Qichao Wang is a computational transportation scientist in the Computational Science Center. His research is in the area of transportation systems modeling and simulation, optimization, and control. His work at NREL includes modeling emerging transportation systems, developing simulation software utilizing high-performance computing resources, and developing and deploying traffic control algorithms. At NREL, Qichao has proposed, developed, and improved a high-performance simulator, Airport Shuttle Planning and Improved Routing Event-driven Simulation, further developed and deployed his dissertation research algorithms for arterial traffic control, and developed a NEMA traffic controller module for the SUMO traffic simulation package.

Research Interests

Transportation systems modeling and simulation

Optimization 

Traffic control

Reinforcement learning

Visualization

Game-aided pedagogy

Education

Ph.D., Civil Engineering, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

M.S., Civil Engineering, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

B.E., Traffic Engineering, Nanjing Tech University

Featured Work

Software

ASPIRES: Airport Shuttle Planning and Improved Routing Event-Driven Simulation (GitHub)

NEMA-Phase-Compliant Traffic Signal Controller Module in SUMO

Publications

ASPIRES: Airport Shuttle Planning and Improved Routing Event-Driven Simulation, Transportation Research Record (2022)

Developing Novel Performance Measures for Traffic Congestion Management and Operational Planning Based on Connected Vehicle Data, Journal of Urban Planning and Development (2022)

Route Optimization for Energy Efficient Airport Shuttle Operations – A Case Study from Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, Journal of Air Transport Management (2021)

A Modeling Framework for Designing and Evaluating Curbside Traffic Management Policies at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice (2021)

Advanced Computing, Data Science, and Artificial Intelligence Research Opportunities for Energy-Focused Transportation Science, NREL Technical Report (2021) 

The Green Light SONATA: Foundations for Musical Agents Controlling Traffic Signals, IEEE Conference on Intelligent Transportation Systems Conference (ITSC) (2020)

Comparing and Contrasting NEMA-Based Virtual Phase-Link Control with Max Pressure Control in Arterial Signal Systems, IEEE Conference on Intelligent Transportation Systems Conference (ITSC) (2019)

Optimal Urban Traffic Model Predictive Control for NEMA Standards, Transportation Research Record (2019)

Designing Web‐Games for Transportation Engineering Education, Computer Applications in Engineering Education (2018)

Awards and Honors

Outstanding Mentor to NREL’s Postdocs, Graduate, and Undergraduate Interns (2020)

Via Teaching Fellowship, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (2018)

World Transport Convention Best Paper Award (2018)

ICAT Creativity and Innovation Day Process Award (2018)

2nd Place - Pavement Management Challenge, 9th International Conference on Managing Pavement Assets (2015)

Outstanding Undergraduate Thesis, Jiangsu Province (2014)

Outstanding Undergraduate Student, Nanjing University of Technology (2012)

Ashland Fellowship (2011)

2nd Place, Products Information Modeling National Competition, China (2011)

1st Place, College Students CAD Competition in East China Region (2011)