Dr. Lian Zhao received the Ph.D. degree from the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ELCE), University of Waterloo, Canada, in 2002. She joined the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Toronto Metropolitan University, Canada, in 2003. Her research interests are in the areas of wireless communications, resource management, mobile edge computing and communications, IoV networks, and machine learning for communication networks.

She has been an IEEE Communication Society (ComSoc) and IEEE Vehicular Technology (VTS) Distinguished Lecturer (DL); received the Best Land Transportation Paper Award from IEEE Vehicular Technology Society in 2016. She has been serving as an Editor for IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications, IEEE Internet of Things Journal, and IEEE Transactions on Vehicular Technology (2013-2021). She served as a co-Chair of Wireless Communication Symposium for IEEE PIMRC 2023, Globecom 2020, and ICC 2018; Finance co-Chair for 2021 ICASSP; Local Arrangement co-Chair for IEEE VTC Fall 2017 and IEEE Infocom 2014. She has been an elected member for the Board of Governor (BoG) 2023-2025. She has severed as a panel expert for Natural Science Engineering Research Canada (NSERC).