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Computing Community Announces Inaugural Recipients of Computing Innovation Fellows Program; Program Will Help Computing Field Retain Ph.D.s

WASHINGTON, DC, October 15, 2009

The Computing Community Consortium (CCC) and the Computing Research Association (CRA) today announced its inaugural class of Computing Innovation Fellows (CIFellows). These 60 recent Ph.D. graduates will receive one to two-year postdoctoral positions at computing research institutions. The fellowship awards were made possible by a $15 million grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF).

"The CIFellows program should help the computing field retain new Ph.D.s in research and teaching," said Ed Lazowska, chair of the CCC and Bill & Melinda Gates chair of computer science and engineering at the University of Washington. "It is a remarkable testament to the community and the National Science Foundation that we are able to provide these fellowships to the top emerging researchers in computing."

"Equally remarkable was the lightning speed at which the community rallied, responded and carried out the project," explained Peter Lee, the coordinator of the CIFellows Project and former head of computer science at Carnegie Mellon University, now at DARPA.

CIFellows is the first ever program coordinated by the computing community to support postdoctoral researchers. The fellowship will connect researchers and organizations of differing characteristics to help support the long-term health of the computing field. The fellows will take positions at a wide range of host institutions including colleges, universities, research labs and non-profit organizations.

"CIFellows and their mentors fully represent the depth and breadth of our field," said Lee. "They are in every respect, an extraordinary and diverse group."

The 60 CIFellows represent 43 colleges and universities and will be mentored by 49 organizations, including six industrial research labs. CIFellows are a diverse group – 40 percent are women; 13 percent are African American, Hispanic American, or Native American; and 77 percent are US citizens or permanent residents. More than 500 recent Ph.D. graduates applied for the CIFellows awards and more than 1,200 established scientists registered as prospective mentors. To learn more about the CIFellows program, visit cifellows.org.

The Computing Community Consortium, an activity of the Computing Research Association, supports the computing research community in creating compelling research visions and the mechanisms to realize these visions.

The Fellows were selected through an intensive process using a Selection Committee followed by discussion on the Steering Committee.

Selection Committee members were:

Maneesh Agrawala (University of California at Berkeley)
Al Aho (Columbia University)
Martin Berzins (University of Utah)
Donna Dodson (National Institute of Standards and Technology)
Kathleen Fisher (AT&T Labs)
Oscar Garcia (University of North Texas)
Thorna Humphries (Norfolk State University)
M. Frans Kaashoek (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)
Leslie Kaelbling (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)
David Kaeli (Northeastern University)
Jon Kleinberg (Cornell University)
James A. Landay (University of Washington)
Christopher James Langmead (Carnegie Mellon University)
Jim Larus (Microsoft Research)
Peter Lee (Carnegie Mellon University)
Andrew McCallum (University of Massachusetts at Amherst)
Lisa Meeden (Swarthmore College)
J Strother Moore (University of Texas at Austin)
Elizabeth Mynatt (Georgia Institute of Technology)
Timothy M. Pinkston (University of Southern California)
Martha E. Pollack (University of Michigan)
Stefan Savage (University of California at San Diego)
David Waltz (Columbia University)
Roy Want (Intel Research)
Rebecca Wright (Rutgers University)

Steering Committee members were:

Andrew Bernat (Computing Research Association)
Andrew A. Chien (Intel Research)
Susan Graham (University of California at Berkeley)
Anita Jones (University of Virginia)
Rangachar Kasturi (University of South Florida)
Rajinder Khosla (National Science Foundation)
Ed Lazowska (University of Washington)
Peter Lee (Carnegie Mellon University)
Ran Libeskind-Hadas (Harvey Mudd College)
Bobby Schnabel (Indiana University)
Fred Schneider (Cornell University)
Bob Sproull (Sun Microsystems Laboratories)

The inaugural class of CIFellows and their mentors are:

CIFellow PhD Institution Field of Research Mentor Host Institution
Zlatan Aksamija University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Quantum Computing, Synthetic Biology, Computational Neuroscience, etc. Irena Knezevic University of Wisconsin at Madison
Sitaram Asur Ohio State University Social Computing/Social Informatics Bernardo Huberman HP Labs
Paula Bach Pennsylvania State University HCI/CSCW Mike Twidale University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Cindy Bethel University of South Florida AI / Machine Learning / Robotics / Vision Brian Scassellati Yale University
Carleton Bosley New York University Information Assurance / Security / Privacy / Cryptography Antonio Nicolosi Stevens Institute of Technology
Quincy Brown Drexel University Computer Science Education / Educational Technology Allison Druin University of Maryland
Yuriy Brun University of Southern California Software Engineering David Notkin University of Washington
Scott Coull Johns Hopkins Information Assurance / Security / Privacy / Cryptography Michael Reiter University of North Carolina
Nicholas Diakopoulos Georgia Tech HCI/CSCW Mor Naaman Rutgers University
Jeremy Fineman Massachusetts Institute of Technology Theory / Algorithms Guy Blelloch Carnegie Mellon University
Davide Fossati University of Illinois at Chicago Computer Science Education / Educational Technology Mark Guzdial Georgia Institute of Technology
Xin Fu University of Florida Hardware / Architecture Sarita Adve University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Ronald Garcia Indiana University at Bloomington Programming Languages/Compilers Frank Pfenning Carnegie Mellon University
Ragib Hasan University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Information Assurance / Security / Privacy / Cryptography Randal Burns Johns Hopkins University
Michael Hines SUNY at Binghamton Networks/Operating Systems Jason Nieh Columbia University
Daniel Howe New York University Quantum Computing, Synthetic Biology, Computational Neuroscience, etc. Andy van Dam Brown University
Yuho Jin Texas A&M University Hardware / Architecture Timothy Pinkston University of Southern California
Jeffrey Johns University of Massachusetts at Amherst AI / Machine Learning / Robotics / Vision Ronald Parr Duke University
Yong Kil University of California at Davis Graphics/Visualization Marshall Bern Xerox PARC
Dara Kusic Drexel University Networks/Operating Systems Daniel Mosse University of Pittsburgh
Benjamin Lee Harvard University Hardware / Architecture Mark Horowitz Stanford University
Katrina Ligett Carnegie Mellon University Theory / Algorithms Eva Tardos Cornell University
Edgar Lobaton University of California at Berkeley AI / Machine Learning / Robotics / Vision Ron Alterovitz University of North Carolina
Cristian Lumezanu University of Maryland at College Park Networks/Operating Systems Nick Feamster Georgia Institute of Technology
Niti Madan University of Utah Hardware / Architecture Pradip Bose IBM Corporation
Victoria Manfredi University of Massachusetts at Amherst Networks/Operating Systems Mark Crovella Boston University
Damon McCoy University of Colorado at Boulder Information Assurance / Security / Privacy / Cryptography Stefan Savage University of California at San Diego
Andrew McPherson University of Pennsylvania HCI/CSCW Youngmoo Kim Drexel University
Miriah Meyer University of Utah Graphics/Visualization Hanspeter Pfister Harvard University
Lilyana Mihalkova University of Texas at Austin AI / Machine Learning / Robotics / Vision Lise Getoor University of Maryland
Antonina Mitrofanova New York University Scientific/Medical Informatics2 Andrea Califano Columbia University
Deidra Morrison Northwestern University Social Computing / Social Informatics Juan Gilbert Clemson University
Ifeoma Nwogu University at Buffalo, State University of New York AI / Machine Learning / Robotics / Vision Christopher Brown University of Rochester
Iris Oved Rutgers University at New Brunswick AI / Machine Learning / Robotics / Vision Paul Cohen University of Arizona
Joyojeet Pal University of California at Berkeley Social Computing/Social Informatics John Bennett University of Colorado
Jeff Phillips Duke University Theory / Algorithms Suresh Venkatasubramanian University of Utah
Sally Pias New Mexico State University Scientific/Medical Informatics2 Carlos Simmerling State University of New York at Stony Brook
Anna Pyayt University of Washington at Seattle Hardware / Architecture Olav Solgaard Stanford University
Emilee Rader University of Michigan at Ann Arbor HCI/CSCW Darren Gergle Northwestern University
Ioan Raicu University of Chicago Numerical/Scientific Computing / HPC / Data-Intensive Scalable Computing Alok Choudhary Northwestern University
Leena Razzaq Worcester Polytechnic Institute Computer Science Education / Educational Technology Beverly Woolf University of Massachussetts at Amherst
Lev Reyzin Yale University AI / Machine Learning / Robotics / Vision John Langford Yahoo! Research
Guy Rothblum Massachusetts Institute of Technology Theory / Algorithms Boaz Barak Princeton University
Sushmita Roy University of New Mexico Scientific/Medical Informatics2 Aviv Regev Broad Institute
Linda Sellie University of Chicago AI / Machine Learning / Robotics / Vision Lisa Hellerstein New York University
Stelios Sidiroglou Columbia University Information Assurance / Security / Privacy / Cryptography Martin Rinard Massachusetts Institute of Technology
David Soloveichik California Institute of Technology Quantum Computing, Synthetic Biology, Computational Neuroscience, etc. Georg Seelig University of Washington
Veselin Stoyanov Cornell University AI / Machine Learning / Robotics / Vision Jason Eisner Johns Hopkins University
Julia Stoyanovich Columbia University Databases / Information Retrieval / Data Mining Susan Davidson University of Pennsylvania
Cui Tao Brigham Young University Scientific/Medical Informatics2 Christopher Chute Mayo Clinic
Lydia Tapia Texas A&M University Scientific/Medical Informatics2 Ron Elber University of Texas at Austin
Duygu Ucar Ohio State University Databases / Information Retrieval / Data Mining Kai Tan University of Iowa
David Van Horn Brandeis University Programming Languages/Compilers Matthias Felleisen Northeastern University
Virginia Vassilevska Williams Carnegie Mellon University Theory / Algorithms Satish Rao University of California at Berkeley
Lawton Verner Johns Hopkins University AI / Machine Learning / Robotics / Vision Simon DiMaio Intuitive Surgical, Inc.
Stephen Voida Georgia Institute of Technology HCI/CSCW Gloria Mark University of California at Irvine
Ilya Wagner University of Michigan at Ann Arbor Hardware / Architecture Shih-Lien Lu Intel Labs
Jennifer Wortman Vaughan University of Pennsylvania AI / Machine Learning / Robotics / Vision Yiling Chen Harvard University
Weijun Xiao University of Rhode Island Hardware / Architecture David Lilja University of Minnesota
Liangjun Zhang University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Quantum Computing, Synthetic Biology, Computational Neuroscience, etc. Jean-Claude Latombe Stanford University