Professor Christos Cassandras Wins 2026 IEEE Intelligent Transportation Systems Society Outstanding Research Award Imagine a world where morning traffic completely disappears, intersection lights are obsolete, and your car pays you a small digital incentive for letting someone merge. It sounds impossible, but CISE Faculty Affiliate and Head of the Division of Systems Engineering Professor Christos Cassandras (ECE, SE) is building that reality, and the engineering community is taking notice. Cassandras was recently named the recipient of the prestigious 2026 IEEE Intelligent Transportation Systems Society (ITSS) Outstanding Research Award. The honor recognizes Cassandras’ groundbreaking contributions to the field of smart cities and automated traffic management. The award comes on the heels of a high-profile feature in Nature, where Cassandras detailed his vision for rewriting how the world drives. “In some circles, this is considered science fiction, but in most technology-aware circles, it’s very real, it’s coming,” Cassandras said. “The hype will never deliver the absolute dream, but it will deliver something that is going to make the world a better place.” For decades, urban commuting has been defined by what Cassandras calls “selfish driving,” a system where individual drivers make competitive choices based entirely on personal convenience. This eventually leads to gridlock, wasted fuel, and accidents. Cassandras is pioneering a shift toward “social optimality.” His research focuses on Connected and Automated Vehicles (CAVs) to transform standard roadways into fully integrated networks. Unlike some autonomous vehicles that currently operate in isolation using only onboard sensors, Cassandras’ model employs CAVs that actively “talk” to one another and to urban infrastructure, such as traffic lights. By sharing real-time data on position, velocity, and destination, the network can optimize routing and speed across an entire area. “It doesn’t take that many, maybe 10 or 20% [of autonomous vehicles] on the road, but they can act