{"690067":{"#nid":"690067","#data":{"type":"news","title":"Hard Work Energizes Year of Achievement","body":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EThe mood was electric on April 20, as the College of Computing hosted its 35th Annual Awards Celebration. While individual success was on full display, the banquet also honored the community and perseverance that truly power achievement.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cFrom my seat, I can feel the energy. I see the momentum. We\u0027re all about growth and change,\u201d said \u003Cstrong\u003EVivekSarkar\u003C\/strong\u003E, dean and John P. Imlay Jr. Chair of the College of Computing.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cBut those are just words. What\u0027s really behind the words is all the hard work put in by all of you.Today\u0027s celebration is for the entire College, all of you, and all your hard work.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EStudents, faculty, and staff from the School of Computational Science and Engineering (CSE) were among those recognized at the celebration. Their accomplishments reflected a year dedicated to excellence in research, teaching, and service. School of CSE award recipients included:\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cul\u003E\u003Cli\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EGrace Kim\u003C\/strong\u003E, M.S. computer science (CS) student: Donald V. Jackson Fellowship\u003C\/li\u003E\u003Cli\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003ESri Ranganathan Palaniappan\u003C\/strong\u003E, M.S. CS student: Donald V. Jackson Fellowship\u003C\/li\u003E\u003Cli\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EEthan Yang\u003C\/strong\u003E, M.S. CSE student: Marshall D. Williamson Fellowship\u003C\/li\u003E\u003Cli\u003EAlumnus \u003Cstrong\u003EAustin Wright\u003C\/strong\u003E (Ph.D. ML-CSE 2025): Outstanding Doctoral Dissertation Award\u003C\/li\u003E\u003Cli\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EArlene Washington-Capers\u003C\/strong\u003E, school administrative officer: 25 Years of Service Acknowledgment\u003C\/li\u003E\u003C\/ul\u003E\u003Cp\u003ETwo lecturers in the School of Computing Instruction with ties to the School of CSE received awards at the celebration.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EMax Mahdi Roozbahani\u003C\/strong\u003E received a Dean\u2019s Award, which went to instructors who taught class sizes over 350 students this year. A Class of 2019 CSE alumnus, Roozbahani teaches \u003Cem\u003ECSE 6242: Data and Visual Analytics\u003C\/em\u003E.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003ENimisha Roy\u003C\/strong\u003E received the Monica Sweat Outstanding Lecturer in External Engagement Award. She earned her Ph.D. in CSE in 2021.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EProfessor \u003Cstrong\u003EPolo Chau\u003C\/strong\u003E advises Kim, Palaniappan, and Wright, and recommended them for their awards.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EChau is an associate director of Georgia Tech\u2019s M.S. Analytics program, which won the \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.informs.org\/News-Room\/INFORMS-Releases\/Awards-Releases\/Georgia-Tech-Awarded-the-2026-INFORMS-UPS-George-D.-Smith-Prize\u0022\u003EUPS George D. Smith Prize\u003C\/a\u003E at the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS). The award recognizes excellence in preparing students to become practitioners of operations research and analytics.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EFor Kim, the Jackson Fellowship was the latest achievement in a year decorated with accolades. She was one of two School of CSE students to receive the National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowship Program award (GRFP). Kim was also selected for a Fulbright U.S. Student Program Research award.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EPh.D. student \u003Cstrong\u003EAbir Haque\u003C\/strong\u003E was CSE\u2019s second NSF GRFP awardee, receiving the grant to advance research in scientific computing. Advised by School of CSE Professor and Associate Chair \u003Cstrong\u003EEdmond Chow\u003C\/strong\u003E, Haque additionally received a Department of Energy (DOE) Computational Science Graduate Fellowship.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EChow was appointed to several leadership roles this year in the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM). The organization selected Chow as vice president for programs. SIAM also named him as co-chair of next year\u2019s Conference on Computational Science and Engineering.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003ENSF presented the CAREER award to two CSE faculty. Assistant Professor \u003Cstrong\u003EYunan Luo\u003C\/strong\u003E \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.cc.gatech.edu\/news\/nsf-grant-funds-protein-research-drug-discovery-and-personalized-medicine\u0022\u003Ereceived a grant\u003C\/a\u003E to build artificial intelligence models to study understudied proteins in biology.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EElizabeth Qian\u003C\/strong\u003E is an assistant professor in the Daniel Guggenheim School of Aerospace Engineering with a joint appointment in the School of CSE. \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/ae.gatech.edu\/news\/2025\/07\/elizabeth-qian-lands-nsfs-prestigious-early-career-award\u0022\u003EHer NSF CAREER award\u003C\/a\u003E will support research developing machine learning methods that learn from multi-fidelity data.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EResearchers from the School of CSE were \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.cc.gatech.edu\/news\/record-breaking-simulation-boosts-rocket-science-and-supercomputing-new-limits\u0022\u003Efinalists for the 2025 Gordon Bell Prize\u003C\/a\u003E. Assistant Professor \u003Cstrong\u003ESpencer Bryngelson\u003C\/strong\u003E led a team that included Ph.D. students \u003Cstrong\u003EBen Wilfong\u003C\/strong\u003E and \u003Cstrong\u003EAnand Radhakrishnan\u003C\/strong\u003E, Research Staff \u003Cstrong\u003Emember Dan Vickers\u003C\/strong\u003E, and alumnus \u003Cstrong\u003EHenry Le Berre\u003C\/strong\u003E (CS 2025).\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe team achieved the largest computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulation to date, exceeding the current record by a factor of 20. The group simulated interacting plumes of 33 rocket thrusters inspired by the SpaceX Super Heavy booster.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EBryngelson advises \u003Cstrong\u003EMelody Lee\u003C\/strong\u003E, an undergraduate student who was one of three Georgia Tech students to receive a \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/undergraduate.gatech.edu\/georgia-tech-celebrates-three-goldwater-scholars-for-2026\/\u0022\u003EBarry Goldwater Scholarship\u003C\/a\u003E this year. She received the award to continue research at the intersection of quantum computing and CFD.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAssistant Professor \u003Cstrong\u003EQi Tang\u003C\/strong\u003E received the \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.cc.gatech.edu\/news\/department-energy-award-power-nuclear-research-machine-learning\u0022\u003EDOE Early Career Research Award\u003C\/a\u003E. He is the first-ever faculty member from CSE and the College of Computing to receive the award.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe $875,000 award will support Tang for five years as he researches particle data processing and compression, with applications in fusion, accelerator, and nuclear physics.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003ETang was also selected as a Summer Early Career Scholar of Digital Futures at KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EBryngelson and Tang were selected as collaborators for three DOE Predictive Science Academic Alliance Program (\u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.energy.gov\/nnsa\/articles\/nnsa-announces-selection-next-round-predictive-science-academic-alliance-program\u0022\u003EPSAAP IV\u003C\/a\u003E) Centers. The program leverages the academic community to advance science-based modeling and simulation.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EOne of Tang\u2019s students, \u003Cstrong\u003EAlex de Magalhaes\u003C\/strong\u003E, received a SPARK Award scholarship from the Georgia Tech Strategic Energy Institute. The award recognizes outstanding student engagement in energy research.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe National Institutes of Health (NIH) awarded prestigious R01 grants to three CSE faculty, each valued at $1.2 million.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAssistant Professor \u003Cstrong\u003EAnqi Wu\u003C\/strong\u003E is using the grant to study multi-animal social behavior using advanced representation learning and reinforcement learning.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003ENIH awarded a grant to Assistant Professor \u003Cstrong\u003EKai Wang\u003C\/strong\u003E and Professor \u003Cstrong\u003EB. Aditya Prakash\u003C\/strong\u003E to build an AI framework to efficiently treat patients diagnosed with diabetes and other chronic diseases.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EPrakash advises M.S. student \u003Cstrong\u003ESudarshan Anand\u003C\/strong\u003E, who claimed two awards at the 2025 International Conference on Biomedical and Health Informatics. First, Anand was the champion of the conference\u2019s data challenge competition. Then, the conference selected him as a Young Professional NextGen Scholar.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAssistant Professor \u003Cstrong\u003EVictor Fung\u003C\/strong\u003E won a \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/research.google\/programs-and-events\/research-scholar-program\/recipients\/\u0022\u003E2025 Google Scholar Program\u003C\/a\u003E award. He received the award in the Applied Science category for multi-modal scientific agents for in silico materials discovery and inverse design. The Research Scholar Program provided up to $60,000 to early-career professors to support advancement of their research.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThis year, the College of Computing selected School of CSE Professor \u003Cstrong\u003ERich Vuduc\u003C\/strong\u003E as \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.cc.gatech.edu\/news\/new-software-center-director-lead-next-wave-scientific-discovery\u0022\u003Edirector of Georgia Tech\u2019s Center for Scientific Software Engineering (CSSE)\u003C\/a\u003E. The center was formed in 2022 from an $11 million investment from Schmidt Sciences. Georgia Tech was one of four universities that Schmidt Sciences selected to host a center.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003ECSSE develops custom software tools and best practices to meet scientists\u0027 needs. Overall, this approach accelerates the pace and quality of scientific discovery.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EVuduc advised alumnus\u0026nbsp;\u003Cstrong\u003EElizabeth Hong\u003C\/strong\u003E\u0026nbsp;(CS 2025), who received a Fulbright U.S.-Korea Presidential STEM Initiative Award. Designed to promote academic and cultural exchange, the award provided graduating college seniors and graduate students funding to pursue independent research projects in Korea on STEM topics of their choice.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EVuduc advises Ph.D. student \u003Cstrong\u003EMax Hawkins\u003C\/strong\u003E, who was selected for the OMSCS Pre-Doctoral Fellowship program.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe program provided Hawkins support to design and teach a one-credit, pass\/fail\/audit seminar course. Hawkins taught \u003Cem\u003EComputing at Scale: The Design, Operation, and Societal Impacts of Data Centers\u003C\/em\u003E in Fall 2025 and a research course in Spring 2026.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EHawkins also received a $3,000 scholarship through the 7X24 Exchange Atlanta Scholarship Program. He was one of three scholarship recipients awarded to students in the greater Atlanta area with research interests in the data center industry.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EVuduc advises Team Phoenix, Georgia Tech\u2019s student cluster competition team. Team Phoenix placed first among USA participants and sixth internationally at \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.cc.gatech.edu\/news\/undergrads-team-phoenix-wins-top-us-honor-international-supercomputing-competition-0\u0022\u003ESC25\u2019s IndySCC competition\u003C\/a\u003E (30 total teams, 12 USA and 18 international). The team was graded on optimizing techniques and running industry standard benchmarks on supercomputers.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe team included computer science undergraduate students \u003Cstrong\u003EAlexander Ichtovkin\u003C\/strong\u003E, \u003Cstrong\u003EAlex Kim\u003C\/strong\u003E, \u003Cstrong\u003EAiden Lambert\u003C\/strong\u003E, \u003Cstrong\u003ESahil Samar\u003C\/strong\u003E, \u003Cstrong\u003ESeth Yiming Shi\u003C\/strong\u003E, and \u003Cstrong\u003EVenkata Sai Aditya Reddy Devarapalli\u003C\/strong\u003E. Graduate students \u003Cstrong\u003ECharles Lindsey\u003C\/strong\u003E and \u003Cstrong\u003EJay Saraha\u003C\/strong\u003E mentored the team coached by Research Scientists \u003Cstrong\u003EJeff Valdez\u003C\/strong\u003E, \u003Cstrong\u003EAaron Jezghani\u003C\/strong\u003E, and \u003Cstrong\u003EWill Powell\u003C\/strong\u003E.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAlumni \u003Cstrong\u003EZiyi (Francis) Yin\u003C\/strong\u003E (Ph.D. CSE-CSE 2024), \u003Cstrong\u003ERafael Orozco\u003C\/strong\u003E (Ph.D. CSE-CSE 2024), \u003Cstrong\u003EMathias Louboutin\u003C\/strong\u003E (Ph.D. CS-CSE 2020), and Professor \u003Cstrong\u003EFelix Herrmann\u003C\/strong\u003E received an honorable mention for the Best Paper of 2024 from the journal \u003Cem\u003EGeophysics\u003C\/em\u003E. The award, presented in 2025, recognized the group\u2019s work on \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/pubs.geoscienceworld.org\/seg\/geophysics\/article-abstract\/89\/4\/A23\/644597\/WISE-Full-waveform-variational-inference-via?redirectedFrom=fulltext\u0022\u003EWISE\u003C\/a\u003E: a full-waveform variational inference via subsurface extensions.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EGeorgia Tech approved both of CSE\u2019s promotion cases \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.cc.gatech.edu\/news\/institute-announcement-recognizes-faculty-achievement-and-excellence\u0022\u003Ethis year\u003C\/a\u003E. \u003Cstrong\u003EElizabeth Cherry\u003C\/strong\u003E will be promoted to full professor. \u003Cstrong\u003ESrijan Kumar\u003C\/strong\u003E will be promoted to associate professor with tenure.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E","summary":"","format":"limited_html"}],"field_subtitle":"","field_summary":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EThe mood was electric on April 20, as the College of Computing hosted its 35th Annual Awards Celebration. While individual success was on full display, the banquet also honored the community and perseverance that truly power achievement.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cFrom my seat, I can feel the energy. I see the momentum. We\u0027re all about growth and change,\u201d said \u003Cstrong\u003EVivek Sarkar\u003C\/strong\u003E, dean and John P. Imlay Jr. Chair of the College of Computing.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cBut those are just words. What\u0027s really behind the words is all the hard work put in by all of you.Today\u0027s celebration is for the entire College, all of you, and all your hard work.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EStudents, faculty, and staff from the School of Computational Science and Engineering (CSE) were among those recognized at the celebration. Their accomplishments reflected a year dedicated to excellence in research, teaching, and service.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"field_summary_sentence":[{"value":"Students, faculty, and staff from the School of Computational Science and Engineering (CSE) were among those recognized at the College of Computing\u0027s 35th Annual Awards Celebration.."}],"uid":"36319","created_gmt":"2026-04-30 11:38:22","changed_gmt":"2026-05-01 16:35:55","author":"Bryant Wine","boilerplate_text":"","field_publication":"","field_article_url":"","location":"Atlanta, GA","dateline":{"date":"2026-04-30T00:00:00-04:00","iso_date":"2026-04-30T00:00:00-04:00","tz":"America\/New_York"},"extras":[],"hg_media":{"680120":{"id":"680120","type":"image","title":"Grace-Kim-College-Awards.jpg","body":null,"created":"1777549195","gmt_created":"2026-04-30 11:39:55","changed":"1777549195","gmt_changed":"2026-04-30 11:39:55","alt":"College of Computing 35th Annual Awards Celebration","file":{"fid":"264360","name":"Grace-Kim-College-Awards.jpg","image_path":"\/sites\/default\/files\/2026\/04\/30\/Grace-Kim-College-Awards.jpg","image_full_path":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/\/sites\/default\/files\/2026\/04\/30\/Grace-Kim-College-Awards.jpg","mime":"image\/jpeg","size":114660,"path_740":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/740xx_scale\/public\/2026\/04\/30\/Grace-Kim-College-Awards.jpg?itok=lrTMnfa-"}}},"media_ids":["680120"],"groups":[{"id":"47223","name":"College of Computing"},{"id":"50877","name":"School of Computational Science and Engineering"}],"categories":[{"id":"130","name":"Alumni"},{"id":"153","name":"Computer Science\/Information Technology and Security"},{"id":"193157","name":"Student Honors and Achievements"}],"keywords":[{"id":"654","name":"College of Computing"},{"id":"166983","name":"School of Computational Science and Engineering"}],"core_research_areas":[],"news_room_topics":[],"event_categories":[],"invited_audience":[],"affiliations":[],"classification":[],"areas_of_expertise":[],"news_and_recent_appearances":[],"phone":[],"contact":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EBryant Wine, Communications Officer\u003Cbr\u003E\u003Ca href=\u0022mailto:bryant.wine@cc.gatech.edu\u0022\u003Ebryant.wine@cc.gatech.edu\u003C\/a\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"email":[],"slides":[],"orientation":[],"userdata":""}}}