Evşen Yanmaz

Evşen Yanmaz is an Associate Professor in the Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering at Özyeğin University, Turkey. She holds a Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Carnegie Mellon University (2005), an M.S. from SUNY Buffalo (2002), and a B.S. from Boğaziçi University (2000). Before joining Özyeğin University, she held research roles at Carnegie Mellon University, Los Alamos National Laboratory, and Lakeside Labs in Austria.

Education:

• Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering, Carnegie Mellon University, 2005
• M.S. in Electrical Engineering, SUNY Buffalo, 2002
• B.S. in Electrical and Electronics Engineering, Boğaziçi University, 2000

Research Interests:

Her research spans drone networks, wireless networks, self-organizing systems, cooperative networks, and multi-UAV coordination. She leads the NAS Lab (Networked Autonomous Systems Lab), which focuses on enabling cooperation among UAVs and ground robots through active communication and intelligent coordination. Her work integrates reinforcement learning, multi-objective optimization, and real-world UAV testbeds.

Research Trends:

Recent publications highlight her focus on multi-UAV path planning, search and rescue missions, connectivity maintenance, and reinforcement learning for decentralized UAV coordination. These works emphasize practical deployment challenges like sensor uncertainty, dynamic target detection, and network performance under real-world constraints.

Student Supervision:

She has successfully supervised multiple MSc thesis defenses at Özyeğin University, including:

• Islam Guven – Multi-UAV Path Planning using Reinforcement Learning
• Hamid Balanji – Search and Rescue with Multiple UAVs
• Atefeh Molaei – Network Provisioning using UAVs in Search and Rescue
• Kadircan Kara – Multi-UAV Cooperative Search under Sensing and Communication Limitations

Lab and Team:

She leads the NAS Lab at Özyeğin University, which is actively recruiting graduate students and researchers with expertise in wireless networks, robotics, UAV swarming, and ROS-based testbed development.