Chellappa and Davis Named Distinguished University Professors

Two computer vision experts in the University of Maryland Institute for Advanced Computer Studies (UMIACS) were just named Distinguished University Professor, considered the most prominent internal academic distinction on campus.

Rama Chellappa (left in photo), professor and chair of electrical and computer engineering, and Larry Davis (right in photo), professor of computer science, are part of a select group of nine faculty that will be recognized as Distinguished University Professors at this fall’s convocation.

Fewer than 65 active professors at the university hold the title.

“The dedication by Rama and Larry toward research, scholarship and service is evident in almost everything we do,” says Amitabh Varshney, professor of computer science and director of UMIACS. “From recruiting and mentoring graduate students, to securing large federal grants for important research, to promoting a culture of excellence throughout our institute, their impact is significant. We couldn’t be more proud to call them our colleagues.”

Chellappa’s research includes signal and image processing, computer vision, pattern recognition, multi-dimension stochastic processes, statistical interference, image analysis, robust and secure biometrics, and artificial intelligence in computer vision.

In May 2016, Chellappa led a team that took top honors in the information science category at the university’s annual Invention of the Year competition.

Notable external awards include being named an International Association for Pattern Recognition (IAPR) Fellow; American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Fellow; Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) Fellow; Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) Fellow; and IEEE Fellow.

Chellappa received his doctorate in electrical engineering from Purdue University in 1981.

Davis’s research focuses on object/action recognition and scene analysis, event and modeling recognition, image and video databases, tracking, human movement modeling, 3-D human motion capture, and camera networks.

He served as chair of the Department of Computer Science from 1999 to 2012, as founding director of UMIACS from 1985 to 1994, and is the current director of the Center for Automation Research, one of 16 labs and centers in UMIACS.

Notable external awards include being named an International Association for Pattern Recognition (IAPR) Fellow; Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) Fellow; and IEEE Fellow.

Davis received his doctorate in computer science from the University of Maryland in 1976.

Chellappa and Davis join six other UMIACS faculty who are Distinguished University Professors: Rita Colwell, Dianne O’Leary, Azriel Rosenfeld, Hanan Samet, Ben Shneiderman and G.W. “Pete” Stewart.