Almabrok Essa
Assistant Professor
Background
Dr. Almabrok Essa is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Math, Computer Science, and Data Science at John Carroll University (JCU). He directs the JCU Artificial Intelligence Lab (AI Lab), which develops innovative, practical solutions for real-world, interdisciplinary research spanning machine learning, deep learning, computer vision, remote sensing, and virtual reality. He is also a director of the AI Minor program and an affiliated faculty member in Neuroscience.
Areas of Expertise
- Applied AI for interdisciplinary real-world problems with emphasis on
- machine learning
- deep learning
- computer vision
- remote sensing
- and virtual/augmented reality.
Research Interests
My research focuses on human-centered AI for autonomous decision-making in complex real-world environments, with emphasis on safety, accessibility, and responsible deployment. I also develop AR/VR applications for learning, clinical care, and immersive human-AI interaction.
Education
Ph.D. University of Dayton, Dayton, OH
Publications
Google ScholarMy publications since joining JCU:
Journal Publications:
- Sidike Paheding, Ashraf Saleem, Mohammad Siddiqui, Nathir Rawashdeh, Almabrok Essa, and Abel Reyes-Angulo“Advancing horizons in remote sensing: a comprehensive survey of deep learning models and applications in image classification and beyond,” Journal of Neural Computing and Applications (NCAA), vol. 36, no. 27, pp 16727-16767, doi: 10.1007/s00521-024-10165-7, August 2024.
- Wilson Vong and Almabrok Essa, “HoloPose: Real-time 3D human pose estimation on Microsoft HoloLens for augmented reality interaction,” SPIE Defense + Security: Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning for Multi-Domain Operations Applications VIII Conference”, Baltimore, MD, USA, April 2026.
- Almabrok Essa and Ava Bruner, “NeuroSync: AI-Enhanced EEG for Sharper BrainDrone Control,” IEEE National Aerospace & Electronics Conference & Ohio Innovation Summit (NAECONOIS), Dayton, OH, USA, July 2025.
- Shashi K Chandrappa, Sidike Paheding, Abel A. Reyes-Angulo, and Almabrok Essa, “Attention Based Spectral Profile Representation for Hyperspectral Image Classification,” IEEE National Aerospace & Electronics Conference & Ohio Innovation Summit (NAECON-OIS), Dayton, OH, USA, July 2025.
- Redha Ali, Almabrok Essa, Fatmah Ali, Elmoatazbellah Ben Omer, Adel Alshamili, and Russell C. Hardie, “Enhancing Zero-Shot Classification in Chest X-rays via Cross-Modal Representation and Attention Alignment,” SPIE Defense + Commercial Sensing: Pattern Recognition and Prediction XXXV Conference”, Orlando, FL, USA, April 2025.
- Almabrok Essa and Ian Wu, “Multibit least significant bit matching: a novel approach to
image steganography,” SPIE Defense + Commercial Sensing: Multimodal Image Exploitation and Learning Conference”, Baltimore, MD, USA, April 2024. - Redha Ali, Almabrok Essa, Elmoatazbellah Ben Omer, Adel Alshamili, Fatmah Ali, and Russell C. Hardie, “Deep learning architecture: an application for skin lesion segmentation-based polar image transformations on dermoscopy images,” SPIE Defense + Commercial Sensing: Pattern Recognition and Prediction XXXV Conference”, Baltimore, MD, USA, April 2024.
