A team of researchers from Politehnica University Timișoara, led by Radu-Emil Precup, awarded at the Romanian Research Gala

A team of researchers from Politehnica University Timișoara, led by Radu-Emil Precup, awarded at the Romanian Research Gala

The Romanian Research Gala, initiated by the government last year for the "symbolic recognition" of excellence in research, has evolved into a prize competition this year, with a total budget of 3.3 million lei for winners in 11 categories. It brings new recognition to a team of faculty members and researchers from Politehnica University Timișoara.

The team led by Professor Radu-Emil Precup, corresponding member of the Romanian Academy and director of the Doctoral School at Politehnica University Timișoara, consisting of Associate Professor Claudia-Adina Bojan-Dragoş, Associate Professor Adriana-Nicoleta Albu, Lecturer Raul-Cristian Roman, Lecturer Alexandra-Iulia Szedlak-Stînean, Assistant Elena-Lorena Hedrea, and Ph.D. student Iuliu Alexandru Zamfirache, was awarded at the 2024 Romanian Research Gala in the category of Engineering Sciences with the "Henri Coandă" prize, along with a sum of 300,000 lei. The award recognized their pioneering research, innovative approaches, and dedication to real-world applications with long-term impact in various fields.

Over the past five years, the team has tackled theoretical and applied research aspects in various subdomains of control engineering. This includes low-complexity fuzzy controllers, parameter tuning techniques for controllers using experiments, machine learning techniques for control systems, highly performing systems developed by the team, observers for mechatronic systems, techniques based on tensor product and artificial intelligence in mathematical modeling, prediction, tuning, and decision-making in various fields, including medical applications. Over the years, the team has evolved into a strong research collective, acknowledged both nationally and internationally.

The team's results, consisting of esteemed researchers from the Process Control Group at Politehnica University Timișoara, have been recognized in 2019-2023 through:

• Remarkable scientometric indices of the authors, expressed through Hirsch indices and citation numbers of extremely high value for their working and publishing field.
• Nominations as members of editorial boards of prestigious journals and program committees of renowned conferences.
• Outstanding results achieved in contractual research activities, reflected in competitive contracts obtained.
• 12 papers published in prestigious journals recognized by Web of Science as Highly Cited Papers.
• 5 papers published in prestigious journals recognized by Web of Science as Hot Papers.
• Two "Tudor Tănăsescu" Awards from the Romanian Academy.
• Two Doctor Honoris Causa received by the team leader from foreign universities.
• Consistent inclusion of two team members in the World’s Top 2% Scientists List, according to studies conducted by Stanford University based on Scopus results.
• The team leader's placement in the Research.com Ranking of Top Scientists in Electronics and Electrical Engineering at position 1131 globally and the first position in Romania.