Roya Firoozi

Roya Firoozi is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Waterloo, Canada. She holds a Ph.D. in Control Theory from UC Berkeley (2021) and a Postdoctoral Research position at Stanford University's Multi-Robot Systems Lab (2024). Her research focuses on advancing safe robot autonomy in interactive environments through generative AI, distributed optimization, and game theory. Key areas include multi-agent systems, autonomous vehicles, and perception-driven control.

Education:

• Ph.D. in Control Theory, UC Berkeley (2021)
• Bachelor's in Mechanical Engineering, UC Berkeley (2014)
• Postdoctoral Research, Stanford University (2024)

Research Interests: Robotics-aided generative AI, multi-modal perception, interactive autonomy in multi-agent systems, game-theoretic optimization, and safe navigation in dynamic environments. Her work bridges theoretical foundations with real-world experiments in robotics and autonomous systems.

Awards:

• NSF Postdoctoral Research Fellowship
• ASEE Fellowship (2021-2023)
• Rising Stars in Aerospace Engineering (2022)
• Outstanding Graduate Instructor Award (2021)

Advising & Grants: Currently supervising graduate students (PhD/Master's) focused on robotics and control systems. Research is supported by grants from NSF and industry collaborations. She has pioneered algorithms for distributed multi-vehicle coordination and occlusion-aware navigation systems.

Labs & Teams: Leads the Autonomous Systems Lab at Waterloo, focusing on robotics, AI, and control. Collaborates with Stanford's Multi-Robot Systems Lab and UC Berkeley's MPC Lab on projects involving autonomous vehicles and fault detection systems.