Dajiang Suo

Dajiang Suo

Assistant Professor The Polytechnic School Arizona State University

Autonomous Sensing and Resilient Connectivity Lab

ARC Lab Director

I am an Assistant Professor at Arizona State University. Before that, I was a research scientist at MIT Auto-ID Lab, researching the Internet of Things to build intelligent transportation infrastructure. I was also a principal investigator leading infrastructure sensing and connected vehicle research projects at MIT Mobility Initiative. I received my Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from MIT in 2020, supervised by Prof. Sanjay Sarma. During my postdoc training, I also worked with Prof. Jinhua Zhao and Prof. Cathy Wu on autonomy and mobility systems.

Before returning to school to pursue a Ph.D. degree, I was with the vehicle control and autonomous driving team at Ford Motor Company (Dearborn, MI), working on the safety and cyber-security of automated vehicles. I serve as a committee member and the paper review coordinator on the Standing Committee on Enterprise, Systems, and Cyber Resilience (AMR40) at the Transportation Research Board.

While at ASU, I was devoted to research and teaching in various IoT-related areas, including transportation and beyond. For instance, in the IoT-focused courses I have been teaching, including (ASU EGR 304) and (ASU EGR 314), I integrate modules that explore the use of emerging sensing and communication technologies to improve safety and productivity on construction sites, and mitigate wildfire risks in Arizona, U.S., highlighting the breadth of my research interests in smart cities.

Lab Members

PhD Student Shaozu Ding (PhD Student)
Shaozu received his B.S. in Automation Control and M.S. in Electronic Information from Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China. He is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Systems Engineering at Arizona State University. His research focuses on roadside perception, multimodal sensing algorithms, and digital twin simulation for autonomous driving and intelligent transportation systems. Outside of research, he is a dedicated badminton enthusiast.

PhD Student Manuel Garcia (PhD Student)
Manny received his Bachelor’s degree in Engineering (Electrical Systems) from Arizona State University. He is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Clean Energy Systems at Arizona State University. His research interests include UAV localization and millimeter wave radar sensing. Outside of academics, he enjoys fitness training and playing basketball.

PhD Student Linan Song (PhD Student)
Linan received his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Civil Engineering from Tsinghua University, Beijing, China. He is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Systems Engineering at Arizona State University. Outside of academics, he enjoys traveling, board games, fitness training, and playing badminton.

Visiting PhD Student Marco De Vincenzi (Visiting PhD Student)
Marco received his Master’s degrees in Data Science and Business Informatics from the University of Pisa and in Cybersecurity and Critical Infrastructure Protection from the University of Genoa. He is currently a Ph.D. candidate in Computer Science at the University of Pisa and a researcher at the Italian National Research Council (CNR), Italy. He has been a visiting research student at the AUTO-ID Lab at MIT and at Arizona State University. His research interests include cybersecurity and privacy in Intelligent Transportation Systems, with a focus on authentication protocols, software-defined vehicles, and AI-integrated security mechanisms. Outside of academics, he enjoys sports (running and swimming overall!), traveling, and volunteering.

Research Philosophy: Empowering Autonomous Systems through Smart Infrastructure

From the visionary sketches of Leonardo da Vinci in the 15th century to today’s cutting-edge technologies, the human pursuit of autonomy has been an enduring and ever-evolving endeavor. The world has seen significant strides in designing ground and aerial vehicles capable of self-navigation under varying conditions. At the CREAT Research Lab at ASU, we explore a compelling question: What if, instead of focusing solely on perfecting the autonomous systems, we enhanced the environments in which they operate? This is where our concept of ‘smart infrastructure’ becomes vital.

Inspired by cross-domain collaboration, our research seeks to transform the interaction between unmanned ground (UGVs) and aerial vehicles (UAVs) and their surroundings. By developing intelligent infrastructure, we enable a more seamless, reliable, and efficient operation of autonomous systems under off-nominal scenarios. This approach not only complements and supports the evolution of on-vehicle intelligence but also provides a cost-effective path for vehicles to achieve full autonomy.

Selected Publications

#Transportation cybersecurity
De Vincenzi, M., Sun, S., Zhang, C.B.C., Garcia, M., Ding, S., Bodei, C., Matteucci, I., Sarma, S.E. and Suo, D., 2025. Vehicular Communication Security: Multi-Channel and Multi-Factor Authentication. IEEE Transactions on Vehicular Technology, https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/11123165.
Suo, D., Moore, J., Boesch, M., Post, K. and Sarma, S.E., 2020. Location-based schemes for mitigating cyber threats on connected and automated vehicles: a survey and design framework. IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Transportation Systems, 23(4), pp.2919-2937.
#Multimodal sensing
Ding, S., Tang, Y., De Vincenzi, M. and Suo, D., 2024. High and Low Resolution Tradeoffs in Roadside Multimodal Sensing. arXiv preprint arXiv:2410.01250.
Qu, A., Huang, X. and Suo, D., 2023, September. SEIP: Simulation-based design and evaluation of infrastructure-based collective perception. In 2023 IEEE 26th International Conference on Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITSC) (pp. 3871-3878). IEEE.
He, Y., Suo, D., Cao, P. and Liu, X., 2025. Optimizing roadside LiDAR beam distribution to enhance vehicle detection performance considering dynamic vehicle occlusion effects. Transportation Research Part C: Emerging Technologies, 179, p.105268.
#Vehicle-to-Infracture Communication
Suo, D., Mo, B., Zhao, J. and Sarma, S.E., 2023. Proof of Travel for Trust-Based Data Validation in V2I Communication. IEEE Internet of Things Journal.
Suo, D., Li, H., Bhattacharyya, R., Wang, Z., Ding, S., Zheng, O., Valderas, D., Melià-Seguí, J., Abdel-Aty, M. and Sarma, S.E., 2023. RF-Enhanced Road Infrastructure for Intelligent Transportation. arXiv preprint arXiv:2311.00280.

Teaching