The winners were selected by senior members of the IPCAI committee based on scientific excellence and innovation.

Zia was recognized for his work on his paper, Automated Surgical Skills Assessment in RMIS Training. His research focuses on exploiting the fluency of surgical motions in order to perform automated surgical skills assessments. This helps minimize the amount of time that expert surgeons spend manually inputting feedback into basic robot-assisted minimally invasive (RMIS) training, while also making their feedback more objective.

“I’m really glad to have received this award. Considering I was the only one presenting at this conference from Georgia Tech this year, I think getting this award gives a great impression of the institute and our work,” said Zia.