Prof. Zak (Zaher) Kassas is the TRC Endowed Chair in Intelligent Transportation Systems and a Full Professor of Electrical & Computer Engineering at The Ohio State University. He is Director of the U.S. Department of Transportation Center for Automated Vehicles Research with Multimodal AssurEd Navigation (CARMEN).

Prof. Kassas is the Chair of the IEEE AESS Navigation System Panel. Under his leadership, the inaugural AESS flagship conference NAVICON (IEEE Navigation Conference) will launch in 2026. He is a Senior Editor of IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Transportation Systems and an Associate Editor of IEEE Transactions on Aerospace and Electronic Systems. He was Program Chair of IEEE/ION Position, Location, and Navigation Symposium (PLANS) 2020 and 2023 and is the Program Co-Chair of IEEE NAVICON 2026. He organized and chaired the 2018 and 2019 Institute of Navigation (ION) Cognizant Autonomous Systems for Safety Critical Applications (CASSCA) Conference. He was involved in the organization of numerous Conferences, Workshops, and Special Sessions at IEEE/ION PLANS, IEEE ICASSP, IEEE VTC, IEEE ITSC, ION GNSS+, ION ITM, FUSION, and ACC.

Prof. Kassas’ research interests include navigation systems, low Earth orbit satellites, cognitive sensing and software-defined radio, and intelligent transportation systems. His research has attracted more than $28M in competitive grants; has been featured in dozens of international media outlets and 9 magazine covers; and has shaped government programs, policies, and investments. He authored 220+ peer-reviewed journal and conference papers, 15 magazine articles, 3 invited book chapters, and 27 U.S. patents. He has given 120+ invited presentations, keynotes, and plenaries, and served as a subject matter expert to the Department of Defense (DOD), Government Accountability Office (GAO), Department of Transportation (DOT), National Science Foundation (NSF), and Federal Communications Commission (FCC). He received from President Biden the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE), the highest honor bestowed by the U.S. government on outstanding scientists and engineers early in their careers. He is a Fellow of the IEEE and the ION and a Distinguished Lecturer of the IEEE Aerospace and Electronic Systems Society and IEEE Intelligent Transportation Systems Society. He received 50+ scientific and governmental awards, notably IEEE Richard Kershner Award for "pioneering contributions to the theory and practice of positioning, navigation, and timing with terrestrial and non-terrestrial signals of opportunity;" IEEE M. Barry Carlton Award; IEEE Harry Rowe Mimno Award; IEEE Walter Fried Award; IEEE Frederick Ellersick Award; ION Col. Thurlow Award for “foundational work in the theory and practice of exploiting signals of opportunity for accurate and reliable positioning, navigation and timing;” ION Samuel Burka Award (twice); Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR) Young Investigator Program (YIP) Award; Office of Naval Research (ONR) YIP Award; National Science Foundation (NSF) CAREER Award; and 40+ best paper/presentation awards.

Prof. Kassas received a B.E. in Electrical Engineering from the Lebanese American University, M.S. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from The Ohio State University, and M.S.E. in Aerospace Engineering and Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from The University of Texas at Austin.