PeopleofSuperintelligence

Researcher

Bastian Leibe

Bastian Leibe is a computer vision researcher whose work spans object categorization, pedestrian tracking, and 3D instance segmentation. He earned computer science degrees from Georgia Tech, the University of Stuttgart, and ETH Zurich, completing his doctorate in 2004. His work earned the 2007 CVPR Best Paper Award and the 2012 U.V. Helava Award; in 2023 he coauthored Mask3D for 3D semantic instance segmentation. At RWTH Aachen, he heads the Computer Vision Chair, where his group works on computer vision and machine learning for mobile robotics and intelligent vehicles.

Works
405
Citations
31,157
h-index
84

Publication numbers from OpenAlex, as of 18 October 2026.

Timeline

  1. 1999–2004

    Computer science degrees

    He earns an M.Sc. in computer science from Georgia Tech in 1999, a diploma from Stuttgart in 2001, and a PhD from ETH Zurich in 2004.

  2. 2004

    Visual object categorization

    His ETH Zurich thesis examines visual object categorization by recognizing unseen objects, localizing them in cluttered images, and assigning category labels.

  3. 2007

    CVPR Best Paper Award

    He receives the CVPR Best Paper Award in 2007.

  4. 2010

    Pedestrian tracking from stereo

    In 2010, he coauthors a stereo system that detects and tracks pedestrians in urban traffic scenes.

  5. 2012

    U.V. Helava Award

    In 2012, he and three coauthors receive the U.V. Helava Award for their 2010 pedestrian tracking paper.

  6. By 2013

    Postdoctoral work, RWTH associate professor

    After his 2004 ETH Zurich doctorate, he works as a postdoctoral research associate at TU Darmstadt and ETH Zurich. In 2013, he is an associate professor for Computer Vision at RWTH Aachen.

  7. 2023

    Mask3D for 3D instance segmentation

    In 2023, he coauthors Mask3D, a transformer model for 3D semantic instance segmentation that sets state-of-the-art results on ScanNet, S3DIS, STPLS3D, and ScanNet200.

  8. As of October 2026

    Professor and head of Computer Vision

    As of October 2026, he is Professor of Computer Vision at RWTH Aachen and heads its Computer Vision Chair, which works on computer vision and machine learning for mobile robotics and intelligent vehicles.

Career

  1. Since 2013RWTH Aachen UniversityAssociate Professor for Computer Vision
  2. 2005–2013TU DarmstadtPostdoctoral Research Associate
  3. 2001–2013ETH ZurichPostdoctoral Research Associate
  4. 2000–2002Georgia Institute of Technology

Education

  1. 2004ETH ZurichPhD
  2. 2001University of StuttgartDiploma
  3. 1999Georgia Institute of TechnologyM.Sc.

From the biography and OpenAlex affiliations (the years of papers that list the organization), so some years are approximate.

Most-cited works

  1. In Defense of the Triplet Loss for Person Re-Identification2017 · 2,835 citations
  2. HOTA: A Higher Order Metric for Evaluating Multi-object Tracking2020 · International Journal of Computer Vision · 1,204 citationsWith Andreas Geiger and Laura Leal-Taixé
  3. Robust Object Detection with Interleaved Categorization and Segmentation2007 · International Journal of Computer Vision · 933 citationsWith Ales Leonardis and Bernt Schiele
  4. Pedestrian Detection in Crowded Scenes2005 · IEEE Computer Society Conference on Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition · 875 citationsWith Bernt Schiele
  5. Combined Object Categorization and Segmentation With An Implicit Shape Model2004 · 811 citationsWith Ales Leonardis and Bernt Schiele

From OpenAlex, as of 18 October 2026.

  1. More people shaping AI studied at Massachusetts Institute of Technology than at any other institutionIncludes RWTH Aachen University. Our estimates of where the people shaping AI studied and where their careers led, from education records in cited biographies.
  2. The company share of AI researchers’ top papers rose from 3% to 32%Includes RWTH Aachen University. We estimate where leading AI researchers worked when their most-cited papers appeared. The company share rose from 3% in 1975–1979 to 32% in 2020–2024.
  3. Google has the highest combined h-index among AI organizationsIncludes RWTH Aachen University. Our estimates of combined and median h-index at AI organizations, using current affiliations and OpenAlex records.
  4. Stanford University trained or employed 27 of the 111 AI major-prize winners, more than any other universityIncludes Georgia Institute of Technology. Stanford University trained or employed 27 of the 111 AI major-prize winners, more than any other university. We compare doctorate and employment links for major-prize and best-paper winners.

Colleagues

People with dated positions at the same organization in the same years.

Sources and credits

Photo: We have no published photo of Bastian Leibe yet. Send us a free-licensed photo.

  1. Next Steps in Dynamic Visual Scene Understanding - Robotics Institute Carnegie Mellon University ri.cmu.edu. Checked 18 October 2026.
  2. Interleaved Object Categorization and Segmentation - Computer Vision vision.rwth-aachen.de. Checked 18 October 2026.
  3. Automatic Detection and Tracking of Pedestrians from a Moving Stereo Rig - Computer Graphics and Multimedia graphics.rwth-aachen.de. Checked 18 October 2026.
  4. ISPRS e-Bulletin #5: November 2012 isprs.org. Checked 18 October 2026.
  5. Visual Object Recognition - Kristen Grauman, Bastian Leibe - Google Books books.google.com. Checked 18 October 2026.
  6. Prof. Dr. Bastian Leibe - Computer Vision vision.rwth-aachen.de. Checked 18 October 2026.
  7. Computer Vision vision.rwth-aachen.de. Checked 18 October 2026.