MOHSIN MAHMUD TOPU
TRANSPORTATION RESEARCHER
Hello!

I'm Topu
Transportation Researcher

โ€œ

When infrastructure thinks ahead, cities don't fall behind.

Mohsin Mahmud Topu
Mohsin Mahmud Topu

Mohsin Mahmud Topu

I am an aspiring transportation researcher and a recent graduate of Civil and Environmental Engineering from Shahjalal University of Science and Technology.

My research interests center on intelligent and sustainable transportation, with a focus on understanding, strengthening, and managing transportation infrastructure and mobility systems. Building on my current work in data-driven transportation research, I am particularly interested in developing a broader understanding of how intelligent methods, sustainable engineering, and pavement design can work together to support resilient and efficient transportation systems. To pursue this direction, I am developing myself along three interconnected areas:

[1] Intelligent & Sustainable Infrastructure, to design data-driven models and explainable intelligence for infrastructure condition assessment, predictive maintenance, and uncertainty-aware decision-making.
[2] Mobility Behaviour & Urban Transport Planning, to develop data-driven understanding of travel choices and their implications for urban mobility, transportation demand, and energy-efficient systems.
[3] Sustainable Pavement Materials & Design, to develop knowledge in pavement materials and design, with particular interest in material selection, mixture design, durability, and sustainable alternatives for improving pavement performance, resilience, and life-cycle sustainability.

My overarching aim is to contribute to transportation systems where intelligent decision-making, sustainable pavement engineering, and mobility analysis work together to strengthen infrastructure and support resilient, resource-efficient mobility for future cities and communities.

Feel free to email me (mohsinmahmudtopu at gmail dot com) if you're interested in collaboration or discussing research!

Research Areas

01

Mobility Behaviour & Urban Transport Planning

Understanding travel choices and translating mobility behaviour into actionable insights for transportation demand and urban mobility planning.

Mobility BehaviourChoice ModellingTransport Planning
02

Intelligent & Sustainable Infrastructure

Developing data-driven and explainable intelligence for infrastructure condition assessment, predictive maintenance, and resilient decision-making.

Explainable AIGNNsLCSA
03

Sustainable Pavement Materials & Design

Exploring pavement materials and mixture design to improve durability, performance, and resilience while advancing sustainable and life-cycle-oriented pavement solutions.

Pavement MaterialsMixture DesignLife-Cycle Sustainability
04

Integrated Urban Mobility & Energy Systems

Exploring how intelligent mobility and sustainable transportation can contribute to more efficient, resilient, and energy-aware urban systems.

Urban SystemsEnergy-Aware MobilityElectric Mobility

News & Updates

  • 08 September 2026

    My collaborative work on ๐’๐ฉ๐š๐ญ๐ข๐š๐ฅ ๐‘๐ž๐š๐ฌ๐จ๐ง๐ข๐ง๐  ๐ข๐ง ๐Œ๐ฎ๐ฅ๐ญ๐ข๐ฆ๐จ๐๐š๐ฅ ๐…๐จ๐ฎ๐ง๐๐š๐ญ๐ข๐จ๐ง ๐Œ๐จ๐๐ž๐ฅ๐ฌ have been accepted to AACL-IJCNLP 2026 in the Main conference (Co-author)!

  • 02 July 2026

    My first author research on XAI for predicting tensile hazard vulnerability in haor embankments is published in the Journal of Engineering and Applied Science (Springer)!

  • 26 May 2026

    My undergraduate thesis on pavement type selection through Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment is accepted for publication in the International Journal of Pavement Engineering (Taylor & Francis)!

  • 11 May 2026

    My first author article, ST-ResGAT, is published in Intelligent Transportation Infrastructure (Oxford University Press)!

  • 29 January 2026

    At the Annual General Meeting, I officially concluded my tenure as Joint Secretary of the ACI SUST Student Chapter.

  • 25 January 2026

    My collaborative work on Vision-Language Model reasoning, SpatiaLab, is accepted to ICLR 2026!

  • 25 June 2025

    My collaborative review paper on Generative Artificial Intelligence for Project Management is published in the PAKDD 2026 Data Science: Foundations and Applications (DSFA) track (Springer)!

  • 01 July 2025

    Joined the ADB TA-9408 BAN project on updating the Road Master Plan as a Research Assistant!

  • 21 June 2025

    Represented the ACI SUST Student Chapter at the ACI Chapters Meet in Bangladesh!

  • 01 December 2024

    Established ACI SUST Student Chapter and officially commenced my tenure as Joint Secretary!

Selected Publications

LCSA Methodology
JOURNAL ARTICLE ยท 2026

Exploring Key Trade-offs in Pavement Type Selection for Developing Economies through Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment (LCSA)

Nixon Deb Pritom, Mohsin Mahmud Topu, Md Bashirul Haque, Md. Aminul Islam, & Abdullah Al Noman.

International Journal of Pavement Engineering ยท Taylor & Francis

A comparative LCSA of PCC and HMA pavement considering environmental and economic trade-offs for resource-efficient infrastructure decisions.

My contribution: Contributed to the research design, sustainability assessment, data analysis, interpretation, and development of the study's infrastructure decision-making implications.
View Publication โ†—
Haor Embankment Hazard Framework
JOURNAL ARTICLE ยท 2026

Mitigating Embankment Failure in Haor Wetlands: An Explainable Machine Learning Framework for Predicting Tensile Hazard Vulnerability

Mohsin Mahmud Topu, Md. Daniel Hossain Tonmoy, Md. Nazmul Islam Rafi, & Mohammad Shahidur Rahman.

Journal of Engineering and Applied Science ยท Springer

An explainable ML framework for predicting direct tensile strength and translating model outputs into an infrastructure hazard classification.

My contribution: Developed and evaluated the seven explainable ML framework, including model comparison, Bayesian hyperparameter optimization, interpretation, and prediction-to-hazard translation framework development.
View Publication โ†—
SpatiaLab: Can Vision-Language Models Perform Spatial Reasoning in the Wild?
CONFERENCE PAPER ยท 2026

SpatiaLab: Can Vision-Language Models Perform Spatial Reasoning in the Wild?

Azmine Toushik Wasi, Wahid Faisal, Abdur Rahman, Mahfuz Ahmed Anik, Munem Shahriar, Mohsin Mahmud Topu, Sadia Tasnim Meem, Rahatun Nesa Priti, Sabrina Afroz Mitu, Md. Iqramul Hoque, Shahriyar Zaman Ridoy, Mohammed Eunus Ali, Majd Hawasly, Mohammad Raza, & Md Rizwan Parvez.

The Fourteenth International Conference on Learning Representations (ICLR)

A comprehensive benchmark for evaluating VLMsโ€™s spatial reasoning in realistic, unconstrained contexts.

My contribution: Contributed to the development of the SpatiaLab benchmark, including Literature review and dataset development.
View Publication โ†—
GenAI Architecture Review
CONFERENCE PAPER ยท 2026

Generative Artificial Intelligence for Project Management: A Review of Architectures, Applications, and Governance

Mahfuz Ahmed Anik, Azmine Toushik Wasi, Mohsin Mahmud Topu, Taki Hasan Rafi, & Dong-Kyu Chae.

Data Science: Foundations and Applications ยท PAKDD 2026

A collaborative review of generative AI architectures, applications, and governance considerations for project management.

My contribution: Contributed to collaborative research, technical discussions, analysis, and manuscript development within the international research project.
View Publication โ†—

In-review Manuscripts

WTP Study
IN REVIEW ยท 2026

Economic Valuation of Pavement Condition: Evidence from a Stated Choice Experiment

Mohsin Mahmud Topu, Md. Aminul Islam, Md Bashirul Haque, Abdullah Al Noman, Nixon Deb Pritom, & Md. Sadman Sakib.

Research in Transportation Economics ยท Elsevier

An estimation of value of travel time (VOT) and willingness to pay (WTP) for pavement improvements using mixed multinomial logit models, demonstrating the economic value of user comfort in maintenance appraisal.

Vehicle Ownership and Driving Choice Behaviour
IN PROGRESS

Random Effect Models of Vehicle Ownership and Vehicle Driving Choice Behaviour: A Case Study of Sylhet City

In Progress

A joint analysis of vehicle ownership and driving choices in Sylhet using discrete choice models, providing behavioral insights to guide urban demand-control policies and mitigate congestion.

Professional Experience

Research Associate

Transportation Studies Unit, Shahjalal University of Science and Technology (SUST)

Developing evidence-based approaches for sustainable and resilient transportation, connecting infrastructure sustainability with mobility behaviour and economic decision-making.

Research Assistant

Computational Intelligence and Operations Laboratory (CIOL)

Developing explainable and predictive AI for transportation infrastructure, with a focus on infrastructure intelligence, condition assessment, and decision-support for predictive maintenance.

Research Assistant โ€” Updating the Road Master Plan

ADB TA-9408 BAN ยท DATAMS ยท Roads and Highways Department, Bangladesh

Led and coordinated a nationwide team of 40 surveyors collecting stated-preference data and supported survey quality, questionnaire implementation, and choice modelling coordination.

Education

B.Sc. ยท ISCED 6

Civil and Environmental Engineering

Shahjalal University of Science and Technology (SUST)

2019 โ€” 2025 CGPA 3.56 / 4.00
Supervisor: Md Bashirul Haque | Co-supervisor: Md. Aminul Islam
Thesis: Exploring Key Trade-offs in Pavement Type Selection for Developing Economies through Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment (LCSA).
HSC

Higher Secondary Certificate (Science)

Murari Chand College (MC College)

2019 GPA 5.00

Achieved the General Grade Board Scholarship.

SSC

Secondary School Certificate (Science)

Sylhet Government Pilot High School

2017 GPA 5.00

Achieved the General Grade Board Scholarship.

Technical Skills

Data Science & AI

PythonPandasScikit-LearnTensorFlowXGBoostGNNsSHAPGNNExplainer

Statistical & Choice Modelling

RMNLMMNLdplyrggplot2Statistical Modelling

Transportation & Simulation

SUMOPTV VissimTransportation PlanningMobility Analysis

Spatial & Engineering Tools

ArcGISQGISAutoCADETABSSPSS

Sustainability & Infrastructure

OpenLCAHDM-4LCSAInfrastructure Risk

Computer Vision

YOLOv8YOLOv11Vision Transformers

Training & Certifications

Transport Studies

PTV VISSIM and VISWALK Basics

Coursera

Supervised Machine Learning (Regression and Classification)

2024

DataCamp

Exploratory Data Analysis with Python

HackerRank

Python (Basic)

Academic Services & Leadership

Joint Secretary & Founding Member

ACI SUST Student Chapter (Dec 2024 โ€” Dec 2025)

Helped establish the chapter and connect students with practical engineering learning through technical programs, competitions, seminars, and industry engagement.

Volunteer, Environmental Programs

Bangladesh Poribesh Andolon (Mar 2023 โ€” Apr 2024)

Engaged in community-based environmental initiatives that strengthened my interest in sustainability beyond technical research and engineering practice.

Honors & Awards

General Grade Board Scholarship โ€” HSC

2019

General Grade Board Scholarship โ€” SSC

2017