Department of Computer Science
Duke Sophomore Alex Balfanz used his programming skills to develop the wildly popular Jailbreak game, earning millions. His ongoing improvements and coding updates keep the players coming back. Initially drawn to Duke's machine learning department and now studying computer science and statistics, Balfanz says "I always knew I wanted to do programming for my career. . . I just want to keep doing what I love." read more about Jailbreak computer game made Duke Computer Science student Alex Balfanz millions »
Gavilán Biodesign was formed by Professor Bruce Donald and Duke Co-founders Mark Hallen, Jonathan Jou, and Marcel Frenkel to design better drugs, while anticipating drug resistance. Now selected as a biotech start-up at IndieBio, Gavilán's technology will enter the world of entrepreneurship. Congratulations to this interdisciplinary team of Duke scientists! read more about Using Supercomputers to Checkmate Cancer »
Ashwin Machanavajjhala, Duke computer science professor and privacy expert, spoke on “Public Use Data Products and Privacy Protection: Experiences from the Front Lines” at the AAAS Annual Meeting. Currently assisting the 2020 Census team to modernize their data publications using differential privacy (DP), Professor Machanavajjhala’s recent work includes “Utility-cost of Provable Privacy: A Case Study Using United States Census Data.” Dr. John Abowd, the U.S. Census Bureau’s Chief Scientist and… read more about Ashwin Machanavajjhala spoke at AAAS Annual Meeting on Privacy and the Census »
Vahid Tarokh, the Rhodes Family Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Computer Science, and Mathematics, was named a member of the National Academy of Engineering. Congratulations! read more about Vahid Tarokh elected to NAE »
Congratulations to Vincent Conitzer, who was recently elected as a new AAAI fellow. Officially inducted at the AAAI 2019 conference, Conitzer is Kimberly J. Jenkins University Professor of New Technologies, Professor of Computer Science, Professor of Economics, and Professor of Philosophy at Duke University. read more about Vince Conitzer Named 2019 AAAI Fellow »
FICO recently announced winners of the inaugural explainable machine learning challenge. Duke Computer Science received the FICO Recognition Award for going above and beyond expectations with a fully transparent global model and a user-friendly dashboard. Duke's team included Cynthia Rudin, Chaofan Chen, Kangcheng Lin, Yaron Shaposhnik, Sijia Wang, and Tong Wang. read more about Duke Computer Science receives FICO Recognition Award »
It's the 50th anniversary of SIGCSE, the pre-eminent international conference on computer science education. To commemorate the occasion, just 20 papers from the last 50 years were nominated for consideration as the top 10 most influential and important papers of all time. Authored by Owen Astrachan, Duke Professor of the Practice of Computer Science, and three then undergraduate Duke students, the paper Design patterns: an essential component of CS curricula was nominated… read more about Astrachan, Berry, Cox, and Mitchener Nominated for SIGCSE Top 10 Symposium Papers of All Time Award »
The computer science department is proud to acknowledge that PhD candidate Brandon Fain was selected as a 2019 Teaching Award Recipient. The 2019 recipients of the Dean’s Awards for Excellence in Mentoring, Excellence in Teaching and Inclusive Excellence in Graduate Education were just announced on January 14, and the Awards Ceremony will take place in March 2019 at the Sarah P. Duke Gardens. This is a well-deserved recognition for Brandon's hard work. A highly competitive award,… read more about Brandon Fain Wins the 2019 Dean's Award for Excellence in Teaching »
Jeff Forbes, Associate Professor of the Practice of Computer Science was recently awarded a substantial grant through a partnership with Siegel Family Endowment. The grant funds a project originating in an October 2018 ACM report, "Lighting the Path: From Community College to Computing Careers.” Forbes led the development of this report, and he also chaired the ACM Education Policy Committee. Findings from the ACM report will be converted into actionable recommendations that will be… read more about Jeff Forbes Awarded Grant to Develop Computer Science Degree and Career Paths for Minority Students »
Bob Wagner, Professor Emeritus of Computer Science at Duke University, passed away in December 2018. Bob joined the Department of Computer Science at Duke in 1978 and retired in 2007. Over the span of three decades, he served the department in multiple capacities. He was well known for his foundational work in algorithms and complexity, especially string algorithms. read more about Computer Science Emeritus Professor Bob Wagner Dies »
With organizations like Facebook currently proposing that employees and external third parties analyze sensitive user data, a need exists for the analysis of sensitive data by systems with strong privacy guarantees. Machanavajjhala and Kotsogiannis will present compelling research on just this topic in their paper "Architecting a Differentially Private SQL Engine." At the biennial Conference on Innovative Data Systems Research on Jan. 14, 2019, they will unveil their revolutionary… read more about Machanavajjhala and Kotsogiannis Present Novel Private Database System at CIDR 2019 »
Congratulations to Shalin Shah and John Reif for winning the 2018 Best Presentation Award at DNA24, the 24th International Conference on DNA Computing and Molecular Programming last semester. This conference was organized by the International Society for Nanoscale Science, Computation and Engineering (ISNSCE). Their winning paper was on “Temporal DNA Barcodes: A Time-Based Approach for Single-Molecule Imaging.” Shah and Reif developed a similar… read more about Shah and Reif Receive Best Presentation Award at DNA24 Conference »
Three Duke students received awards from the Computing Research Association (CRA) for Outstanding Undergraduate Research: Runliang (Oscar) Li - Finalist, Hui (Frederick) Xu - Honorable Mention, and Rohith Kuditipudi - Honorable Mention. Congratulations! read more about Duke Students Win CRA Outstanding Undergraduate Research Awards »
Congratulations to Kamesh Munagala and joint authors Yu Cheng, Kangning Wang, and Nick Gravin (Shanghai UFE). They recently won the Best Paper Award for "A Simple Mechanism for a Budget Constrained Buyer" at WINE 2018: The 14th Conference on Web and Internet Economics. read more about Munagala, Cheng, Wang, and Gravin Receive Best Paper Award at WINE 2018 »
Bruce M. Maggs, the Pelham Wilder Professor of Computer Science, has been named an ACM Fellow for his contributions to the development of content distribution networks and the theory of computer networks. As a fellow, Maggs joins a select group of the top 1% of ACM professional members. ACM, the Association for Computing Machinery, is the world's largest educational and scientific computing society. read more about Bruce Maggs Named ACM Fellow »
Congratulations to Aaron Lowe and Pankaj Agarwal for winning the 2018 Best Paper Award at the 26th ACM SIGSPATIAL International Conference on Advances in Geographic Information Systems in November. Their winning paper was on “Flood Risk Analysis on Terrains under the Multi-Flow-Direction Model.” It examines the flooding query problem, using a data structure that quickly estimates how much rain has to fall in a region so that a query point is flooded. The goal of the paper… read more about Aaron Lowe and Pankaj Agarwal Win 2018 Best Paper Award at ACM SIGSPATIAL »
Five Duke University faculty members, including Krishnendu Chakrabarty, and one staff member have been named Fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). read more about Krishnendu Chakrabarty named AAAS Fellow »
Duke researchers like Vince Conitzer, Kimberly J. Jenkins University Professor of New Technologies and Professor of Computer Science discuss how AI can help decision making. read more about Can Artificial Intelligence Help Us Be More Moral? »
Could a computer write sonnets convincing enough to fool people into thinking they were written by human poets rather than machines? One Duke team created an algorithm to find out. read more about Duke Data Science Team Wins Computer-Generated Poetry Competition »
Duke University recently hosted global technology leader and trailblazer, Dr. Sandra Johnson. As the first African-American woman to receive a Ph.D. in computer engineering in the US, Dr. Johnson inspired a crowd on November 8. read more about Meet Dr. Sandra Johnson, Computer Engineering "Hidden Figure" »
We live in a world where data is the new currency. Every aspect of our lives is tracked digitally, especially through the internet and mobile devices. However, sensitive information can be gleaned from this data and could cause social and financial harm to the individual. Ashwin Machanavajjhala is a brilliant, creative scholar and pioneer in the important field of database privacy. While he could have spent his career in industry, his desire to blend research with teaching led him to a faculty position at… read more about Privacy Expert Awarded for Teaching Excellence »
With an endless onslaught of news and opinion pounding us from traditional outlets, blogs and social media, fact-checking helps a weary public determine which political claims are accurate and which ones aren’t. A fact-checking app being developed by a team lead by Jun Yang and and Bill Adair will rely on a database of fact-checks that were published by organizations such as The Washington Post, PolitiFact and FactCheck.org. The database grew out of an earlier partnership between the Reporters’ Lab and… read more about Real-Time Fact-Checking: There's (Almost) An App For That »
We welcome Alberto Bartesaghi as Associate Professor of Computer Science, Biochemistry, and Electrical & Computer Engineering. Read about him in Duke's new faculty member profiles. read more about We Welcome Alberto Bartesaghi »
Computer scientist and statistician Rebecca Steorts has been developing state-of-the-art statistics and machine learning techniques to help human rights groups take on the grim task of tallying Syria's war dead. read more about Rebecca Steorts Develops Techniques to Tally War Dead »
Graduate student awards for 2017-18 were presented at the 2018 annual departmental meeting. Congratulations to the recipients: Outstanding PhD Dissertation Rupert Freeman Advisor: Vincent Conitzer Eliciting and Aggregating Information for Better Decision Making Xi He (ACM Dissertation Award Nominee) Advisor: Ashwin Machanavajjhala Policy Driven Data Sharing with Provable Privacy Guarantees Nathaniel Kell Advisor: Debmalya Panigrahi … read more about Grad Student Awards 2017-18 »
A person stepping forward to donate a kidney can set off a chain that saves dozen of lives. An article in Quartz features work by Vince Conitzer and his colleagues in AI, economics, and philosophy. read more about How AI Changed Organ Donation in the US »
An article by Vincent Conitzer, "Natural Intelligence Still has its Advantages," appears in the Wall Street Journal. read more about Article by Vince Conitzer Appears in Wall Street Journal »
Vincent Conitzer has been awarded an NSF grant titled "RI: Small: Designing Preferences, Beliefs, and Identities for Artificial Intelligence." Total funding is $400,000. read more about Vince Conitzer Receives NSF Grant for AI Research »
Bruce Donald was honored at a 60th birthday tribute organized by his former students. More than 50 colleagues, students, and postdocs gathered at Duke Gardens for what was a full day of talks followed by dinner, some from as far away as California, New York, France, Switzerland and China. read more about Bruce Donald Honored by Colleagues and Students »
Congratulations to recipients of the 2018 undergraduate student awards which were presented at commencement ceremonies on May 13. Alex Vasilos Memorial Award Friends and colleagues of the late Alex Vasilos donated the Alex Vasilos Memorial Award to the Department of Computer Science to recognize deserving students. This year's recipients: Harrison Graham Lundberg - For outstanding research contributions in database for an inter-query contention analyzer for cluster computing… read more about Undergraduate Awards Presented 2018 »