UCSB CE and CS Undergraduate Advising, Fall 2025

Sanjukta Krishnagopal Sanjukta is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science. Sanjukta's research interests are multidisciplinary, with the goal of developing computational and mathematical tools to answer questions about real world physical, social, and biological systems. She received her PhD from the University of Maryland, College Park. She was a UC Presidential postdoc with a joint appointment at UC Berkeley and UCLA. She enjoys traveling and has lived on four continents. In her free time she enjoys dance, art, hiking, and attempting to climb mountains. Email: sanjukta at ucsb.edu		Nabeel Nasir Dr. Nabeel Nasir is an Assistant Teaching Professor in the Department of Computer Science at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He received his PhD in Computer Science from the University of Virginia in 2024. Before his PhD, he worked as an Android Developer at Adobe for the Lightroom and Photoshop Mix teams. He also worked as a Software Developer for an IoT startup, EnLite Research, developing solutions to reduce energy consumption in office spaces. He is passionate about teaching and broadening participation in Computer Science, and supporting undergraduate research in Cyber Physical Systems and CS Education. Email: nabeeln at ucsb.edu
Ziad Matni Ziad Matni is an Assistant Teaching Professor in Computer Science. He received his PhD in Information Science from Rutgers University, where he also taught as an adjunct faculty member before joining UCSB. Before his work in academia, he held multiple engineering and management positions in the semiconductor, computer systems, and data communication industry for over a decade. He engages in research in CS education, computational social science, and in data & information science. He currently directs the Early Research Scholars Program (ERSP) at UCSB and co-directs the CS Undergraduate Learning Assistant Program. Email: zmatni at ucsb.edu		James Preiss James A. Preiss is an Assistant Professor of Computer Science at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He received a Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of Southern California. Before joining UCSB, he was a postdoctoral scholar in Computing + Mathematical Sciences at the California Institute of Technology. James has made contributions to a broad spectrum of topics in robotics, including control, learning, motion planning, and software platforms. Email: preiss at ucsb.edu

Maryam Majedi Dr. Maryam Majedi joined the Department of Computer Science at the University of California, Santa Barbara, as an Assistant Teaching Professor in 2023. Dr. Majedi's research primarily revolves around Embedded Ethics and Data Privacy. She explores the intersection of computer science and ethical considerations, aiming to develop modules that facilitate the integration of ethics and data privacy principles into computer science education. Email: majedi at ucsb.edu		Murphy Niu Murphy Yuezhen Niu is an Assistant Professor and Stansbury Chair in Computer Science at UCSB since 2024. Previously, she was a senior research scientist in the Google Quantum AI team, where her work focused on intelligent quantum control optimization and metrology, quantum machine learning, quantum algorithm design and near-term quantum error correction. Niu received her doctorate in theoretical and mathematical physics from MIT in 2018. She received the Claude E. Shannon Research Assistantship for her work at the intersection of photonic quantum computation, quantum error correction and quantum cryptography. Professor Niu's long-term research goal is to develop quantum computing paradigms in regard to how we program, control, characterize, measure, and error correct a large-scale quantum computer without paying the steep price of digitization towards real-world impacts. Niu applies cutting-edge deep reinforcement learning and generative models to quantum control, quantum circuit compilation, and quantum system learning using some of the largest quantum computers based on superconducting qubits. Her recent research focus on developing scalable analog quantum control and algorithms for emerging quantum architectures with superconducting, ion trap, photonic, and neutral atom qubits. Email: murphyniu at ucsb.edu
Jianwen Su Jianwen Su is a Professor in Computer Science. He received his PhD from the University of Southern California before joining the UCSB CS department in 1990. His research interests include database systems, services computing, and business process management. He is a member of th ACM and IEEE and has served or serves on committees of several conferences and journals. Email: su at cs.ucsb.edu		Diba Mirza Diba Mirza is a Teaching Professor in the Department of Computer Science. She received her Ph.D. in Computer Engineering from the UC San Diego and joined the Computer Science department at UCSB in 2017. She worked as a post-doc on interdiscplinary projects in the department of Computer Science and the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego, where she developed underwater robotic swarms that can help scientists learn more about the ocean. She has directed the Early Research Scholars Program (ERSP) from 2018 to 2022, which is designed to support students in their first research experience. Email: dimirza at cs.ucsb.edu

Tim Sherwood Tim Sherwood is a Professor in the Department of Computer Science and Dean of the College of Creative Studies. Professor Sherwood joined the CS Department in 2003. He is a co-founder of Tortuga Logic. Professor Sherwood works on all manner of computer science and engineering problems from the perspective of how to better "shape" computers to address our needs (e.g. to be more secure or amenable to machine learning). Email: sherwood at cs.ucsb.edu		Phillip Conrad Phill Conrad joined the faculty of the CS Department in January 2008, and in July 2012 was promoted to Lecturer (SOE), a career-oriented position focusing on undergraduate education. Dr. Conrad's focus is the lower-division curriculum, however he often teaches CS156, the project-oriented course in Java and Javascript. Email: pconrad at engineering.ucsb.edu
Rich Wolski Rich Wolski is a Professor in the Department of Computer Science and co-founder of Eucalyptus Systems Inc. Professor Wolski joined the department in 2001. His Ph.D. degree is from the University of California at Davis. Professor Wolski has led several national scale research efforts in the area of distributed systems and is the progenitor of the Eucalyptus open source cloud project. His research explore ways in which the ubiquitous proliferation of high-performance network connectivity can be used to foster new distributed computing capabilities and systems. Email: rich at cs.ucsb.edu		Chandra Krintz Chandra Krintz is a Professor in Computer Science. She recieved her Ph.D. from UC San Diego before joining the UCSB CS Department in 2001. She co-directs the Lab for Research on Adaptive Computing Environments (RACELab) and previously worked at AppScale. Her research interests include AI systems for the Internet of Things (IoT), Programming Systems, cloud computing and services, distributed systems and edge computing, embedded systems, and digital agriculture and technology. Email: ckrintz at ucsb.edu

Ben Hardekopf Ben Hardekopf is an Associate Professor of Computer Science at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he leads the Programming Languages Research Laboratory. Professor Hardekopf's main research area is Programming Languages, investigating programming language design, analysis, and implementation. Office: HFH 1109 Email: benh at cs.ucsb.edu		Amr El Abbadi Amr El Abbadi is a Professor in the Department of Computer Science. Professor El Abbadi joined the Department in 1987. His Ph.D. is from Cornell University. His research interests include: Fault-tolerant distributed systems; Distributed Databases, Operating Systems, Cloud, and Social Networks. He is also the faculty advisor for the class of 2019. Office: HFH 3115 Email: amr at cs.ucsb.edu
Tobias Höllerer Tobias Hollerer is a Professor in the Department of Computer Science. Professor Hollerer joined the Department in 2002. His Ph.D. is from Columbia University. His research interests include: Human computer interaction; computer graphics; virtual and augmented reality; wearable and ubiquitous computing. Professor Hollerer is the faculty advisor for the class of 2022. Email: holl at cs.ucsb.edu		Tao Yang Dr. Tao Yang is a Professor in the Department of Computer Science. Dr. Yang joined the Department of Computer Science at UCSB in 1993. His research has been in the areas of parallel and distributed systems, web search/mining, and high performance computing with over 100 refereed papers and patents. His recent research is in the fields of web data mining and search, and cloud systems. Email: tyang at cs.ucsb.edu
Yuheng Bu Dr. Bu is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science. He joined the Department of Computer Science at UCSB in 2025. His research lie in the intersection of machine learning, information theory, and signal processing. He leverages the tools from information theory and statistical signal processing to foundational machine-learning problems to develop theoretically justified algorithms for diverse applications, including watermarking generative AI, fair machine learning, uncertainty quantification, and model compression. Email: buyuheng at ucsb.edu		Richert Wang Richert Wang is a joint Associate Teaching Professor between the Department of Computer Science in the College of Engineering and Computing in the College of Creative Studies. He received his Ph.D. in Information and Computer Science at UC Irvine in 2011. Professor Wang works on computer science pedagogy topics including interdisciplinary approaches to teach applications of computer science to students with various backgrounds. Professor Wang is the current faculty advisor for UCSB's Game Development Club. Email: richert at cs.ucsb.edu