Fossen is a cyberneticist, a person who practices cybernetics. He received an MSc degree in Marine Technology in 1987 and a PhD degree in Engineering Cybernetics in 1991, both from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), Trondheim. He was elevated to IEEE Fellow by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers in 2016. Fossen's academic background, besides cybernetics, is computer science, cybersecurity, aerospace engineering, marine technology and inertial navigation systems. He has been a Fulbright scholar in flight control at the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics of the University of Washington, Seattle. He was appointed professor of guidance, navigation and control at NTNU in 1993. He has been visiting professor at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB), the Technical University of Denmark (DTU), Aalborg University, and the University of Porto. Fossen has been elected to the Norwegian Academy of Technological Sciences (1998) and the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters (2022). He teaches mathematical modeling of aircraft, marine craft, unmanned vehicles, guidance and control systems, and inertial navigation systems. Fossen is one of the co-founders of the company Marine Cybernetics AS (2002), acquired by DNV in 2012. He is also co-founder of the company ScoutDI AS (2017).

Wiley 2021 (2ed)

Wiley 2011 (1ed)

Wiley 1994

Springer 2017

Springer 2012

Springer 1999

Fossen holds several patents on HIL-testing technology for marine and offshore systems, a patent for weather optimal positioning control of marine vessels, and a pending patent for UAV landing systems. He received the Automatica Prize Paper Award at the IFAC World Congress in 2002 and the Arch T. Colwell Merit Paper Award in 2008 at the SAE World Congress.