Burcin Becerik-Gerber facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Burcin Becerik-Gerber
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| Alma mater | Harvard University University of California at Berkeley |
| Scientific career | |
| Institutions | University of Southern California |
Burcin Becerik-Gerber is a Turkish American engineering professor at the University of Southern California. She is famous for creating a new field called "human-building interaction." This field studies how people and buildings can work together better using technology.
Professor Becerik-Gerber leads the Innovation in Integrated Informatics LAB and is the director of USC's Center for Intelligent Environments (CENTIENTS). She focuses on how buildings and people can "talk" to each other. Her goal is to make buildings smarter and help people use them in better ways, especially through artificial intelligence. For example, she works on smart desks that can improve how you feel at work or school.
About Her Life
Burcin Becerik-Gerber was born in İzmir, Turkey. She started her university studies at the Istanbul Technical University in 1999. After that, she moved to the United States.
She continued her education at the University of California, Berkeley, where she earned a Master's degree in Engineering in 2002. Then, she got a special Doctor of Design (DDes) degree from Harvard University in 2006.
In 2008, Professor Becerik-Gerber joined the University of Southern California as a professor. She became a full professor in 2019 and was named Chair of the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department in 2021.
Awards and Special Recognitions
Professor Becerik-Gerber has received many important awards for her work.
- In 2012, she was recognized by MIT Technology Review as one of the top innovators under 35 years old.
- She received an NSF CAREER Award in 2014, which is a big honor for young researchers.
- In 2018, she was a special visiting fellow at the Alan Turing Institute in the UK.
- She was elected as a member of the National Academy of Construction (NAC) in 2021. This is a group of top experts in building and construction.
- In 2022, she won an LA Area Emmy Award! She was a co-producer for a documentary called "Lives, Not Grades." This film was about a unique course she helped create, which taught students how to use engineering to solve big global problems.
- In 2023, the Los Angeles Business Journal named her a "Leader of Influence." She also received the ASCE Computing in Civil Engineering Award in 2023 and the ASCE Peurifoy Construction Research Award in 2024.
These awards show how much her work in engineering and education is valued.
