Sheldon H. Jacobson is a Founder Professor of Computer Science, Director of the Simulation and Optimization Laboratory, and Founding Director of the Bed Time Research Institute at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. With a strong background in Computer Science, Industrial Engineering, Electrical and Computer Engineering, Mathematics, Statistics, and Medicine, he is well versed in applications of technology, and his research displays that. Most of Professor Jacobson’s research focuses on Vaccines and Immunizations, Data Science Applications (Computation Public Health), Aviation Security (TSA), Presidential Election Predictions, NCAA Basketball Predictions (and March Madness), Political Redistricting (Gerrymandering), and much much more! Make sure to watch Professor Jacobson’s video session to learn how you can use computer science to impact the fields mentioned above, and the world!

Wade Fagen-Ulmschneider is a highly qualified and well-known Professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He has impacted thousands of students annually with his teachings on Data Science, Data Structures and Data Visualizations and has been recognized as a National Academy of Engineering’s Frontiers of Engineering Education scholars and has been awarded the Collins Award for Innovation Teaching. His research and technical work has impacted various fields of study, as exhibited by the 91-DIVOC project (used by public health officials around the country), GPA visualizations, Queue (an open source resource for many cs classes), and more! Make sure to tune into Professor Wade Fagen-Ulmschneider’s session to learn about how these fields are affected by computer science!

Roxana Girju is a Linguistics Professor here at the University of Illinois, as well as Computer Science affiliate and faculty member of the Organizational Intelligence and Computational Social Science and the Social and Emotional Dimensions of Well-Being Groups at the Beckman Institute of Advanced Science and Technology. Professor Girju has done much of her research around Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Computational Linguistics. The focus of Professor Girju’s session here is Emotion AI, and why it is important to focus on the portrayal of empathy within language technology. Make sure to tune into this session to learn more about the importance of Empathetic AI, and how it can be used to bridge the gap within communication!

Sanmi Koyejo is a Computer Science professor here at the University of Illinois. With a Ph. D. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Texas Austin and postdoctoral work at Stanford University in neuroimaging data techniques, his research interests range from brain data analysis to interpreting data from models and the fairness of these models. He is especially interested in research using machine learning for neuroscience and biomedical imaging. We are excited to have him speak about AI for turning x-ray images into 3D CT images, how AI can be applied in the medical field to help develop treatment plans, as well as some of the privacy and trustworthiness issues that can arise from using these methods.

Gang Wang is a well-praised Professor here at our university, as indicated by his receival of the NSF CAREER Award (2018), Google Faculty Research Award (2017), IMWUT Distinguished Paper Award (2019), and much more! Professor Gang focuses his specialization on fields such as: Security and Privacy, Internet Measurement, Mobile Networks, and HCI. His presentation with us here is within the Security and Privacy realm, specifically focused on Spoofing and Spear-Phishing. Spear-phishing is the exploitation of human factors to attack and breach target networks. Spoofing is a critical step in phishing, where the attacker impersonates a trusted entity to gain the victim’s trust. In this talk, Professor Gang will describe a measurement study to understand how flawed system designs can severely weaken user-level defenses in spear-phishing attacks. Through the illustration of data analytics and active measurements, he will show us how we can better understand the reasons behind successful spoofing attempts and how users react to spoofed messages. Professor Gang will also touch upon his other on-going research in his group that focuses on combining machine learning and human efforts to jointly improve security. Make sure to tune into this session to learn more about Security and Privacy applications, and why they are important to understand!

Mattox Beckman is a Computer Science Professor at UIUC who has taught many prominent upper level CS classes at our university. Professor Beckman is also an alumnus at our university, having studied here for around 14 years (from undergrad to PhD)! He is well versed in the study of programming languages, as well as Computer Science education as a whole. The main focus for Professor Beckman’s presentation here is the structure of programming languages and their language families, including how they relate to the many languages that we are familiar with around the world! He will also be discussing Computer Science education, and why it is important to understand the impact that education like this has on not only the CS field, but the world as well. Make sure to tune in to this session to learn more about how you can get started in learning about Computer Science yourself!