Awards

RECOGNITIONS

  • Best Presenter Award for the paper “Development of an Augmented Reality Handwashing Tool for Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder” in the Big Data, Data Management and Analytics; AI session track at IEEE-CCWC 2024, UNLV.
  • Faculty Fellowship for the Translational Health Research Center (THRC) at Texas State University, FY2023.
  • Best Paper Award at the 2023 IEEE World AI IoT Congress (IEEE – AIIoT’23), Author: Mohammad Nooruddin, Co-Authors: Dr. Valles, Seattle, WA, USA, 2023.
  • Best Poster Award at the American Statistical Association Conference on Statistical Practice 2022, Authors: T. Stapleton, R. Fuentes, S. R. Jeter, Co-Authors: Dr. R. Rolfe, Dr. D. Knudson, Dr. Valles, & Dr. F. Mendez, New Orleans, LA, USA, 2022.
  • Best Paper Award at The 12th IEEE Annual Ubiquitous Computing, Electronics & Mobile Communication Conference (IEEE – UEMCON’21), Author: Md. Syadus Sefat, Co-Authors: Dr. Md. Shahjahan, Mahbubur Rahman, & Dr. Valles, New York, NY, USA, 2021.
  • Best Presenter Award for the paper “An Audio Processing Approach Using Ensemble Learning for Speech-Emotion Recognition for Children with ASD” in Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning session track at IEEE-AIIoT Congress 2021, Seattle, WA, USA.
  • Best Presenter Award for the paper titled “A Victims Detection Approach for Burning Building Sites Using Convolutional Neural Networks” in Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, and Embedded Systems session track at IEEE-CCWC 2020, UNLV.
  • Best Presenter Award for the paper “Identification of Wild Species in Texas from Camera-trap Images Using Deep Neural Network for Conservation Monitoring” in the Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning session track at IEEE-CCWC 2020, UNLV.
  • Best Paper Award at The 9th IEEE Annual Information Technology, Electronics & Mobile Communication Conference (IEMCON’18), Author: Bikram DasGupta, Co-Authors: Dr. Valles & Dr. McClellan, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada, 2018
  • Outstanding Achievement Award in research contributions to the Field of Cyber-Physical Systems at The 2018 World Congress in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, and Applied Computing (CSCE’18), Las Vegas, NV, 2018
  • Best Paper Award at The 8th Annual IEEE Computing and Communication Workshop and Conference (CCWC’18), Author: Riana Freedman, Co-Author: Dr. Valles, University of Nevada Las Vegas, Las Vegas, NV, 2018

GRANTS & Contracts

  • Sertainty/TXST-CIEDAR – PI, Sertainty UXP Technology Implementation in the Context of IoT and LoRaWAN Gateway Constructs, Jun. 1, 2024 – May 31, 2025, Amount: $30,000.00
  • Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) – SME, Advanced Air Mobility (AMM), Jan. 1, 2024 – Mar. 31, 2025, Amount: $400,000.00
  • NSF-S-STEM – Co-PI, Scholars of Excellence in Engineering Design (SEED), Jan. 1, 2024 – Dec. 31, 2029, Amount: $2,499,310.00
  • NSF-ExpandAI – Co-PI, CAP: Expanding AI Curriculum and Infrastructure at Texas State University to Advance Interdisciplinary Research and Grow a Diverse AI Workforce, Jan. 1, 2024 – Dec. 31, 2025, Amount: $400,000.00
  • United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) – National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) – Co-PD, AnimalCareBot: Bridging the Gap between Emerging Technologies for Livestock Production and Education in Agricultural Sciences, September 15, 2023 – September 14, 2027, Amount: $399,720.00
  • FY23 Translational Health Research Center – PI, Smart City Firefighting: Autonomous Data Collection and Machine Learning for Improved Response, September 1, 2023 – August 31, 2024, Amount: $102,049.00
  • NSF I-Corps – Co-PI, Nurture Neurodiversity – Development of an app that aids people with ASD in having socially appropriate interactions by identifying the emotion of their conversational partner, September 1, 2022 – January 31, 2024, Amount: $50,000.00
  • Dell Technologies/NVIDIA – PI, MOU, Human Detection Using IR, and Scream DL Classifiers and Prototype Development of Autonomous Vehicle Units for Smart Firefighting, May 1, 2022 – Sept. 1, 2022, Amount: $24,976.00
  • NSF-STTR – TXST Co-PI, STTR Phase I: Real-Time Mineral Data Collection and Identification Module with Stratajam, LLC, April 15, 2022 – Sep. 30, 2022, Amount: $256,000.00
  • Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board – Supporting Personnel, The Accelerating Credentials of Purpose and Value for the Texas Innovation Corridor (TIC) Consortium Grant with Sam Houston State University, Jan. 15 – October 31, 2022, Amount: $1,445,000.00
  • NSF-REU – PI, Undergraduate Research Experiences in Machine Learning, Analytics, and Augmented Reality for Smart and Connected Health, January 15, 2022 – December 31, 2024, Amount: $344,029.00
  • TXST FY22 Research Enhancement Program (REP) – Co-PI, Emotion Validation Database, January 1, 2022- May 31, 2023, Amount: $10,894.00
  • Dell Technologies/NVIDIA – PI, GIK-MOU, Data Science Workstation (DSW) Hardware Benchmarking Performance Analysis Study Using Machine Learning Models, January 2021 – December 2021, Amount: $72,600.00
  • Jacobs JETS – Co-PI, Engineering & Technical Support for AstroMaterials Curation, January 1, 2021- Dec. 31, 2022, Amount: $200,700.00
  • AMD – Co-PI, Small-scale GPU option in-kind equipment, and Penguin-on-Demand Cloud resources grant from AMD to support TXST multidisciplinary Public Health Research Center from CS/ISoE/Health and the future Data Science Center towards COVID-19 and health-related research, Aug. 2020-Aug. 2021, Amount: $440,000.00
  • Jacobs Technology – PI, Development, and dissemination to undergraduate students of the core Flight System (cFS), January 1, 2020- Aug. 31, 2020, Amount: $14,500.00
  • TXST FY20 Research Enhancement Program (REP) – Co-PI, Development of An Artificial Intelligence System to Prevent Overexertion Injuries at the Workplace, January 1, 2020- May 31, 2021, Amount: $14,938.00
  • Toyota Material Handling North America (TMHNA) – Co-PI, Using Industry 4.0 Digital Twins to Model Human Labor in Smart Material Handling, August 14, 2019 – July 31, 2020, Amount: $197,411.00
  • Exxon Mobil – 100K Strong in the Americas Innovation Fund – Senior Personnel, Building Bridges for New Innovators in Engineering (BBNIE) with the Universidad Politecnica de Guanajuato, Texas International EducationConsortium, & Lamar University, May 14 – November 31, 2019, Amount: $1,000.00
  • Texas Parks & Wildlife Department Grant – Co-PI, Houston Toad recovery: A comprehensive monitoring, evaluation, and support program for head-start success, October 13, 2016 – August 31, 2019, Amount: $125,881.00
  • NEC Corporation of America – Co-PI, Joint Study for a Data-Intensiv Analysis of the NEC In-Vehicle Passenger Detect, Texas State University, October 1, 2017 – December 15, 2018, Amount: $9,200.00
  • Semiconductor Research Corporation Education Alliance (SRCEA) Undergraduate Research Opportunities (URO) Grant – Co-PI, Attracting and retaining students at the undergraduate level in science and engineering disciplines relevant to technology-based industries and increasing the progression of these students to graduate school, Texas State University, September 1, 2017 – August 31, 2019, Amount: $35,000.00