His current research focuses on driver cognition, automated driving and parallel driving, where he has contributed over 160 publications. He received the ASME AVTT'2010 Best Paper Award and 2012 SAE Arch T. Colwell Merit Award. Dr. Cao serves as an Associate Editor for IEEE TVT, T-ITS, TIE, TMECH, JAS, and ASME JDSMC. He serves as the Co-Chair of IEEE ITSS Technical Committee on Cooperative Driving.