School of Computing, Informatics, and Decision Systems Engineering - Redefining excellence Societal impact and educational experience
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2019
Annual Report
School of Computing,
Informatics, and Decision
Systems Engineering
Redefining excellence
Societal impact and educational experience
The Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering at Arizona State University offers
25 undergraduate programs and 46 graduate programs in its six schools:
SBHSE CIDSE ECEE SEMTE SSEBE TPS
School of School of School of School for School of The Polytechnic
Biological and Computing, Electrical, Engineering of Sustainable School
Health Systems Informatics, and Computer Matter, Transport Engineering
Engineering Decision Systems and Energy and Energy and the Built
Engineering Engineering Environment
Marco Santello, Director Sandeep Gupta, Director Stephen Phillips, Director Lenore Dai, Director Ram Pendyala, Director Ann McKenna, Interim Director
Innovation at scale
8
National
Academy of
10
American Association
for the Advancement
4
National
Academy of
11
American
Society of
Engineering of Science Construction Mechanical
42
Members Fellows Members Engineers
Fellows
38
NSF CAREER
7
Awardees in the
last five years
IEEE PECASE
5
Fellows
7
Awardees
National
Academy of
Inventors
Fellows
American
Society of
Civil Engineers
3
American Institute
for Medical and
Fellows Biological Engineering
Fellows
Lead institution on two Lead institution of the Department of
National Science Foundation Engineering Research Centers Homeland Security Center of Excellence
Director’s letter.
Redefining excellence: Ensuring societal
impact in the educational experience
This past year has been one of tremendous growth, both in size and ingenuity to find software vulnerabilities. Assistant Professor
and stature, for the School of Computing, Informatics, and Decision Tiffany Bao won the NSA’s Best Scientific Cybersecurity Paper
Systems Engineering. Throughout this period of continued competition for her exploration of game-theory in finding methods
expansion, my goal has been to ensure our standards of academic to exploit and patch weaknesses prior to strategic cyberbattle.
excellence grow alongside our student populations, now spanning In early 2019 we assisted in launching academia’s largest drone
two campuses and online. We are committed to providing an motion capture studio, which will be used to study multi-robot
educational experience befitting a top research institution — at a swarming, cyberphysical systems and human-robot interactions.
grand, and inclusive, scale. The idea and creation of this new facility was organized by faculty
A Fall 2019 enrollment of 7,773 students equates to a nearly 15% working across several disciplines — a truly collaborative effort.
increase across our undergraduate and graduate programs. In This entrepreneurial mindset also appears in the form of IP activity.
these pages you will find that our students are achieving at all I am proud of our faculty and students for their seven patents and
levels — receiving NSF Graduate Research Fellowships, earning four spinout companies this year. We also have 37 technologies
awards and recognition at national and international competitions, available for license.
and not only working with industry on business challenges, but While making great technical strides in our research, we remain
also starting their own innovative companies. keenly aware of the communities we serve and the societal
Leading the way is our core group of senior faculty, who are implications of our work. As educators we must ask ourselves
advancing the burgeoning fields of robotics and artificial “Should we build it?” as often as “Can we build it?” This is especially
intelligence. We welcomed Professor Dimitri Bertsekas, true in sensitive fields like artificial intelligence, where technological
CIDSE’s first-ever NAE member, and his deep expertise in advancements threaten to automate jobs. Assistant Professor
reinforcement and machine learning. Professor Stephanie Forrest Siddharth Srivastava is working toward a solution to that very
was recognized with an ISCE Ten-Year Most Influential Paper problem. His NSF-funded research aims to reprogram autonomous
Award for her seminal research on using genetic programming robots, equipping them with intelligent tutoring systems to retrain
to fix software bugs. workers in AI technology so they are not displaced from their jobs.
Professor Sethuraman “Panch” Panchanathan was named a I am excited for what the future of the School of Computing,
vice president of the National Academy of Inventors and helped Informatics, and Decision Systems Engineering holds, especially
ASU secure a $3 million National Science Foundation Research as we advance research and discovery in robotics, artificial
Traineeship award to train students for careers in smart city-related intelligence and cybersecurity. While doing so we strive to validate
fields as urban populations rapidly grow and change. ASU’s charter by drawing value from whom we include and how
they succeed. If you are interested in the work we are doing and
Following the robust growth of our recently launched online Master
would like to collaborate, I would love to hear your thoughts on our
of Computer Science degree, we have added a cybersecurity
publication and how we can work together.
concentration to the program. Not only does this provide our
advanced-degree students with greater opportunities, it also shines
a light on our junior faculty and their considerable achievements.
Sandeep Gupta
Assistant Professors Yan Shoshitaishvili and Ruoyu “Fish” Wang Director and Professor
received an $11.7 million DARPA award to create a human- School of Computing, Informatics,
assisted autonomous tool that learns human strengths like intuition and Decision Systems Engineering
3
ey statistics
Fall 2019 enrollment
By degree program
Program
Computer engineering
(computer systems)
Computer science
Computer systems engineering
Engineering management
Bachelor’s
--
2,981
436
669
Master’s
143
769
--
--
Doctoral
62
201
--
--
Total enrollment
5,672
Fall 2016
6,213
Fall 2017
6,787
Fall 2018
7,773
Fall 2019
Industrial engineering 313 93 59
5,097
Informatics 153 -- -- Fall 2015
Robotics and autonomous -- 27 --
systems (artificial intelligence)*
Software engineering 1,322 190 --
-- No degree offered.
* New degree program established January 2019. On-ground 4,186 4,666 4,986 5,257 5,887
Online 911 1,006 1,227 1,530 1,886
On-ground 775 937 1,050 1,195 1,243
Degrees granted 2018-2019 1,354
13 degrees
14granted53 93 111
By degree program Online Total 1,288 2018-2019
2017-2018
Program Bachelor’s Master’s Doctoral
1,103
Computer engineering -- 76 4
(computer systems)
Computer science 383 268 25 2016-2017
Computer systems 87 -- -- 951
engineering
Engineering management 70 -- --
788 2015-2016
2014-2015
Industrial engineering 81 76 On-ground
4 4,186 4,666 4,986 5,257 5,887
Informatics 25 -- --
Software engineering 143 112
Online
--
911 1,006 1,227 1,530 1,886
-- No degree offered.
On-ground 775 937 1,050 1,195 1,243
Online 13 14 53 93 111
Research
Expenditures Awards Proposals
FY2015 $16,102,168 FY2015 $11,143,956 FY2015 $111,634,633
FY2016 $16,439,982 FY2016 $13,892,143 FY2016 $103,978,093
FY2017 $17,628,787 FY2017 $23,387,720 FY2017 $219,970,049
FY2018 $20,915,736 FY2018 $25,258,041 FY2018 $163,271,093
FY2019 $25,544,940 FY2019 $30,252,647 FY2019 $154,142,321
$0 $5M $10M $15M $20M $25M $20M $0 $5M $10M $15M $20M $25M $30M $35M $0 $50M $100M $150M $200M $250M
4
CON-
CIDSE Report 2019
Faculty Big data Students and curriculum
6 Faculty spotlight 21 Decrpyting the mystery of blockchain 29 Student recognition
technology
8 Awards and recognition 30 PhD alumni in academia
10 New faculty 22 Predicting the future with better data
TENTS
visualization 32 Doctoral Students
Campaign ASU 2020 23 Shifting big data into high gear 34 Degrees offered
13 Eminent scholar gives $2 million to support 35 New programs
ASU industrial engineering program
Research centers
24 Center for Embedded Systems
Industry
Artificial intelligence 36 Serving digital innovation cup at a time
ASU-Mayo Center for Innovative Imaging
and robotics
Center for Cognitive Ubiquitous Computing Engineers and clinicians study headaches
14 How smart is AI from traumatic brain injuries
The Drone Studio
Little AI lies 37 Going FFAR with agricultural research
Center for Cybersecurity and Digital
15 NSF Graduate Research Fellow engineers Forensics iLux Lab amplifying positive impact
big data solutions Center for Assured and SCAlable Data 38 New ASU center helps secure the nation
Alumni, Arizona Impact Engineering
Tiny but mighty: Bee brains may hold 25 Center for Accelerating Operational IP activity
key to miniaturizing AI Efficiency, A Department of Homeland
39 Spinout companies
Security (DHS) Center of Excellence
Artificial intelligence supports
real intelligence iLUX (Innovative Learner and User Staff
Experience)
A new way to “see” neighborhoods, 40 Thank you
Biocomputing, Security and Society
16 Coming soon: A robot that understands IMPACT awards
its world and the people in it Industrial Assessment Center
41 Better call Lincoln
NSF grant supports smart city research
and STEM education Innovation
17 MURI Award sets tiny particles to 26 Biocomputing + computer science =
Stay in touch
answer big questions de-bugged software
Keep up to date on news about Fulton
Safety becomes smart with 27 Decision framework Engineering and CIDSE at our news site,
breakthroughs in software dependability Full Circle fullcircle.asu.edu
Coding the future
Engineering success: It’s
Cybersecurity all in the mind(set) (ASU School of Computing, Informatics, and
18 Adding human ingenuity to automated Decision Systems Engineering) to connect
28 Engineering and humanities
with CIDSE students, alumni and faculty.
security tools collide for social good facebook.com/ASU.CIDSE
NSF Graduate Research Fellow solving
society’s toughest problems
Article credits Photo credits
19 Cybersecurity expert takes a deeper Karishma Albal Marco-Alexis Chaira
look into the dark web Madison Arnold Deanna Dent
Monique Clement Erika Gronek
Hackers to head off cybercriminals Joe Caspermeyer Jessica Hochreiter
Mary Beth Faller Connor McKee
Jackpotting and US bank attacks Jerry Gonzalez Nora Skrodenis
Terry Grant
20 Interns solve technical challenges Kelly Krause Production
Joe Kullman Use the QR code to
for companies Rhonda Hitchcock-Mast
Scott Seckel send Sandeep Gupta
Jessica Hochreiter
Amanda Stoneman a message or share our
Lanelle Strawder Stephanie Mabee
Fall 2019 report online.
Marshall Terrill Craig Smith
Melinda Weaver
Erik Wirtanen
cidse.engineering.asu.edu
Faculty spotlight
Engineering excellence
Stephanie Mohamed
Gil Sarwat
Stephanie Gil will bridge robotics and communications to Mohamed Sarwat will build innovative scalable technologies
help multi-agent cyberphysical systems gain robust capable of seamlessly connecting data collected from
contextual awareness for better coordination and decision- various geographically distributed internet of things devices.
making in a project supported by a $500,000 five-year NSF His project is supported by a $550,000 five-year NSF
CAREER Award. CAREER Award.
For these systems to reach their full potential, the intelligent Sarwat’s research is the first step toward building next-
agents must understand their environment, know the state generation computing infrastructure that can
of other agents in the system, and use this information effectively manage and analyze the ever-growing
to coordinate and complete mission-level goals across internet of things data.
diverse platforms. The new technology will organize data in a way that allows
Gil’s algorithms have the potential to make fleets of a commodity computer system to digest and store large-
interacting intelligent agents more capable in situations scale data from the interconnected devices. Sarwat and his
where higher levels of contextual awareness are integral team will also build new data processing techniques that
for achieving mission-focused tasks. Such situations include will enable convenient and fast access of such data. More
making driving safer for autonomous cars on the road, entities will be able to leverage the new data processing
carrying critical medical supplies to accident sites as quickly techniques to build many applications ranging from
as possible, or having robotic counterparts working with simple data filtering and integration operations to artificial
human emergency responders during search-and-rescue intelligence methods being employed in autonomous
or reconnaissance missions. v vehicles and robots. v
6
Faculty spotlight
The National Science Foundation’s Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Program identifies the
nation’s most promising junior faculty members and provides them with funding to pursue outstanding research, excellence
in teaching and the integration of education and research.
The School of Computing, Informatics, and Decision Systems Engineering at Arizona State University has a strong record
of winning multiple prestigious early career awards, including four NSF CAREER Awards in the past two years.
Heni Yezhou
Ben Amor Yang
Heni Ben Amor conducts research at the intersection of Yezhou Yang focuses his research on creating intelligent
robotics and human-machine interaction. He investigates robots that can understand humans through the lens of
how humans and machines can work together to accomplish visual perception.
important tasks in service, health care and other industries. He studies active perception, an area of computer vision
Ben Amor received a five-year, $500,000 NSF CAREER with a focus on computational modeling, decision and control
Award that will focus on establishing the concept of strategies for robotic perception. Yang combines active
preventative robotics to intelligently minimize the risk perception with natural language processing and artificial
of physical injury. In contrast to rehabilitation robotics intelligence reasoning to advance robotic visual learning.
that focuses on therapeutic procedures after an injury, Together they improve the capabilities of a robot or any
preventative robotics is a novel approach that incorporates intelligent agent to make sense of a specific environment.
human well-being into robot control and decision-making to A $550,000 NSF CAREER Award is supporting
steer away from injury. Yang’s project to address the challenging task of pairing
Ben Amor is seeking to generate and deploy assistive robotic visual recognition with knowledge. This research will
technologies, such as a prosthesis or an exoskeleton, that attempt to enable a seeing machine to identify unknown
seamlessly blend with actions of a human partner to achieve visible concepts from previous encounters and other
an intended function while minimizing biomechanical stress contextual information.
on the body. Combining these goals will unlock new potential Yang’s project will lay the foundation for the development
for robotics to improve public and occupational health. v of robust personal mobile applications and service robots,
such as visual assistants for people with impaired vision
and/or voice-enabled agents for elder care. v
7
Faculty awards and recognition
National Academy of from data, particularly social media data — a
Inventors Vice President challenging type of information.
His work attracts high-achieving students, who
Sethuraman Panchanathan
as users of social media know which problems
they can solve. Current and recent graduate
students are tackling online issues like fake
National Academy of
news, cyberbullying, data privacy, thwarting
Inventors ASU Chapter malicious users and many more challenges.
Members
His body of work recently earned recognition
Ayan Banerjee from three prominent professional organizations.
Sandeep Gupta In the last few months of 2018, Liu was named
a Fellow of the Association for Computing
J.P. Morgan AI Research Students’ fresh Machinery, the Association for the
Advancement of Artificial Intelligence
Awards 2019
“Human-Aware AI Assistants for Interactive perspectives and the American Association for the
Advancement of Science. He is already
Decision Support in Finance”
Subbarao Kambhampati
Iead to success a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and
Electronic Engineers.
“It’s a very pleasant surprise to get all three in
Professor Huan Liu has built a renowned the same year,” Liu says. “To get this kind of
research career in the areas of social recognition is a reinforcement of our pursuit
Faculty Women’s computing, data mining and artificial intelligence of excellence. It will help us reach a wider
Association Outstanding by letting his doctoral students lead the way. audience and also encourages us to be more
Mentor Award As an AI researcher, Liu’s expertise focuses creative and diligent.” v
Sharon Hsiao on discovering actionable patterns or insights
Fulton Exemplar Faculty
K. Selçuk Candan
Fulton Outstanding Assistant
Professor
Heni Ben Amor
2019 Teaching Excellence
Award
Ajay Bansal
Yalin Wang, associate professor of Dan Shunk, joined ASU’s industrial
Top 5% Teachers computer science, and Junwen Wang, engineering faculty in 1984 and has
research faculty member at the Mayo recently been conferred the title of
Ajay Bansal Clinic, will work together on a research professor emeritus. He has been
K. Selçuk Candan project, “Integrating genomic and recognized in industry communities
imaging biomarkers for early detection for his innovative approaches to
James Collofello of Alzheimer’s disease.” Their project product development and productivity
Adam Doupé is one of eight innovative pilot studies improvements. He has published more
that received funding through the 2019 than 30 journal articles, one book
Georgios Fainekos Mayo Clinic and Arizona State University and two book chapters, more than
Esma Gel seed grant program. The program 35 refereed conference proceedings
launches new, interdisciplinary and and has presented a dozen keynote
Troy McDaniel translational projects on a small scale speeches. Shunk is a senior member of
Fengbo Ren and enables the researchers to attract the Institute of Industrial Engineers and
funding needed for larger studies. v Society of Manufacturing Engineers. v
8
Big Data.
Faculty awards and recognition.
Reinforcing computational
decision-making
Throughout his career, decision problems, often with the use of
neural networks and self-learning.”
Bertsekas received the Richard E. Bellman
Control Heritage Award for “contributions to
Dimitri Bertsekas has Reinforcement learning is widely known for
the foundations of deterministic and
enjoyed engineering’s rich helping computers successfully learn how to
stochastic optimization-based methods in
systems and control,” the 2014 Khachiyan
variety of challenges and play and win games such as chess and Go.
While games have defined rules, real-world
Prize for Life-Time Accomplishments in
how many of them can be challenges often do not. However, Bertsekas
Optimization, the 2015 George B. Dantzig
Prize and the 2018 John von Neumann
viewed through a “unifying says reinforcement learning includes a
Theory Prize with his co-author John Tsitsiklis
big enough pool of methods that students
mathematical lens.” and researchers can begin to address
for their research monographs “Parallel and
Distributed Computation: Numerical Methods”
An avid researcher, author and educator, engineering problems of enormous size
and “Neuro-Dynamic Programming.” He and
Bertsekas has used this approach to and unimaginable difficulty.
Tsitsiklis have also received the 1997 Prize for
contribute to advances in multiple research Bertsekas has written numerous research Research Excellence in the Interface Between
areas, including optimization, reinforcement papers and 17 books and research Operations Research and Computer Science
learning, machine learning, dynamic monographs on the topics of optimization for “Neuro-Dynamic Programming.”
programming and data communications. theory and algorithms, dynamic programming
Bertsekas’ passion for education has also won
In Fall 2019, he joined ASU’s School of and optimal control, data communications,
him accolades. His educational efforts have
Computing, Informatics, and Decision parallel and distributed computation, and
been awarded the 2001 John R. Ragazzini
Systems Engineering as Fulton Chair of applied probability. His work has been
Education Award for outstanding contributions
Computational Decision Making. recognized with many prestigious awards
to automatic control education and the 2009
and honors over the years.
“I found ASU to be an exciting place for INFORMS Expository Writing Award.
research where I can work with outstanding He was elected member of the National
When he’s not teaching or researching
colleagues,” says Bertsekas. Academy of Engineering in 2001 for
optimization and control theory, Bertsekas
“pioneering contributions to fundamental
Bertsekas has spent much of his career — enjoys the visual arts, particularly travel and
research, practice and education of optimization
since 1979 — as a faculty member at the nature photography. His original photos,
and control theory, and especially its application
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which can be found on Instagram, have been
to data communication networks.”
where he held the position of McAfee exhibited at several locations within MIT. He
Professor of Engineering. Additionally, he has earned several key awards looks forward to exploring the art scene and
over the span of 20 years from American nature Arizona has to offer. v
His main research focus at present is
Automatic Control Council and from the
reinforcement learning — “a field that
Institute for Operations Research and the
addresses large and challenging multistage
Management Sciences, known as INFORMS.
9
Faculty
Leading and contributing to discoveries
With expertise spanning artificial intelligence, robotics, cybersecurity, software and enterprise systems, our faculty drive transformative
advances in human-technology systems. We are energized and boundless; teaching robots in hours not days, revolutionizing
programmable material and paving the way for future innovation.
Ruben Acuna Chitta Baral Yinong Chen Adolfo Escobedo
Lecturer Professor Senior Lecturer Assistant Professor
MS, Arizona State University PhD, University of Maryland, PhD, University of Karlsruhe PhD, Texas A&M University
Software engineering College Park Computer science and engineering Industrial engineering
Computer science and engineering
Gail-Joon Ahn Michael Clough Georgios Fainekos
Professor Rida Bazzi Lecturer Associate Professor
PhD, George Mason University Associate Professor MS, Arizona State University PhD, University of Pennsylvania
Computer science and engineering PhD, Georgia Institute of Industrial engineering Computer science and engineering
Technology
Computer science and engineering
Ronald Askin Charles Colbourn Xuerong Feng
Professor Professor Lecturer
PhD, Georgia Institute of Heni Ben Amor PhD, University of Toronto PhD, University of Texas, Dallas
Technology Assistant Professor Computer science and engineering Computer science and engineering
Industrial engineering PhD, Technical University
Freiberg
Computer science and engineering James Collofello Stephanie Forrest
Robert Atkinson Professor, Vice Dean Professor
Associate Professor PhD, Northwestern University PhD, University of Michigan
PhD, University of Wisconsin, Kevin Burger Computer science and engineering Computer science and engineering
Madison Lecturer
Informatics MS, University of Kansas
Computer science and engineering Partha Dasgupta Ashraf Gaffar
Associate Professor Assistant Professor
Janaka Balasooriya PhD, University of New York at PhD, Concordia University
Lecturer Debra Calliss Stony Brook Software engineering
PhD, Georgia State University Senior Lecturer Computer science and engineering
Computer science and engineering PhD, Arizona State University
Computer science and engineering Kevin Gary
Hasan Davulcu Associate Professor,
Ajay Bansal Associate Professor Program Chair
Assistant Professor K. Selçuk Candan PhD, State University of PhD, Arizona State University
PhD, University of Texas at Dallas Professor New York at Stony Brook Software engineering
Software engineering PhD, University of Maryland, Computer science and engineering
College Park
Computer science and engineering
Esma Gel
Srividya Bansal Adam Doupé Associate Professor
Assistant Professor Assistant Professor PhD, Northwestern University
PhD, University of Texas at Dallas Linda Chattin PhD, University of California, Industrial engineering
Software engineering Principal Lecturer Santa Barbara
PhD, State University of Computer science and engineering
New York at Buffalo
Industrial engineering
New faculty
Tiffany Bao Dimitri Bertsekas Chris Bryan Heewook Lee
Assistant Professor Fulton Chair of Computational Assistant Professor Assistant Professor
Decision Making
PhD, Carnegie Mellon University PhD, University of California, Davis PhD, Indiana University
Computer science and engineering National Academy of Engineering Computer science and engineering Bloomington
PhD, Massachusetts Institute of Computer science and engineering
Software security, automated Technology Data visualization, visual analytics,
binary analysis techniques, data science, human-computer Computational biology,
Computer science and engineering bioinformatics, genetic variation.
autonomous game-theoretical interaction, virtual reality.
strategy for software vulnerabilities. Network optimization, linear and Joint appointment with the
nonlinear programming, data Biodesign Institute
communication networks, parallel
and distributed computation.
10Faculty.
Stephanie Gil Cheryl L. Jennings Baoxin Li Phill Miller
Assistant Professor Lecturer Professor, Program Chair Lecturer
PhD, Massachusetts Institute of PhD, Arizona State University PhD, University of Maryland, MBA, Northcentral University
Technology Industrial engineering College Park Computer science and
Computer science and Computer science and engineering
engineering engineering
Feng Ju
Assistant Professor Pitu Mirchandani
Javier Gonzalez- PhD, University of Jing Li Professor, The Avnet Chair
Sanchez Wisconsin — Madison Associate Professor in Supply Chain Networks
Lecturer Industrial engineering PhD, University of Michigan ScD, Massachusetts
Industrial engineering Institute of Technology
PhD, Arizona State University
Industrial engineering
Software engineering Joseph Juarez
Lecturer Tim Lindquist
Sandeep Gupta PhD, Arizona State University Professor Douglas Montgomery
Professor, School Director Industrial engineering PhD, Iowa State University Regents Professor
PhD, The Ohio State University Software engineering PhD, Virginia Tech
Industrial engineering
Computer science and Subbarao “Rao”
engineering
Kambhampati Huan Liu
Professor
Professor Mutsumi Nakamura
Dianne Hansford PhD, University of Maryland
PhD, University of Southern Principal Lecturer
Lecturer California PhD, University of Texas,
Computer science and Computer science and Arlington
PhD, Arizona State University engineering
Computer science and engineering Computer science and
engineering engineering
Yoshihiro Kobayashi Ross Maciejewski
Robert Heinrichs
Lecturer Assistant Professor Rong Pan
PhD, University of California, PhD, Purdue University Associate Professor,
Lecturer Los Angeles
Computer science and Program Chair
PhD, Technische Computer science and
Universität Berlin, Germany engineering PhD, Pennsylvania State
engineering University
Software engineering
Industrial engineering
Joohyung Lee Daniel McCarville
Sharon Hsiao Associate Professor
Professor of Practice
Sethuraman “Panch”
Assistant Professor PhD, Arizona State University
PhD, University of Texas
PhD, University of Pittsburgh at Austin Industrial engineering Panchanathan
Computer science and Computer science and Professor, ASU Senior Vice
President for Knowledge
engineering engineering Alexandra Mehlhase Enterprise Development
Lecturer
PhD, University of Ottawa
Dijiang Huang Yann-Hang Lee PhD, Technische Universität Computer science and
Associate Professor Professor Berlin, Germany engineering
PhD, University of PhD, University of Michigan Software engineering
Missouri — Kansas City Computer science and Paolo Papotti
Computer science and engineering Ryan Meuth Assistant Professor
engineering Lecturer PhD, Universita’ degli Studi
PhD, Missouri University Roma Tre
of Science and Technology Computer science and
Computer science and engineering
engineering
Ruoyu “Fish” Wang Yingzhen Yang Jia Zou Mike Findler
Lecturer
PhD, Wright State University
Software engineering
Samira Ghayekhloo
Lecturer
PhD, Eastern Mediterranean
University, Turkey
Computer science
Ali Kucukozyigit
Assistant Professor Assistant Professor Assistant Professor Lecturer
PhD, University of California, PhD, University of Illinois at PhD, Tsinghua University, China PhD, Old Dominion University
Santa Barbara Urbana-Champaign Computer science and engineering Industrial engineering
Computer science and engineering Computer science and engineering
Data-intensive distributed systems, Vijay Suthar
System security, with emphasis in Statistical machine learning, functional machine learning systems, blockchain, Lecturer
automated binary program analysis, analysis, large scale data. development of dynamic applications.
reverse engineering of software. MS, Stanford University
Software engineering
11Faculty
Ted Pavlic Justin Selgrad Farideh Guoliang Xue
Assistant Professor Lecturer Tadayon-Navabi Professor
PhD, The Ohio State University MS, Washington University Senior Lecturer PhD, University of Minnesota
Industrial engineering in St. Louis MS, University of Louisiana Computer science and engineering
Computer science and engineering at Lafayette
Giulia Pedrielli Computer science and engineering
Hao Yan
Assistant Professor Arunabha Sen
Assistant Professor
PhD, Politecnico di Milano, Italy Professor Kurt VanLehn
Industrial engineering PhD, University of South Professor, The Diane and PhD, Georgia Institute of
Carolina Gary Tooker Chair for Technology
Computer science and engineering Effective Education in Industrial engineering
Fengbo Ren Science, Technology,
Assistant Professor Engineering and Math
PhD, University of California, Paulo Shakarian PhD, Massachusetts Institute
Yezhou Yang
Los Angeles Assistant Professor of Technology Assistant Professor
Computer science and engineering PhD, University of Maryland, Computer science and engineering PhD, University of Maryland,
College Park College Park
Computer science and engineering
Andrea Richa J. Rene Villalobos Computer science and engineering
Professor Associate Professor
PhD, Carnegie Mellon University Yan Shoshitaishvili Stephen Yau
PhD, Texas A&M University Professor
Computer science and engineering Assistant Professor
Industrial engineering PhD, University of Illinois
PhD, University of California,
Santa Barbara Computer science and engineering
George Runger Computer science and engineering Sarma Vrudhula
Professor Professor
PhD, University of Minnesota PhD, University of Southern
Nong Ye
Industrial engineering
Aviral Shrivastava California Professor
Professor Computer science and engineering PhD, Purdue University
PhD, University of California, Industrial engineering
Hessam Sarjoughian Irvine
Associate Professor Yalin Wang
Computer science and engineering
Associate Professor Yu “Tony” Zhang
PhD, University of Arizona
PhD, University of Washington Assistant Professor
Computer science and engineering Dan Shunk Computer science and engineering PhD, University of
Professor Emeritus Tennessee, Knoxville
Mohamed Sarwat PhD, Purdue University
Assistant Professor Industrial engineering
Carole-Jean Wu Computer science and engineering
PhD, University of Minnesota Associate Professor
Computer science and engineering PhD, Princeton University Ming Zhao
Violet Syrotiuk Computer science and engineering Associate Professor
Associate Professor
Jorge Sefair PhD, University of Waterloo, PhD, University of Florida
Assistant Professor Canada Teresa Wu Computer science and engineering
PhD, University of Florida Computer science and engineering Professor
Industrial engineering PhD, University of Iowa
Industrial engineering
12Campaign ASU 2020.
Eminent scholar gives $2 million to support
ASU industrial engineering program
The world has no the next generation of thought leaders in
industrial engineering has been, simply put,
shortage of worthwhile top of class. His investment is instrumental
causes to support. in elevating the profile, potential and
contributions of our learning community in
Diseases need cures. Environments need the Fulton Schools.”
preservation. People need a higher quality
of life. One ASU professor has found that Among his long list of accomplishments,
supporting graduate student education in Montgomery is most proud of the 68
industrial engineering is his top priority. doctoral students he has mentored, with
four students under his wing currently.
“Graduate student education is really
important,” says Douglas C. Montgomery, a Montgomery’s first doctoral student was
Regents Professor of industrial engineering. Ronald G. Askin, whom he continued to
“Industrial engineers play a vital role in a huge mentor as Askin’s career progressed at the
range of industrial and business settings, from University of Iowa, the University of Arizona
and finally to ASU when he joined the Fulton We believe engineering is more than a discipline
manufacturing to health care. So, we should — it is a mindset, a way of looking at the world
do whatever we can to improve graduate Schools faculty in 2006 as the chair of
to determine how challenges can be met most
education and make it a good experience.” the industrial engineering program. Askin
efficiently, sustainably, safely and in cost-effective
went on to serve as director of the School ways to maximize impact and benefit those we
Montgomery’s passion to help graduate of Computing, Informatics, and Decision serve. As a partner in our mission, you will help
students develop their research interests Systems Engineering from 2009 to 2016. support our diverse faculty and students as they
has motivated him to become an investor find innovative and entrepreneurial solutions to
and partner in their education by making “Doug is the kind of advisor and faculty
pressing concerns.
contributions over the years to ASU and mentor you want to emulate. He’s been
his alma mater, Virginia Tech. And in 2018, my role model for how to be a successful To make a donation of any amount, please
classroom instructor, a high impact call Margo Burdick, our school’s director of
the eminent scholar and statistician made a
researcher who combines technical depth development, at 480-727-7099. You can
personal contribution of $2 million to the also mail your gift to Ira A. Fulton Schools of
Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering. with real-world relevance and impact, and
Engineering Attn: Margo Burdick, PO Box
a graduate advisor,” says Askin.
“Doug is fueled by a sincere commitment 879309, Tempe, AZ 85287-9309. Please make
to scholarship at the highest levels in his “I’ve been quite fortunate to work with checks payable to the “ASU Foundation” with
excellent research students,” says “School of Computing, Informatics, and Decision
teaching, service and research,” says Kyle
Montgomery. “I’m really proud of every Systems Engineering” noted in the memo line.
Squires, dean of the Fulton Schools. “He
embodies the core tenets of the New single one of them because they’ve all Your gift is greatly appreciated. Thank you.
American University and his impact on gone on to do really great things.” v
13Artificial intelligence and robotics
Children see the world, manipulate it, play with
it and then they learn. Machines, on the other
hand, learn using very large sets of examples
about patterns that even humans have a hard
time describing. For example, you teach a
machine how to recognize a dog by showing
it millions of pictures of dogs using databases
of labeled images.
How smart
That’s where artificial intelligence is right now:
using perception as a learning technique. Yezhou Yang (middle) participated in a panel
Machines learn by doing and from examples. to discuss the future of AI following a Mesa
is AI? “Basically we are trying to figure out how to make
learning more efficient,” Kambhampati says.
Community College theater production
called The Intelligent Design of Jenny
Chow. The fictional play follows a robot,
Creating machines that think and act But when artificial intelligence fails, no one designed by a young girl, that takes on
like humans is as much grounded in the knows why it didn’t work. humanistic emotions and behaviors. v
humanities as it is in engineering.
“I’m not sure machine learning has reached the
When a group of retired Army and Marine point where it can extrapolate or be creative like
generals, CIA agents and scientists gathered humans are,” says Spring Berman, an associate
at ASU to discuss the future of national professor in the School of Engineering of
security research, their discussion veered Matter, Transport and Energy and associate
into how to successfully pair humans and director of ASU’s Center for Human, Artificial
artificial intelligence. Intelligence, and Robot Teaming.
“In order to create machines and algorithms that “Our goal is to think about how best to
adapt to a human, we first need to understand coordinate teams of humans, software agents
more about humans,” says Heni Ben Amor, an and robots for a variety of applications, which
assistant professor in the School of Computing, could be transportation, manufacturing, search
Informatics and Decision Systems Engineering. and rescue or defense,” she says. “We look at Professor Katina Michael served as a guest
For Subbarao “Rao” Kambhampati, a professor creating control strategies for swarms of robots editor for a special edition of Proceedings
in the school and an expert in artificial that you could give them a mission and they of the IEEE, the leading journal for technical
intelligence, automated planning and machine could then carry it out on their own.” v developments in electronics, electrical
learning, the answer lies in how machines learn. and computer engineering, and computer
science. Michael and her collaborators co-
authored the introduction and an article on
engineering-based design methodology for
Little AI lies embedding ethics in autonomous robots. v
“We attempted to take the first steps toward
understanding the state of the public Students
consciousness on this topic,” Kambhampati
says. “We got a sense of when people are
willing to be told white lies.”
But only if it’s for the greater good. They
discussed scenarios where the research
found white lies were considered acceptable,
such as to achieve teaming performance.
However, other circumstances, like
considering the role of AI in the future of Doctoral student Tahora Nazer discussed
medicine, raised discussion among experts how data mining experts are making social
ASU computer scientist Subbarao Kambhampati in computing, ethics, philosophy, economics, media an effective tool in helping the
and his former graduate student Tathagata psychology, law and politics. public and emergency responders during
Chakraborti traveled to the Artificial Intelligence, hurricanes, tornadoes, floods and other
“The doctor-patient relationship, and the
Ethics and Society conference to ask the natural disasters during an appearance on
intriguing roles of deception in it, does
question, “Is it okay for AI to lie?” And how do Catalyst, an Arizona PBS show. v
provide an invaluable starting point for
we keep humans in the loop if they do?
conversation on the topic of greater good in
Kambhampati’s research poses several human-AI interactions,” Kambhampati says. Watch the video:
unresolved ethical and moral questions scan the
As AI develops, researchers will continue to QR code or
regarding the design of autonomy in AI.
seek answers to the unresolved moral and visit links.asu.edu/
ethical questions that will continue to arise. v CHMAIvideo
14Artificial intelligence and robotics.
Students
NSF Graduate Artificial
Research Fellow intelligence
engineers big supports real
data solutions intelligence
Kurt VanLehn applies artificial intelligence
to education. He recently received nearly
$1.5 million from the National Science
Foundation to conduct research on the use
An ASU team won the AI commentator of automated intelligent teaching assistants
competition at the Korean Advanced in the classroom.
Institute of Science and Technology AI His work is part of The Future of Work at
World Cup 2018, a worldwide competition the Human-Technology Frontier, one of the
of online soccer teams simulated by AI. NSF’s 10 Big Ideas for Future Investment.
The team, led by Assistant Professor VanLehn’s approach challenges how
Yezhou Yang (left), was comprised of artificial intelligence has previously been
Students Siyu Zhou (middle), a doctoral student used in the classroom, which focused
in physics, and Chia-Yu Hsu (right), a mainly on students. Instead, this project
Logan Mathesen has been using master’s student in computer science. v focuses more on designing intelligent
industrial engineering to find solutions assistants to support teachers and the
to big data problems since he was an current education system, rather than
undergraduate student. replacing them.
Now a doctoral student, he was selected “For intelligent technology to be viable in
as an NSF Graduate Research Fellow. the classroom, it must serve both the
He’ll earn an annual stipend and a students and the teacher, and the teacher
cost-of-education allowance to support must be in charge,” VanLehn says.
his graduate education.
Over the course of three years, VanLehn
“I want to influence how the next generation and his team are observing classroom
interacts with data and information,” he says. patterns, conducting trials, and collaborating
with teachers to enhance education
Through his research, Mathesen is building
systems and improve student learning. v
the algorithms, data analysis and modeling
techniques to manage large data sets and
aid in decision-making. v
A new way
Alumni, Arizona impact to “see”
Tiny but mighty: neighborhoods
Bee brains may Arizona impact
hold key to Computer scientists are working with
researchers in ASU’s College of Health
miniaturizing AI Solutions to develop an automated, cost-
effective tool that will inspire communities
to enhance safety and increase physical
ASU alumni and students make up about How can we miniaturize artificial fitness among its residents. Combining
two-thirds of employees at AdviNOW intelligence? Bees may have the answer. Google Street View, crowdsourcing,
Medical, a Scottsdale-based medtech Ted Pavlic is part of a research team computer vision and deep learning to
startup specializing in the self-guided studying the miniaturization of nervous virtually detect a neighborhood’s micro
medical stations. Tarek Saleh, the company’s systems. With support from the U.S. features, like sidewalks and bike lanes,
product director and a computer science Department of Defense, the team is the automated micro feature detection
and software engineering graduate, is working toward miniaturizing artificial system will help determine the correlation
among the recent Fulton Schools alumni intelligence by studying the structure and between the presence of these features
who contribute their skills and knowledge function of tiny brains of multiple species and physical activity levels. v
about the latest AI technologies. v of stingless bees. v
15Artificial intelligence and robotics
Coming soon: A robot that understands
its world and the people in it
research assistants have produced in the lab. But what happens when
the working environment changes? How can we be sure that the robot
will calculate its actions so that the job is completed correctly and safely?
Srivastava’s work, recently funded by grants from the National Science
Foundation, is advancing the capabilities of autonomous agents,
which will not only reason and plan to execute tasks even when the
circumstances are uncertain, but also communicate successfully with
the humans around it. He focuses on developing the frameworks,
algorithms and implementations that enable robots to reason and
act efficiently.
As robots move into a growing range of settings, the importance of
human-robot interaction grows. The future holds many opportunities
for robots to improve human life, such as caring for the sick or elderly,
responding to emergencies and participating in the exploration of
places inhospitable to humans.
In those roles, Srivastava says, robots will need to be able to
The self-directed carts that deliver supplies in hospitals. The vacuum communicate with people who may have limited knowledge of
that cleans the floors in your home and then parks at a refueling engineering or computer science. A second NSF grant is providing
station. These are examples of autonomous agents — robots — that $275,000 to improve the ways humans talk to and question robots,
help humans with simple daily tasks and complex work thanks to and the ways robots respond.
artificial intelligence. First mentioned in research literature in the The goal is to develop a system that generates questions humans can
1950s, AI has steadily gained momentum, says Assistant Professor ask that will allow the robot to discern how much the person knows
Siddharth Srivastava. about robots so it can then tailor the interaction to the person’s level of
Autonomous agents can be programmed to complete specific jobs, knowledge. Srivastava anticipates that humans will bring a wide range
such as setting the table, a demonstration that Srivastava and his of expertise to these interactions. v
NSF grant supports smart city research
and STEM education
“Our project will prepare students to become the engineers, scientists,
entrepreneurs and policymakers who lead this growing field and shape
the future of smart cities in a human-centric way,” says Sethuraman
“Panch” Panchanathan, principal investigator on the project and director
of ASU’s Center for Cognitive Ubiquitous Computing.
The project, “Citizen Centered Smart Cities and Smart Living,” is taking an
interdisciplinary approach to understanding and developing smart cities,
focusing on citizen awareness, engagement and education.
Career placement and finding career paths in smart-cities-related
positions for STEM graduates is a main priority for organizers. They also
strive to create community, national and global impact through sharing
research findings and project outcomes.
A new $3 million grant from the National Science Foundation is helping
ASU launch a graduate research training program focused on citizen- The successful recruitment, retention and graduation of STEM students
centered smart cities. from diverse backgrounds, including underrepresented minorities, women
and individuals with disabilities, is a main goal of the project.
The grant is a part of the NSF’s Research Traineeship Program, which
was designed to encourage the development and implementation of The NSF selected 17 institutions across the U.S. to participate in the
bold, new and potentially transformative models for STEM graduate highly competitive program, including Stanford University, UCLA and
education training. ASU’s project launched with 24 master’s and 14 the University of Texas, Austin. v
doctoral students.
16Safety becomes
smart with
breakthroughs
in software
dependability
MURI Award sets The distinction between
“smart” technologies and
tiny particles to answer autonomous systems has
big questions been the focus of research
for Georgios Fainekos,
an associate professor of
What do you get when Broadly, emergence occurs when the whole
is greater than the sum of its parts — the computer science.
you combine computer whole has properties its parts do not have,
Supported by a National Science Foundation
science, physics, robotics and these properties only come about
because of collective interactions among CAREER Award, the overarching mission of
and nanotechnology? the parts. Fainekos’ project has been devising new and
improved techniques and methodologies to test
The opportunity to In the nanotechnology realm, tiny computer the abilities of cyberphysical systems.
advance the fundamental “particles” that have limited computational
capabilities individually can do amazing things Fainekos is advancing complex automated
understanding of how as a group. They can behave like “matter,” systems by improving the dependability
of the software small computers use to
tiny computer particles self-reconfiguring to repair wounds, sealing
nuclear reactor leaks or fixing spacecraft trigger mechanisms — or “actuators” — in
can work together to do cracks in flight, all without human intervention. cyberphysical systems.
great things — without But first, scientists and engineers need to “A major breakthrough is our demonstration
better understand emergent behaviors so of the feasibility of mathematically expressing
any human intervention. they can be predicted and built effectively. and testing safety requirements for complex
Professor Andrea Richa is part of a U.S. “If we get our overarching goal of cyberphysical systems. Before our work, the
Department of Defense Multidisciplinary understanding, predicting and synthesizing results on tests of the systems were limited in
University Research Initiative effort that the local rules for the emergent behaviors we scope,” Fainekos says.
seeks to make fundamental research want, and also of building the systems that The team is also working with the major
discoveries in the project, “Formal can carry out these rules, it’s a huge thing,” international carmaker Toyota to develop
Foundations of Algorithmic Matter and Richa says. effective testing for embedded processors and
Emergent Computation.” cyberphysical systems in cars with automated
The MURI project will explore the local
Richa and her ASU team received algorithmic rules and computations particles systems, like adaptive cruise control, emergency
$808,000 of a $6 million MURI award need to perform a desired emergent behavior. braking and lane keeping.
to study emergent behaviors, with the Richa’s team will employ a continuous Next, Fainekos and his team want to lay the
rest distributed among collaborators at feedback loop of developing theories and groundwork for advancing their analysis, testing
the Georgia Institute of Technology, the experimentation over the five-year period of and verification processes from the laboratory to
Massachusetts Institute of Technology the MURI award. industrial-scale operations. Progress there could
and Northwestern University. “We want to better understand what causes help prevent embedded systems design flaws
The study of emergent behavior has been emergent behavior so we can start predicting and testing errors that cost industry billions of
around for decades, even before computers. when it will happen,” Richa says. v dollars due to product defects. v
17Cybersecurity
NSF Graduate
Research
Fellow solving
society’s toughest
problems
Adding human ingenuity to
automated security tools
Students
The world’s top chess “It’s a lot of responsibility,” says Yan
Shoshitaishvili, an assistant professor of After having received his master’s
player isn’t a human or a computer science and engineering and co- degree through the 4+1 computer
science accelerated program, Scott
computer, it’s a “centaur” principal investigator on the project. “It’s a big
undertaking that the government is making Freitas received a National Science
— a hybrid chess-playing and we have a lot of responsibility to make it a
Foundation Graduate Research
Fellowship award to support his work
team comprised of a success. I have no doubt we’ll be successful.”
toward a doctoral degree in computer
human and a computer. The CHECRS team wants to create an science at the Georgia Institute of
autonomous tool that can be used by a Technology.
The Defense Advanced Research Projects wider variety of human assistants. Software
Agency is applying the same human-computer There, Freitas is focusing on research
developers, quality assurance specialists and that explores how people connect and
collaborative approach to cybersecurity through other non-security experts have human function through “societal constructs” —
its Computers and Humans Exploring Software intuition and ingenuity that can meaningfully for example, energy and transportation
Security, or CHESS program. aid the automated tool. networks and social networks. v
A team of ASU researchers is working with “While modern automated tools run on
collaborators at the University of California, computers that calculate billions of times
Santa Barbara, the University of Iowa, North
Carolina State University and EURECOM to
faster than a human brain, human security
analysts still find the majority of software
“When your DNA
make their move in this space. The team’s vulnerabilities,” Wang says. “This is because is out there, like
project is called CHECRS, or Cognitive Human
Enhancements for Cyber Reasoning Systems.
the knowledge and intuition that humans
possess outweigh the speed of calculation
data, it’s sort of
The $11.7 million award supports the multi- when facing problems with extreme complexity, like Pandora’s box.
university CHECRS team’s efforts to create a for example, finding software vulnerabilities.” Once it’s out there,
human-assisted autonomous tool for finding
and analyzing software vulnerabilities that also
As part of the DARPA CHESS program,
other research teams will evaluate whether
you can’t ever put it
learns from and incorporates human strengths the human-computer teams are working back in the box.”
of intuition and ingenuity. The ASU team, led effectively by competing against the system
by Ruoyu “Fish” Wang, an assistant professor – Adam Doupé, assistant
to detect vulnerabilities. v
of computer science and engineering, received professor of computer science,
$6.6 million of the award funding. on privacy issues surrounding
DNA testing services
18Cybersecurity.
Hackers to head
off cybercriminals
Cyberattacks make
the headlines seemingly
every week with
few untouched by
the breaches.
Fulton Entrepreneurial Professor Paulo
Shakarian talks about how mining
the dark web can throw light on these
cybercriminals and thwart their impending
attacks during an ASU KEDtalk.
He likens his research strategy to that
of a soldier running reconnaissance on
the enemy. He and his collaborators are
Photographer: Deanna Dent/ASU Now taking advantage of the limitations and
weaknesses of malicious hackers to
Cybersecurity expert takes a
head off cybercriminals at the pass. v
deeper look into the dark web
Watch the video:
scan the
QR code or
visit links.asu.edu/
In 2013 Paulo and Jana Summit — a meeting of leaders in defense and
security industries and officials in government cyberattacks-kedtalk
Shakarian collaborated agencies and the U.S. military.
on a book that explored CYR3CON was also a finalist in tech startup
cyberwarfare from “a and business model competitions held
by the Arizona Technology Council and Jackpotting and
human-centric viewpoint,”
as Paulo Shakarian
PricewaterhouseCoopers.
“What we are essentially trying to do is get
US bank attacks
describes it. ahead of the bad guys,” Paulo Shakarian
“We noticed that everyone who was working
explains. If you look at the major cyberattacks ATMs across the country
of recent years, he says, the vast majority were
on cybersecurity was focused on the technical enabled by software vulnerabilities that were are being targeted by a
aspects of it. Things like building firewalls and
virus scanning,” he says. “But no one was taking
known about ahead of time. wave of cybercriminals
a deep look at the people who are doing the Along with the power of the company’s in search of an illegal
technological infrastructure, the value of its
bad stuff, the cyberattackers.”
service hinges on a deep understanding of the high-tech payday.
That research has given birth to CYR3CON, perpetrators of malevolent cyber activity. This phenomenon is called “jackpotting,”
which the Shakarians define as “a next- and US bank attacks involving malware
generation cyber threat intelligence company” “I don’t think you can do a good job predicting
human behavior unless you have good socially are imminent.
that employs machine learning, data mining
and artificial intelligence technology — along rooted intuitions about what people are doing,” “The best long-term solutions for these
with knowledge of the workings of the dark he says. “It’s knowing what the reputations of types of attacks is to gather information
web — to identify emerging threats. the people are and what their social connections about what the hackers are discussing
look like that helps us create better algorithms from places like the deep web/dark web —
CYR3CON was started and is led by the to identify potential threats.” as this allows us to understand where
Shakarians. Paulo Shakarian is the company’s they are headed in terms of target
chief executive officer. Jana Shakarian is Research aimed at improving the company’s
operations and capabilities will continue. The selection,” says Paulo Shakarian,
the president. director the Cyber-Socio Intelligent
Shakarians expect to tap into the skills of those
Their CYR3CON venture won a TechConnect working in Fulton Schools labs — including System Laboratory. v
Defense Innovation Award at the Defense graduate and undergraduate students. v
Innovation Technology Acceleration Challenges
19You can also read
