Dr. Amela Sadagic is a computer scientist and a Research Associate Professor at the Naval Postgraduate School, Modeling Virtual Environments and Simulation (MOVES) Institute, Monterey, CA. Her professional research career spans 31 years. While at NPS has been a PI and co-PI on research efforts with close to $10M in funding and over 4500 USMC and USN personnel as subjects in user studies. Past and current research sponsors include The Office of Naval Research - ONR, Disruptive Technology Office - DTO, Navy Modeling and Simulation Office - NMSO and OPNAV. Funded research efforts have been focused on effective use of simulations in training, training transfer studies, use of game-based systems for acquisition of tactical decision-making skills, novel training approaches and pedagogies, automated systems for sensor-enabled instrumented physical training ranges, 3D virtual humans, and adoption of additive manufacturing. She currently leads a research effort aimed at designing the approaches for large-scale adoption of additive manufacturing in Naval domain. In addition to her research work she teaches several master degree courses, and advises multiple students in their thesis research.

Dr. Sadagic started her career in 1987 as a Research Scientist at the Institute for Automatics and Computer Science (IRCA), Energoinvest Co. in Bosnia and Herzegovina. She was a member of research team that designed and developed PROGRAPH II graphics workstation, a research effort founded by the Bosnian Ministry of Science and Culture. Her responsibility was to lead a team charged with implementation of PHIGS (The Programmer's Hierarchical Interactive Graphics System) graphics standard for PROGRAPH II. After completion of PhD studies at the University College London in 1999, Dr. Sadagic was hired by Advanced Network and Services non-profit company based in Armonk, NY. She led research activities in the central VR laboratory and was responsible for technical coordination of the National Tele-immersive Initiative, a consortium of several U.S. universities with Jaron Lanier as a Chief Scientist. The centerpiece of the National Tele-immersive Initiative was the world’s first real-time Mixed Reality system for remote human collaboration. In 2000 the consortium demonstrated three-way collaboration that employed real-time 3D data sets representing real environments and people, in combination with 3D synthetic objects that participants could manipulate and operated with in a given scenario. Dr. Sadagic also served as a Director of Programs responsible for designing and directing multiple projects for K-12 education that employed emerging technologies in learning. While working in Advanced Network and Services she also chaired Internet2 Application QoS Needs Design Team, and was one of the authors of Internet2 Videoconferencing Cookbook resource.

Dr. Sadagic regularly publishes academic papers and serves as a reviewer of works submitted to professional conferences, journals and other publications. She has been serving as a Program Committee member and co-chair for a number of VR-related conferences and workshops. Her expertise and research interests cover several areas: Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality, multiuser environments, game-based systems; human factors, evaluation of learning and training effectiveness, additive manufacturing; diffusion of innovation; acquisition and large scale adoption of technical innovations. Dr. Sadagic holds the degree in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from the College of Electrical Engineering, University of Sarajevo, and PhD degree in Computer Science from University College London, UK.