re featuring Ph.D. student, Ala Alobeidyeen. Ala received her master’s degree in transportation engineering from the University of Jordan. She then went to study at the Illinois Institute […]
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UFTI at the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS) Annual Meeting
November 4, 2019Several UFTI faculty and students presented at the INFORMS Annual Meeting in Seattle this past month. The Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS) Annual Meeting provides attendees with a unique opportunity to connect and network. Dr. Lily Elefteriadou gave a presentation titled “Signal Control and Autonomous Vehicle Trajectory Optimization for Enhancing Mobility” […]
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Do you know about the WTS Student Chapter at UF?
October 28, 2019Diversity in research and engineering is vital. We all bring our own experiences and perspectives to the table, and that diversity and collaboration leads to new and exciting innovations. Women’s Transportation Seminar (WTS) is an international organization that was founded in 1977 by a group of women in transportation who realized that women’s careers in […]
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Student Spotlight: Fabio Sasahara
October 23, 2019Our students are an important part of the UF Transportation Institute and we’re excited to be able to feature some of them in our newsletter. This month we’re featuring Ph.D. student, Fabio Sasahara. Fabio came to the UFTI after working in consulting and project management in Brazil. Working on a rail project sparked his interest […]
Read more »The Human Side of Data Collection
October 7, 2019Data collection is a necessary part of the research process. But is all the data that is collected in the course of a research project necessary? What happens when we think of the information collected not as “data” but as observations? How does the public feel about being the subject of these observations? How do […]
Read more »Older Drivers and Autonomous Vehicles
October 7, 2019What happens when you can’t drive, but you still want to get around? Autonomous vehicles may be the answer. Transportation is taken for granted by many from day-to-day. But what happens when something goes wrong? As drivers age, they may experience physical or cognitive declines which can challenge their ability to drive safely. Autonomous vehicle […]
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