Brown CS News

Almost thirty years after earning his doctorate from Brown CS, Yi-Jing Lin’s phone rang, and his already unconventional career took an unexpected turn.

As the latest step in a career that’s ranged from the Marine Corps to the Department of Energy to serving as Federal Cybersecurity Lead and Senior Cybersecurity Advisor to the White House’s Federal Chief Information Officer, Brown CS Master of Science in Cybersecurity alum Nicholas (Nick) M. Andersen has taken on a prominent new role.

Will artificial intelligence cure disease or hasten environmental disaster, free us from drudgery or drown us in slop? What’s next for AI, and what role does Brown have to play? With nuance, in depth, with a bit of humor and without a lot of hype, Michael Littman would like to tell you all about it. 

Our new issue is here! This year's cover story takes a look at the future of AI at Brown and beyond with Michael Littman, Brown's inaugural Associate Provost for Artificial Intelligence, as your guide. Other stories highlight student research and entrepreneurship, including responsible AI, a visit to a startup school, and an online game that explores our understanding of language. Finally, we offer detailed retrospectives as we bid farewell to Kathy Kirman Billings, Tom Doeppner, Steve Reiss, Don Stanford, and Stan Zdonik. Best wishes for a healthy and happy holiday season!

Brown CS Visual Computing PhD students Yiqing Liang and Rao Fu were recently selected for the annual Rising Stars workshop, a competitive program hosted by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)’s Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science that recognizes talented underrepresented PhD students and postdocs, especially those who could potentially become faculty members in the coming years.

Vasilis received a Top Reviewer Award and the group’s paper (“PickleBall: Secure Deserialization of Pickle-based Machine Learning Models”) received one of five Distinguished Artifact Awards. 

Brown CS faculty members Serena Booth and Suresh Venkatasubramanian have just been appointed to co-chair the AI and Algorithms Subcommittee, whose recent work includes responses to government RFIs, techbriefs, and statements on chatbot use.

ARIA, a Brown-based research consortium supported by a $20 million grant from the National Science Foundation, welcomed scientists from across the U.S. to kick off a five-year program with a launch event in Providence.

The Randy F. Pausch '82 Computer Science Undergraduate Summer Research Award, given this year to Wanjia Fu to support her work with Brown CS faculty member Srinath Sridhar, recognizes strong achievement from undergraduate researchers and offers them the opportunity to continue their work over the summer.

This year’s lecture was delivered by Claire Mathieu, a former Brown CS faculty member who currently serves as research director at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) in Computer Science at Université Paris-Cité (France).