Biography
I received the B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical and Electronics Engineering from Middle East Technical University, Ankara, in 1999, 2001, and 2006. From 2007 to 2012 I was a postdoctoral researcher, successively in Delft University of Technology, the Netherlands; in Ecole Nationale Supérieure de Techniques Avancées-ParisTech, France; in Univ. Pierre & Marie Curie - Paris 6, France. In 2012 I received the European Union Marie Curie Intra-European Fellowship with my project "Skill Assistance with Robot for Manual Welding". Between 2012 and 2014, I was with Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Switzerland, with this fellowship. I am an Assistant Professor with the School of Engineering and Physical Sciences at Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh, UK, since 2015. My research interests include physical human-robot interaction, assistive robotics, skill assistance, mechatronics design, medical robotics, walking robots, and machine learning. I have been the PI of the EPSRC funded first-grant project "Understanding Laparoscopy Skills for Robotic Training and Assistance" (£124,958), and the Rail Safety and Standards Board (RSSB) funded "Cab Front Cleaning Robot Project" (£35,714). Three of my PhD students are partially/fully funded by industry (RACE-UK Atomic Energy Authority, £33,000; RSSB, £136,000). I have been supervising 1 post-doc and 4 PhD students.