FAMU-FSU College of Engineering researchers receive respected awards from the National Science Foundation.

Two researchers from the FAMU-FSU College of Engineering have received prestigious National Science Foundation Early Career Awards to recognize emerging leaders in their fields.

Juyoung Choi, Associate Professor, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, and Lichun Li, Associate Professor, Department of Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering, received the Early Teaching Career Development or CAREER awards and will receive a five-year grant from the NSF.

“We are extremely proud of the research that these two faculty members have done,” said Richard Liang, interim Associate Dean for Research and Graduate Studies. “The NSF award allows researchers to grow and push the boundaries, and bring more success to college and university students.”

Choi received the award for his work in developing sustainable demolition waste management practices. He is leading a research team to study the impact of decisions made by various stakeholders throughout a building’s life cycle on the use, reuse and recycling of materials. Choi plans to develop a holistic approach to maximize the yield of recyclable and reusable materials by collecting sustainable materials during demolition.

“I am honored to receive this award,” he said. “I am grateful to my family for their unwavering support, and to my colleagues in the department and the Center for Sustainable Infrastructure and Disaster Response (RIDER) for their advice and support.”

Li is researching innovative methods for integrating artificial intelligence, control theory and game theory to provide efficient computational algorithms that can be processed on a conventional computer. The idea is to enable cyber-attacks to be intelligently and effectively deployed on the latest ultra-dense computer networks.

“I am very grateful for being recognized and receiving an NSF grant,” Lee said. “We will add the topic of video game development to the freshman course and provide undergraduate students, especially female students, with early exploration opportunities. It will also help support STEM initiatives.”