He was a professor, and founding director of the
Center of Excellence for Control and Intelligent Processing (CIPCE), school of electrical and computer engineering, University of Tehran, as well as a researcher at the
School of Cognitive Sciences (SCS),
Institute for Studies in Theoretical Physics and Mathematics (IPM), Tehran, Iran. He served as the director of school of intelligent systems, IPM (1993–1997) and chairman of the ECE Department at the
University of Tehran (1986–1988). Lucas was also a visiting associate professor at the
University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada (summer, 1989–1990), University of California, Berkeley (1988–1989), an assistant professor at
Garyounis University (1984–1985),
University of California, Los Angeles (1975–1976), a senior researcher at the
International Center for Theoretical Physics, and the
International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology, both in
Trieste, Italy, the Institute of Applied Mathematics,
Chinese Academy of Sciences,
Harbin Institute of Electrical Technology, a research associate at the Manufacturing Research Corporation of Ontario, and a research assistant at the Electronic Research Laboratory,
University of California, Berkeley. Lucas authored/co-authored about 826 conference papers, 332 journal papers and 39 chapters in books, edited 8 book volumes, served as program committee (PC) member for 96 conferences, and presented invited talks (or keynote speeches) in 190 national and international events. He had been a pioneer in presenting new multi-disciplinary graduate courses like biologic computing, general systems design, and advanced topics in socio-cognitive systems, where, he has presented courses (and supervised theses) in different disciplines and departments like Electrical and Computer Engineering, Management, Psychology, Fine Arts and Architecture, and Finance and Economics. He was also the founder of the ISRF,
Institute for Studies in Theoretical Physics and Mathematics and has assisted in founding several new research organizations and engineering disciplines in Iran. He is the holder of the patent for Speaker Independent Persian Isolated Word Neurorecognizer. Lucas served as managing editor of the
Memories of the Engineering Faculty, University of Tehran (1979–1991), reviewer of
Mathematical Reviewers (since 1987), associate editor of the
Journal of Intelligent and Fuzzy Systems (1992–1999), and chairman of the IEEE, Iran Section (1990–1992). He has served as the chairman of several international conferences. ==Industry career==