Electrical and computer engineering Professor Alan Bovik has been awarded the highest technical honor collaboratively given by the Society for Imaging Science and Technology (IS&T) and SPIE, two of the largest academic and industrial societies in the world.
Bovik, director of the Cockrell School of Engineering’s Laboratory for Image and Video Engineering (LIVE), was selected for the IS&T/SPIE Imaging Scientist of the Year Award “for his seminal contributions to the computational aspects of biological visual perception, specifically in the areas of image and video quality,” according to the organizations.
“Dr. Bovik’s cutting-edge research has led to major transformations in the fields of digital imaging and visual perception,” said Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering Chair Dr. Ahmed Tewfik. “He pioneered the use of new human vision models in image and video processing and his contributions have deeply enhanced our understanding of the interplay between natural image statistics, eye movement, and foveation. It is a great honor for our department to have Dr. Bovik’s work recognized by such esteemed academic and industrial societies.”
Bovik received the award Jan. 25 after giving a plenary talk at the IS&T/SPIE Electronic Imaging Symposium in San Francisco. Previous recipients of the award include James Janesick, who designed sensors for the Hubble Space Telescope, Galileo Jupiter orbiter and Mars orbiter; and Morley Blouke, who pioneered charge-coupled device technology, a type of computer memory circuit that’s revolutionized everything from cameras, fax machines and photocopiers.
Bovik joined The University of Texas at Austin in 1984 and is highly noted for developing advanced algorithms to measure the quality of digital images in a manner that agrees with human perception — something that was considered an “impossible problem” before his breakthroughs. Bovik has recently been researching complex algorithms that can determine perceived video quality. In late 2010, he and four ECE professors were selected to receive a $900,000 competitive gift over three years from Intel and Cisco to develop innovative algorithms that improve the wireless networks ability to store, stream and share videos more efficiently.
Bovik holds two U.S. patents and has published more than 550 technical articles on everything from image and video processing, computational vision, digital mammography, and modeling of biological visual perception.
He holds the Keys and Joan Curry/Cullen Trust Endowed Chair.
