Rate My Professor Mehmet Kurum

Mehmet Kurum is an Associate Professor in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Georgia, where he serves as Director of the Information Processing and Sensing (IMPRESS) Laboratory. He earned a B.S. degree in Electrical and Electronics Engineering from Bogazici University in Istanbul, Turkey, in 2003, followed by M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical Engineering from The George Washington University in Washington, DC, in 2005 and 2009, respectively. After completing his doctorate, he held positions as a NASA Postdoctoral Program Fellow and Research Associate at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center's Hydrological Sciences Laboratory from 2009 to 2013. He subsequently served as Chief Researcher at TUBITAK BILGEM in Turkey and Research Scientist at The George Washington University. From 2016 to 2023, Kurum was on the faculty at Mississippi State University, advancing from Assistant Professor to Associate Professor and holder of the Paul B. Jacob Endowed Chair in Electrical and Computer Engineering. He joined the University of Georgia in 2023 and maintains an adjunct professorship at Mississippi State University.

Kurum's research centers on microwave remote sensing across scales from satellites to small aerial platforms, with applications in environmental sustainability, particularly precision agriculture. His work involves developing spectrum-efficient remote sensing technologies, retrieval algorithms, and forward electromagnetic models supporting NASA missions including SMAP, CYGNSS, NISAR, and SNOOPI. He has secured funding as principal investigator from agencies such as NSF, NASA, DOD, and USDA. Notable awards include the 2021 NSF CAREER Award, 2022 Paul B. Jacob Endowed Chair, 2024 Faculty Fellow in the UGA College of Engineering, 2013 Leopold B. Felsen Award for Excellence in Electromagnetics, 2014 URSI Young Scientist Award, and 2009 NASA Postdoctoral Program Fellowship. Key publications encompass 'A Microwave Emission Model for Layered Vegetation (MEMLV): A Case Study for Boreal Forests from L- to Ka-band' (IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing, 2024), 'Surface Soil Moisture Retrievals Under Forest Canopy For L-band SAR Observations Across A Wide Range of Incidence Angles By Inverting A Physical Scattering Model' (IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Applied Earth Observations and Remote Sensing, 2021), and 'A Ubiquitous GNSS-R Methodology to Estimate Surface Reflectivity Using Spinning Smartphone Onboard a Small UAS' (2023). As a Senior Member of IEEE, he serves as Associate Editor for IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing and IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Applied Earth Observations and Remote Sensing.