9/26/2023 Eleanor Wyllie
We’re excited to welcome seven new pioneering faculty members to the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. Their research encompasses many of ECE’s crosscutting research themes, from AI-based systems, cybersecurity and applied cryptography to optoelectronics, haptic interaction and wearables.
Written by Eleanor Wyllie
We’re excited to welcome seven new pioneering faculty members to the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. Their research encompasses many of ECE’s crosscutting research themes, from AI-based systems, cybersecurity and applied cryptography to optoelectronics, haptic interaction and wearables.
“The knowledge, passion and dedication of our new ECE faculty members will contribute to the continued success of our department,” said Bruce Hajek, ECE Department Head and Leonard C. and Mary Lou Hoeft Endowed Chair in Engineering. “I look forward to the cutting-edge research, innovation and collaboration that they will bring to our academic community.”
Meet the new Grainger Engineers
Varun Chandrasekaran
Assistant Professor
Varun Chandrasekaran brings a wealth of experience in the intersection of security and domains encompassing systems, networking, distributed computing and machine learning. He received his Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and worked as a post-doctoral researcher at Microsoft Research with the Adaptive Systems Interaction group.
Hyunseok Kim
Adjunct Assistant Professor
Hyunseok Kim’s research interests encompass low- and mixed-dimensional heterostructures for novel physical phenomena, III-V/III-N/2D materials for electronics and optoelectronics and 3D heterogeneous integration. Before joining Illinois, Kim worked as a research scientist at MIT. He received his Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from UCLA.
Craig Shultz
Adjunct Assistant Professor
Craig Shultz specializes in haptic devices and haptic interaction, with applications in surface computing, VR/AR/XR, wearables, mid-air haptics and the Internet of Things (IOT). Shultz holds a Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from Northwestern University and worked as a postdoctoral fellow at the Human-Computer Interaction Institute at Carnegie Mellon University.
Abhishek Umrawal
Teaching Assistant Professor
Abhishek Kumar Umrawal's research focuses on causal inference, reinforcement learning, machine learning algorithms, optimization and social networks. He received his Ph.D. in Industrial Engineering with a focus on Operations Research and a concentration in Computational Engineering from Purdue University.
Dong Kai Wang
Teaching Assistant Professor
Dong Kai Wang is a specialist in computer architecture, focusing on microarchitecture, digital design and hardware systems, parallel programming and discrete mathematics. An Illinois ECE alumnus, he received his Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering in 2023. During his time at Illinois he held positions as a Research Intern at AMD, Google and IBM.
Huan Zhang
Assistant Professor
Huan Zhang’s research interests lie in autonomous systems and artificial intelligence. He aims to build trustworthy AI systems, focusing on formal verification of machine learning and AI safety, robustness and reliability. Zhang holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science from UCLA.
Yupeng Zhang
Assistant Professor
Yupeng Zhang brings experience in cybersecurity and applied cryptography. He looks at zero-knowledge proofs, secure multiparty computations and their applications in blockchain and machine learning. Zhang previously held a professorship at Texas A&M University and a postdoctoral position at UC Berkeley. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Maryland.