GEORGE A. BEKEY (1928-2024)

BY MARC BALLON AND YANNIS C. YORTSOS

GEORGE ALBERT BEKEY, a renowned American roboticist and professor emeritus of computer science, electrical engineering, and biomedical engineering at the University of Southern California (USC) Viterbi School of Engineering, passed away on Oct. 17, 2024. He was 96.

A pioneer of modern robotics, George was elected to the National Academy of Engineering in 1989. As a teacher and a mentor, he was known for his passionate style—leaping on his desk even in his 60s, to demonstrate a point about robot locomotion. Over his 40-year career at the USC Viterbi School of Engineering, he played a key role in launching many of the school’s most prominent departments and initiatives.

Born in Bratislava, Slovakia – then part of Czechoslovakia – in 1928 to an engineer father and a chemist mother, he moved with his family to Prague at a young age. In 1938, his secular Jewish family fled the Nazi invasion on the last train out of the city. Because Jews were not allowed to leave the country, his father bribed an official for train papers, which turned out to be forgeries. They escaped near-certain death only because the conductor failed to check their row.

The family settled in La Paz, Bolivia, where George and his younger brother, Ivan, attended a school run by American Methodists. After five years, the family emigrated again to join surviving relatives in California. Despite speaking limited English with a strong Spanish accent, he joined the high school debating team – early evidence of the optimism, curiosity, and inventive problem-solving for which he would later be known.

George earned a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1950. He received both his master’s and doctoral degrees in engineering from the University of California, Los Angeles, in 1952 and 1962, respectively.

A prolific writer, he authored or co-authored more than a dozen books, including his most recent Robot Ethics: The Ethical and Social Implications of Robotics (with Patrick Lin and Keith Abney; The MIT Press, 2012), a field in which he was an early proponent. He also published about 250 professional articles.

George was a Life Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) and a member of the National Academy of Engineering. He was the founding editor of IEEE Transactions on Robotics and Automation and the journal Autonomous Robots, a founding member of the IEEE Robotics and Automation Society, and the recipient of numerous honors, including the IEEE Third Millennium Medal, the IEEE Robotics and Automation Award, and the IEEE Robotics and Automation Distinguished Service Award.

He joined the faculty at USC in 1962. Four years later, he helped create the “Phony Pony,” the world’s first four-legged walking machine. In 1977, he co-developed the first humanoid, five-fingered robotic hand, the first capable of giving a proper handshake.

“George pushed the field of robotics forward with a rare and possibly unique combination of creative vision, collaborative spirit, and courage, which drove him to relentlessly pursue his projects regardless of what the mainstream activities of the field were at the time,” said Maja Matarić (NAE 2025), a professor at USC Viterbi whom George recruited to the university.

According to A Remarkable Trajectory: From Humble Beginnings to Global Prominence (2015), a USC Viterbi history book that he co-authored with his daughter, Michelle Bekey, and Robert Calverley, George secured one of the school’s first major computers in the mid-1960s: an IBM 360/44 mainframe.

He also played a key role in the creation of the USC Information Sciences Institute (ISI), widely considered the university’s most prominent research institute over the past 50 years.

In addition, George helped establish the Department of Biomedical Engineering at USC, recently renamed the Alfred E. Mann Department of Biomedical Engineering. The department has been the source of major breakthroughs, including the world’s first artificial retina to restore sight to blind individuals and a brain implant designed to restore long-term memory for people living with Alzheimer’s disease or dementia.

“George Bekey was truly a pioneer in establishing, in the Viterbi School, the biomedical engineering department nearly 50 years ago at a time that very few schools had such departments,” said C.L. Max Nikias (NAE 2008), USC president emeritus and former engineering dean from 2001 to 2005.

George’s illustrious career integrated disciplines including computer science, electrical engineering, biomedical engineering, and biology. A pioneer across several fields, he was a longtime advocate of interdisciplinary research for its power to improve science and accelerate discovery. He significantly advanced robotics and automation, influencing areas such as humanoid development, human-robot interaction, and coordination and control of multiple robots.

But it was his impact on students that may stand as one of his greatest legacies.

Ayanna Howard, who earned a doctorate in electrical engineering from USC in 1999 and now serves as dean of the College of Engineering at The Ohio State University, recalled one formative moment: “During one of my first graduate robotics classes at USC, Dr. Bekey began to discuss robot locomotion and the gait patterns of animals. At one point, he jumped onto the table and enthusiastically simulated the walking pattern for a quadrupedal robot mimicking cat locomotion. I was hooked. Here was this famous, larger-than-life leader in robotics, and he cared enough, without hesitation, to inspire us using nontraditional methods.”

Gaurav Sukhatme, who earned a doctorate in computer science from USC in 1997, is a proud member of the “Bekey tribe,” a group of 42 former Ph.D. students. He now leads the USC School of Advanced Computing and serves as the USC Viterbi executive vice dean of engineering. “I could not have asked for a kinder or wiser mentor, and in running my research group, I have from time to time asked myself, ‘WWGD?’ (What would George do?),” Sukhatme said.

Bekey himself reflected on his approach to teaching in a 2021 interview: “I cared about my students as people. I looked at them as fellow seekers in the research journey. They were partners in the search to make meaningful discoveries.”

“Professor Bekey was a progressive thinker,” Sukhatme added. “He gave his students the encouragement and freedom to dream big. He was a formative figure in the rise of the Viterbi School to its current stature and the growth of robotics as a field of research.”

George is survived by his son, Ronald; his daughter, Michelle; and his brother, Ivan.

Michelle described her father as “an extraordinarily broad human being” equally at ease backpacking, skiing, helping her with her homework, or studying the world’s religions, including Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, and Sufism. “He was a wonderful father,” she said.