Yi Deng, associate professor
of Computer Science, has been named director of Florida International
University’s School of Computer Science.
Deng, who initially came to FIU
in 1992 as an assistant professor, recently returned to the
University after a two-year leave of absence during which he
was managing director of the Embedded Software Center, a research
and development center at the University of Texas at Dallas.
In his new capacity, he is responsible for the overall strategic
planning, management and operations of the School. He assumed
his new duties Aug. 1, replacing Professor Jainendra Navlakha,
who is continuing his duties as a faculty member.
“I am very encouraged by
many positive changes at FIU in the last couple of years, including
significant increases in quality and productivity,” Deng
said. “FIU is clearly on its way to becoming a first-class
research university, and it is my privilege as a member of the
FIU community to contribute my two cents to help the University
achieve its goals.”
Deng was the founding director
of FIU’s Center for Advanced Distributed Systems Engineering
(CADSE), a research division of School of Computer Science.
Under his leadership, CADSE grew to include nearly 30 members
with five research laboratories and its research was supported
by grants and contracts from the National Science Foundation,
Air Force Office of Scientific Research, Army Research Office,
NASA and private industry. The center’s research focuses
on distributed software engineering, i.e. using engineering
methods and technologies to tackle development problems of complex,
reliable, and/or real-time distributed systems.
There are currently some 800 undergraduate
and 100 graduate students enrolled in the School’s bachelor’s,
master’s and doctoral degree programs. Among the goals
Deng will pursue during the next two to three years are:
• Significantly expand
the School’s education and training programs at both undergraduate
and graduate levels, with the goal of doubling graduate enrollment
and the graduation rate. This will be accompanied by the recruitment
of additional tenure-track faculty.
• Strengthen the School’s
relationship and collaborations with the community and local
corporations.
• Significantly increase
the quality and productivity of the School’s research
programs and actively pursue collaborative multidisciplinary
research and development with other units at the University.
Deng received his Ph.D.
in computer science from the University of Pittsburgh. He has
been the principal investigator or co-principal investigator
of 14 research awards from federal agencies, has published more
than 60 scientific papers and is an editor of the International
Journal of Software Engineering and Knowledge Engineering.
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