I am NOT looking for new students at the moment (on sabbatical in 2026).
I currently advise several students and have worked with many more
over the years.
Current Students
Graduated Graduate Students
- Runxiang (Sam) Cheng
(PhD, April 2025,
first job: Google, Mountain View, CA)
- Marcelo d'Amorim
(PhD, August 2007,
first job: Federal University of Pernambuco (UFPE), Brazil)
- Lamyaa Eloussi (MS, April 2015, Siebel Scholar Class of 2015, first job: Salesforce, San Mateo, CA)
- Kely Garcia
(MS, September 2007,
first job: Strata Decision Technology, Champaign, IL)
- Milos Gligoric
(PhD, July 2015,
awarded Saburo Muroga Endowed Fellowship for 2009-2010,
won C.L. and Jane W.S. Liu Award for 2012,
won C. W. Gear Outstanding Graduate Student Award for 2014,
awarded Mavis Future Faculty Fellowship for 2014-2015,
won David J. Kuck Outstanding PhD Thesis Award for 2016,
won ACM SIGSOFT Outstanding Doctoral Dissertation Award for 2016,
first job: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX)
- Alex Gyori
(PhD, July 2017,
awarded Saburo Muroga Endowed Fellowship for 2014-2015,
first job: Facebook, Seattle, WA)
- Milica Hadzi-Tanovic
(MS, April 2018,
Siebel Scholar Class of 2018,
next: PhD studies at the Technical University of Munich, Germany)
- Farah Hariri
(PhD, April 2018,
awarded Saburo Muroga Endowed Fellowship for 2013-2014,
first job: Granular, Champaign, IL)
- Vilas Jagannath
(PhD, April 2012,
MS, July 2010,
co-advised by Gul Agha,
first job: Optiver LLC, Chicago, IL)
- Kaiyao Ke
(MS, April 2025,
next: PhD studies at the University of California, Berkeley)
- Mathew (Matt) Kirn
(MS, December 2011,
first job: Microsoft, Redmond, WA)
- Wing Lam
(PhD, July 2021,
co-advised by Tao Xie,
won ACM SIGSOFT Outstanding Doctoral Dissertation Award for 2022,
awarded Google - CMD-IT Dissertation Fellowship in 2020,
Yunni & Maxine Pao Memorial Fellowship in 2018,
NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Honorable Mention in 2017,
State Farm Companies Foundation Doctoral Scholarship in 2016,
Qualcomm Innovation Fellowship Finalist in 2016,
Ray Ozzie Computer Science Fellowship in 2015,
Illinois Technology Foundation Fifty for the Future Award in 2015,
first job: George Mason University, Fairfax, VA)
- Steven (Steve) Lauterburg
(PhD, August 2011,
first job: Salisbury University, Salisbury, MD)
- Owolabi Legunsen
(PhD, December 2019,
co-advised by Grigore Rosu, won ACM SIGSOFT Distinguished Paper Award at ASE 2016,
first job: Cornell University, Ithaca, NY)
- Xinyu Lian (MS, April 2024,
co-advised by Tianyin Xu,
next: PhD studies at Illinois)
- Qingzhou Luo
(PhD, May 2015,
co-advised by Grigore Rosu,
first job: Google, Mountain View, CA)
- Chaitra Niddodi
(PhD, June 2023,
co-advised by Sibin Mohan)
- Adrian Nistor
(PhD, April 2014,
co-advised by Shan Lu,
won ACM SIGSOFT Distinguished Paper Award at ICSE 2015,
first job: Chapman University, Orange, CA)
- Yicheng Ouyang (PhD, July 2025,
co-advised by Lingming Zhang,
first job: Google, Sunnyvale, CA)
- Qianyang Peng
(MS, April 2019,
co-advised by Lingming Zhang,
first job: Google, Seattle, WA)
- Rohan Sharma
(MS, December 2013,
co-advised by Matt Caesar,
first job: Dropbox, San Francisco, CA)
- August Shi
(PhD, July 2020,
won ACM SIGSOFT Outstanding Doctoral Dissertation Award for 2021,
awarded Mavis Future Faculty Fellowship for 2019-2020,
won ACM SIGSOFT Distinguished Paper Award at ICSE 2017,
awarded Ray Ozzie Computer Science Fellowship for 2013-2014,
first job: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX)
- Shin Hwei Tan
(MS, April 2012,
won David J. Kuck Outstanding MS Thesis Award,
co-advised by Lin Tan,
next: PhD studies at the National University of Singapore)
- Peilun Zhang (MS, May 2020,
co-advised by Victoria Stodden,
first job: Google, Austin, TX)
- Peiyuan Zhao
(BS-MS, April 2018,
first job: Amazon, Seattle, WA)
Former Graduate Students
- Deniz Arsan (PhD, switched to the HCI area after a year, in 2018)
- Sandro Badame (MS,
switched to Danny Dig's group after a semester, in 2011)
- Brett Daniel (PhD unfinished,
Brett passed away on December 5, 2010)
- Wajih Ul Hassan (PhD, awarded Sohaib and Sara Abassi Fellowship for 2015-2016,
switched to the systems area after a year, in 2016)
- Yun Young Lee (MS,
switched to Ralph Johnson's group after a year, in 2009)
- Yu Lin (PhD,
started co-advised by Danny Dig in 2011,
switched to Danny Dig's group in 2015)
- Muhammad Suleman Mahmood (PhD, awarded Sohaib and Sara Abassi Fellowship for 2016-2017,
switched group after two years, in 2018)
- Rutvik Choudhary (PhD, switched to the architecture area after a semester, in 2020)
- Erkai Yu (MS, switched to MCS in Spring 2026)
- Tifany Yung (MCS, graduated from a program with no thesis requirement in 2015)
Former Visitors
- Mirco Dotta (visited in Fall 2008,
MS, March 2009,
from EPFL, Switzerland, advised by Viktor Kuncak)
- Yanjie Jiang (visited October 2019-October 2020, PhD student from Beijing Institute of Technology, China)
- Davino Mauro Junior (visited in Spring 2018,
MS student from Federal University of Pernambuco, Brazil)
- Ziyi Lin (visited September 2013-September 2014,
PhD student from Shanghai Jiao Tong University, China,
advised by Jianjun Zhao)
- Luis Melo (visited in Spring 2018,
MS student from Federal University of Pernambuco, Brazil)
- Mehdi Mirzaaghaei
(visited in Spring 2011, PhD student from the University of Lugano, Switzerland,
advised by Mauro Pezzè)
- Stefan Winter (visited in Fall 2019, postdoc from TU Darmstadt, Germany)
Former Undergraduate Students
- Khalique Ahmed (collaboration with Sarita Adve's group; grad school: Illinois MS)
- Nader Al Awar (visiting researcher from AUB, Lebanon, July-August 2018; grad school: UT Austin)
- Igor Andjelkovic
(ITI
Undergraduate Research Internship Opportunity, Summer 2008;
won Second Prize for Best Diploma Thesis
at the School of Electrical Engineering, University of Belgrade in 2008; grad school: University of Belgrade, Serbia)
- Sang Baik (senior thesis, Fall 2009 and Spring 2010)
- Chris Baker (II-EN, Fall 2010; REU, Spring 2011)
- Anirudh Balagopal (research, Fall 2012; II-EN Spring 2013; worked with Milos Gligoric)
- Adhithya Bhaskar (collaborator, Spring 2019-Fall 2020; grad school: University of Southern California)
- Xinxi Chen (visited July-September 2014, undergraduate student
from the University of Hong Kong, China; worked with Ziyi Lin; grad school: Cornell Tech University MS)
- Jesus DeLaTorre
(McNair scholar,
Summer and Fall 2006)
- Jordan Ebel (PURE, Spring 2012;
REU, Fall 2012; worked with Milos Gligoric)
- Joshua Friedman (REU, Fall 2012; worked with Milos Gligoric)
- Stoyan Gaydarov (REU, Spring and Fall 2009)
- Milos Gligoric
(ITI
Undergraduate Research Internship Opportunity, Summer 2007; grad school: Illinois)
- Mert Guldur (individual study, Summer 2012; worked with Adrian Nistor)
- Tihomir Gvero
(ITI
Undergraduate Research Internship Opportunity, Summer 2007; grad school: EPFL, Switzerland)
- Bobak Hadidi (REU, Spring and Fall 2009;
ITI
Undergraduate Summer Intern Program Summer 2009; grad school: Princeton)
- Karl Hajal (visiting researcher from AUB, Lebanon, July-August 2018)
- Kai Huang (co-authored one paper with Michael Hilton and Danny Dig from Oregon State)
- Shubhi Jain (remote collaborator, Summer 2022; grad school: UC Irvine MS)
- Cheng Ji (research Spring 2021)
- Johnston Jiaa (REU, Fall 2009, Spring 2010, Spring 2011; II-EN, Fall 2010;
individual study, Spring 2013 worked with Yun Young Lee;
won Best Undergraduate Research Project Award
at the Illinois Department of Computer Science 2011 Undergraduate Research Symposium sponsored by Yahoo!)
- Pengyue Jiang (hourly pay Summer 2022 and Fall 2022; grad school: Cornell)
- Arash Khan (II-EN, Fall 2010)
- Kaiyao Ke (CS397 Spring 2022, research REU Summer 2022; grad school: Illinois MS)
- Mathew (Matt) Kirn (individual study, Fall 2010; grad school: Illinois MS)
- Ben Lambeth (worked with Alex Gyori, Owolabi Legunsen, and August Shi; co-authored two papers)
- Yilong Li (research Fall 2012, Spring 2013, Summer 2013, and individual study Fall 2013; worked with Milos Gligoric,
co-advised by Grigore Rosu; grad school: Stanford)
- Zhengxi Li (research Fall 2020-Spring 2021; worked with Wing Lam; grad school: Illinois MCS)
- Yiming (Harry) Liang (CS397 Spring 2022; grad school: Purdue MS)
- Fei Luo (visited July-September 2014, undergraduate student
from Tsinghua University, China; worked with Ziyi Lin; grad school: Northwestern University MS)
- Aleksandar Milicevic (visiting researcher, Summer 2006; grad school: MIT)
- Sasa Misailovic (visiting researcher, Summer 2006; grad school: MIT)
- Monil Narang (remote collaborator, Summer 2022; grad school: UC Irvine MS)
- Reed Oei (REU, Summer and Fall 2018; Runner Up CRA Outstanding Undergraduate Researcher Awards 2021; NSF Graduate Research Fellowship; worked with Wing Lam and August Shi; grad school: UCLA)
- Uma Pal (collaboration with PKU, China; Spring-Summer 2021; grad school: UMass Amherst)
- Vasko Popstojanov (REU, Summer 2009; individual study, Fall 2009)
- Dan Schweikert (REU Spring 2014 worked with Milos Gligoric)
- Rohan Sehgal (individual study Spring 2014 worked with Milos Gligoric)
- Rohan Sharma (individual study, Fall 2009; research Spring 2010, Fall 2010, Spring 2011, Fall 2011, and Spring 2012; II-EN Summer 2011;
Finalist CRA Outstanding Undergraduate Researcher Awards 2012;
won Best Undergraduate Research Project Award
at the Illinois Department of Computer Science 2012 Undergraduate Research Symposium sponsored by Yahoo!;
Finalist CRA Outstanding Undergraduate Researcher Awards 2013;
worked with Milos Gligoric; grad school: Illinois BS-MS)
- Corbin Souffrant (REU Fall 2013; worked with Rohan Sharma)
- Mirko Stojmenovic
(ITI
Undergraduate Research Internship Opportunity, Summer 2008)
- Paras Sud (PURE, Spring 2012; worked with Adrian Nistor)
- Shin Hwei Tan (senior thesis, Fall 2009 and Spring 2010; grad school: Illinois MS, National University of Singapore PhD)
- Timothy (TJ) Tunnell (co-authored two papers with Michael Hilton and Danny Dig from Oregon State)
- Nikhil Unni (PURE, REU Fall 2013 worked with Yun Young Lee; REU Spring 2014 worked with Milos Gligoric; ISUR 2014-2015 worked with Milos Gligoric)
- Kai Wang (senior thesis, Fall 2010 and Spring 2011)
- Anjiang Wei (remote collaborator from PKU, China; January 2020-May 2021; worked with Wing Lam and August Shi; grad school: Stanford)
- Xinyu Wu (hourly pay Summer 2022; grad school: Illinois MS)
- Xinyue Xu (hourly pay Spring 2015 worked with Alex Gyori, Farah Hariri, and August Shi; Spring 2016 worked with Owolabi Legunsen; grad school: Illinois MS)
- Pu (Luke) Yi (remote collaborator from PKU, China; July 2020-May 2022; worked with Wing Lam; grad school: Stanford)
- Andrey Zaytsev (PURE, individual study Fall 2013 worked with Yun Young Lee; II-EN Winter 2013; individual study Spring 2014 worked with Milos Gligoric, Alex Gyori, and August Shi; hourly pay Spring 2015 worked with Lamyaa Eloussi and Milos Gligoric; Honorable Mention CRA Outstanding Undergraduate Researcher Awards 2016; grad school: Illinois BS-MS)
Former Pre-Graduate Students in UIUC+ Summer Research Program (Remote Mini-Crowd Research Projects)
Co-organized with Wing Lam
a remote program for 19 pre-graduate (undergraduate and high-school) students in Summer 2021 (still the COVID era):
- Basak Balci (Ozyegin University, Turkey; grad school: TUM, Germany MS)
- Juan Pablo Bortol (National University of Rio Cuarto, Argentina)
- Yang Chen (Huazhong University of Science and Technology, China; grad school: Illinois)
- Satvik Eltepu (California High School, San Ramon, CA; undergrad school: UCLA)
- Huseyin Gokay (Ozyegin University, Turkey; grad school: George Mason)
- Bryan Guo (Case Western Reserve University, USA)
- Peilin Pan (Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications, China)
- Jeremias Parladorio (National University of Rio Cuarto, Argentina)
- Tuna Tuncer (Ozyegin University, Turkey; grad school: TUM, Germany MS)
- Dobrosav Vlaskovic (University of Belgrade, Serbia)
- Hao Wang (Peking University, China)
- Ruixin Wang (Zhejiang University, China; grad school: Purdue)
- Anjiang Wei (Peking University, China; grad school: Stanford)
- Alexander Williams (New College of Florida, USA)
- Jingtao Xia (Peking University, China)
- Yiwei Yang (ShanghaiTech University, China; grad school: UC Santa Cruz)
- Mohammed Yaseen (Bilkent University, Turkey)
- Pu Yi (Peking University, China; grad school: Stanford)
- Ruidong Zhu (Peking University, China)
Co-organized with Saikat Dutta
a remote program for 18 pre-graduate students in Summer 2023:
- Muhammad Salman Abid (Habib University, Pakistan; grad school: Cornell)
- Sugam Adhikari (Islington College, Nepal)
- Faustino Aguilar (University of Panama, Panama)
- Ryed Badr (University of Illinois Urbana Champaign, USA)
- Asha Boyapati (Monta Vista High School, USA; undergrad school: CMU)
- Xuyan Cheng (Dickinson College, USA; grad school: Ohio State)
- Mehzabin Haque (University of Dhaka, Bangladesh)
- Choiyin Li (Beanstalk International Bilingual High School Chengdu, China)
- Licheng Lin (Zhejiang University, China)
- Lu Liu (University of Washington, USA)
- Que Liu (University of Shanghai for Science and Technology, China)
- Rohit Sai Naidu (Dublin High School, USA; undergrad school: UC Berkeley)
- Asif Zubayer Palak (BRAC University, Bangladesh)
- Mrigank Pawagi (Indian Institute of Science, India; grad school: UPenn)
- Ronghui Qi (Wuhan University, China; grad school: Michigan MS)
- Vedant Rathi (Adlai E Stevenson High School, USA; undergrad school: Illinois)
- Md Wahiduzzaman (BRAC University, Bangladesh)
- Hao Wang (Peking University, China; grad school: UC Berkeley)
Co-organized with Reyhan Jabbarvand
and Sam Grayson
a remote program for 30+ pre-graduate students in Summer 2024, including:
- Sugam Adhikari (Islington College, Nepal)
- Faustino Aguilar (University of Panama, Panama)
- Nnamdi Azubuike Aninye (University of Benin, Nigeria)
- Shofiya Bootwala (Gujarat Technological University, India)
- Swapnil Dey (Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology, Bangladesh; grad school: Stony Brook University)
- Mariam Elmoazen (Cairo University, Egypt)
- Istiaq Ahmed Fahad (University of Dhaka, Bangladesh)
- Kyrillos Ishak (Alexandria University, Egypt)
- Mashequr Rahman Khan (BRAC University, Bangladesh; grad school: Brandeis)
- Nikita Lakha (Indian Institute of Technology Mandi, India)
- Saleha Muzammil (National University of Computer and Emerging Sciences, Pakistan; grad school: University of Virginia)
- Uchenna Wilson Odo (Ankara University, Turkey; grad school: Brown MS PRIME)
- Asif Zubayer Palak (BRAC University, Bangladesh)
- Mrigank Pawagi (Indian Institute of Science, India; grad school: UPenn)
- Eda Pekol (Sabancı University, Turkey)
- Akash Poudel (National Institue of Technology (NIT) Rourkela, India)
- Priyanshu Prajapati (UIET Kanpur, India)
- Abijeet Ramesh (Wilcox High School, USA; undergrad school: UC Santa Cruz)
- Aditya Shah (Pune Institute of Computer Technology (PICT), India; grad school: University of Toronto, Canada MScAC)
- Arjun Shah (SVKM's Dwarkadas J. Sanghvi College of Engineering, India; grad school: CMU MSAII)
- Jad Shaker (American University of Beirut, Lebanon)
- Haania Siddiqui (Habib University, Pakistan)
- Pranit Sinha (Ashoka University, India; grad school: University of Alberta, Canada MS)
- Sumaiya Sinha (BRAC University, Bangladesh)
- William Yang (Irvington High School, USA; undergrad school: UC Irvine)
- Dan Yoo (University of Notre Dame, USA)
Organized a remote program for 30+ pre-graduate students in Summer 2025, including:
- Harini Anand (PES University, India)
- Alessandro Botta (University of Palermo, Italy; grad school: UT Dallas)
- Shubham Chapagain (Tribhuvan University, Nepal)
- Jana Dragovic (University of Belgrade, Serbia; grad school: Illinois)
- Mehmet Fırat Dündar (Sabancı University, Türkiye; grad school: ETHZ, Switzerland MS)
- Milkiyas Gebremichael Gebru (Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia; grad school: Concordia, Canada MS)
- T.M. Rithwanul Islam (Jahangirnagar University, Bangladesh)
- Divyanshi Joshi (Maharaja Agrasen Institute of Technology, India)
- Ji young Kim (SAP Labs Korea, South Korea; grad school: Illinois)
- Alaa Mohamad (American University of Beirut, Lebanon)
- Saad Nasir (American International University-Bangladesh, Bangladesh)
- Nurjemal Saryyeva (Bilkent University, Türkiye; grad school: National University of Singapore)
- Karim Sharaf (The Egyptian E-Learning University-Alexandria University, Egypt)
- Sejuti Sharmin Siddiqui (University of Dhaka, Bangladesh)
- Arjun Tandon (Indraprastha Institute of Information Technology Delhi, India)
Students Supervised at MIT
As a PhD student at MIT, I was fortunate to work with 12 undergraduate
and M.Eng. students, mostly through the Undergraduate Research
Opportunities Program (UROP) and on Advanced Undergraduate Projects
(AUP).
Sarfraz Khurshid
and I co-supervised 9 students in the MulSaw
project, and I supervised 3 students in the
D2 project.
- Omar Abdala (UROP)
- Daniel G. Adkins (AUP, D2 project; grad school: UC Berkeley)
- Basel Al-Naffouri (AUP, also M.Eng. student, thesis not supervised)
- Alexandr Andoni (UROP; grad school: MIT)
- Faisal Anwar (UROP)
- Suhabe Bugrara (UROP; grad school: Stanford)
- Cristian Cadar (UROP, D2 project; grad school: Stanford)
- Dumitru Daniliuc (UROP)
- Ang-Chih (Brendan) Kao (M.Eng. student, thesis not supervised)
- Ioan Tudor Leu (UROP, D2 project)
- Jelani Nelson (UROP; grad school: MIT)
- Lev Teytelman (AUP)