Karaca has had an active role in the administration of ITU as he has held different academic and administrative positions throughout his career. He became an Assistant Professor in 1992 at the Department of Geological Engineering, and held the post of Vice Dean at the Graduate School of Science Engineering and Technology during 1993-1996. Karaca obtained a Disaster Management certificate given by FEMA-USA, as a result of the alliance following the 1999 Kocaeli Earthquake.
He was rector’s adviser and feasibility study team head for ITU-ARI Technopolis between 1998 and 2000. Prof. Karaca prepared business plan for it. He acted as a member of the execution committee for TÜBİTAK-ÇAYDAĞ (Turkish Science Foundation) between 2001-2007. Positions held by Prof. Karaca also include the post of Dean at the Graduate School of Science Engineering and Technology between 2001-2004 and Vice Rector of ITU between the years of 2008-2010, founding Rector of the ITU-Northern Cyprus between 2009-2010. Karaca has been holding various board memberships in TÜBİTAK, academic consultancy for National Geographic-Turkey and he is a member of the commission for the Elginkan Foundation Science and Technology award. Prof. Karaca’s research areas include are atmospheric and oceanic modeling; climate change, paleo-oceanography, paleo-climatology, disaster management and air quality modeling. Scientific research on these areas appeared in over 50 international and national journals in addition to chapters published in 6 edited books. Karaca was also a member of American Geophysical Union, American Meteorological Society, National Geographical Society, World Wildlife Fund in Türkiye. He is member of ITU Foundation and ITU ETA Foundation and active member of executive board of Knowledge Economy Association.
Prof. Dr. Mehmet Karaca had been appointed as the rector of Istanbul Technical University (ITU) between 2012 and 2020 and has been as a member of the executive board of Turkish Patent and Trademark Office of the Ministry of Science and Technology of Turkey since 2018. He was also executive board member of special school for gifted students of Ministry of National Education of Turkey.Prof. Dr. Mehmet Karaca has a wide range of interests, which include national and international music, cinema, history, football, basketball and gastronomy. Prof. Dr. Mehmet Karaca, owns a wide range of records of Turkish Classical Music, jazz and eclectic music.
He has three honorary doctorate degrees: The National Technical University Kharkiv Polytechnical Institute (NTU KhPI) in Ukraine, Azerbaycan Archtitecture an Civil Engineering University (Azerbaycan Mimarlık ve Inşaat Mektebi), Azerbaycan, Baku Higher Oil School (Bakı Ali Neft Mektebi) in Azerbaycan, respectively.
