2026 Celebration of Excellence

Benjamin is a first-year senior at Illinois. He was awarded the Matthews scholarship for outstanding academic performance, and is a member of the Phi Kappa Phi honors society. He hopes to research algorithm design and high performance computing in relation to mathematics. In his free time he is a game developer and studies higher-dimensional geometry.

Advita is set become a Graduate Student as a part of the BS/MCS Program in Fall 2026. At Illinois, she has been involved as a Head Tutor in CS 124 for 4 semesters and interned with Amazon.

Yoshee is a senior in Computer Science at Illinois. She has conducted research with multiple national and international labs in HAI and computing education, and has served as a course assistant for CS 101 and CS 102. Beyond research, she enjoys traveling and exploring new destinations.

Amba is a Senior studying Clinical-Community Psychology. At Illinois, she is the lead undergraduate course assistant for CS105, an introductory Python and Excel course for non-STEM majors. Amba is passionate about applying her skills in research and data science to support students and address current topics in mental health.

Vira is a first-year PhD student in the Siebel School researching AI safety and trustworthy LLMs. Her work focuses on adversarial evaluation of LLM agents and sycophancy in multi-agent systems. She serves as AI Lead at RxRobotics, a medtech startup, and has interned at NCSA.

Juno is a Junior studying Computer Science. At Illinois, he is a head course assistant for CS 124, an introductory programming course for CS majors. Juno is passionate about using his skills to give back to students through teaching. In his free time, he likes to play the piano.

Chaoqi Liu is a senior in Computer Science and Mathematics at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, where he conducts research in robotic manipulation and learning-based control. His work focuses on diffusion policies, action representation, and scalable dynamics modeling, with publications at venues such as ICRA, RSS, and RA-L. He has collaborated with labs at UIUC, CMU, Columbia, and Harvard. He has received the James N. Snyder Award for Scholastic Achievement.

Jaclyn Rizzo is a 2nd year undergraduate in Information Sciences + Data Science. She is a recipient of the 2026 iSchool Ames Scholarship. At Illinois, she has participated in CHIME research and is a current Business & Operations Intern with the Illini Dads Association. Her interests are in data science, health informatics, and data analytics. In her free time she likes to run, ski, and cook.

Sneha is a senior in Statistics & Computer Science. During her time at Illinois, she's worked as a course assistant for STAT 107 and as an undergraduate research assistant in Tal August's Language Interaction Lab. Outside of academics, she has been a student leader at Kesem, a nonprofit aiding kids impacted by a parent's cancer.

Annie Zeng is a senior in CS at UIUC. She is doing research in graph theory under the supervision of Chandra Chekuri and Abhishek Methuku.

Mitali Ahlawat is a James Scholar majoring in Computer Science with a minor in Business. As a CS STARS scholar, she conducts research in AI and human-computer interaction with Professor Koustuv Saha. She is involved in mentorship and consulting initiatives, serving as co-chair of ACM’s Mentorship Program and as Corporate committee member for OTCR, in addition to working as a Course Assistant for CS 173. She was recently selected for Bain & Company’s CREW program,focused on developing women leaders, and is a recipient of multiple honors, including Grainger Engineering Outstanding Scholarship, Illinois Engineering Outstanding Scholarship, and Illinois Engineering Achievement Scholarship.

First-generation college student studying Computer Science at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign-Interested in using technology to create meaningful, real-world impact, especially in healthcare-Conducted research on how AI can reduce language barriers for non-English-speaking patients-Involved in student organizations and outreach supporting and connecting with others in STEM

Brendan is a freshman computer science student. He is a member of various clubs, including SIGGRAPH@UIUC, Illinois Data Science Club, and Illini Solar Car, among others. He loves to climb with the climbing club on Wednesdays and build projects on his down time or during club time. He hopes to continue his current interest in computer graphics and pursue a career path in it one day.

Sarah is currently an undergraduate senior, who will return next year to start her PhD. She is currently a lead course assistant for CS 374, and she has participated in CS STARS in the past. She is currently working with Professor Nancy M. Amato.

Reid is a senior graduating with a bachelor’s degree in Computer Science + Astronomy. He is a Co-Chair of SIGRobotics, a project-oriented robotics club in the Siebel School. Previously, Reid did research in the Department of Astronomy under Professor Leslie Looney, and interned at NASA. He is currently with Parasol Lab, led by Professor Nancy Amato, investigating motion planning for industrial robot arms.

Lily is a second-year undergraduate in computer science, working with Professor Tianyin Xu. Her research interest is in using AI to automate deployment and management of distributed systems. She is a core team member of SREGym, a benchmark that evaluates how AI can handle cloud system failures. SREGym was selected for a Slingshot grant from the Laude Institute.

Sabrina is a first-year CS major who hopes to pursue human-centered AI development, helping technology evolve alongside policy, ethics, and inclusivity. She is heavily involved in campus organizations and events (especially those that promote underrepresented groups), such as the Society of Women Engineers, Women in Engineering, and Women in Computer Science. She is also a part of the UIUC Steel Band and enjoys crafting, shopping, and gaming.Sabrina is a first-year CS major who hopes to pursue human-centered AI development, helping technology evolve alongside policy, ethics, and inclusivity. She is heavily involved in campus organizations and events (especially those that promote underrepresented groups), such as the Society of Women Engineers, Women in Engineering, and Women in Computer Science. She is also a part of the UIUC Steel Band and enjoys crafting, shopping, and gaming.

Maharsh Jani is a Chancellor's Scholar pursuing a B.S. in Computer Science & Education with a minor in Economics. At the INVITE Institute, he works on Vex and Learner Modeling, building real-time data pipelines to support large-scale educational data collection infrastructure. Passionate about using technology for good, Maharsh serves as a Peer Mentor, is a CS STAR, and is a PM for DevAda. He also works on Alumni Relations for the SAA, helping bridge students and Illinois alumni. Outside the classroom, you'll find him training for endurance triathlons!

Bolden is a graduating senior in CS. At Illinois, he has served as Vice President and Infrastructure Director for B[U]ILT by ColorStack, a student organization dedicated to increasing the representation of Black, Indigenous, and Latino students in tech. He is a 2x Microsoft intern and will be joining the company full-time as a software engineer after graduation.

Suhaan is a freshman interested in CS and Astronomy research and loves buliding and tinkering. He is very interested in entreprenuership and has recently been named a G Fellow where he was chosen to pitch to leading investors from YC, a16z, and other top incubators as well as source startups and connect top startups to brilliant investors.

Jianwei is a Junior at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, majoring in Computer Science and Statistics. As a recipient of the Franz Hohn and J.P. Nash Scholarship, his research focuses on Human-Computer Interaction and Spatial Computing. Jianwei has peer-reviewed work accepted at CHI 2026 and IEEE AIxVR 2026, where he investigates the interaction boundaries between intelligent agents and users within high-fidelity virtual environments. He is currently developing simulation frameworks that leverage AI to enhance the responsiveness and pedagogical efficacy of medical training systems.

Tarang is a freshman Computer Science & Philosophy major at UIUC. He is being recognized for his HackIllinois project, Open Reality, a spatial AI platform that received the Modal Track, Best Use of Gemini API, and Most Creative awards along with being a member of the CS STARS program at UIUC. Additionally, he conducts research with a CS Professor at UIUC as an undergraduate research assistant and has published five papers in venues including IEEE and Springer Nature. His interests include distributed systems, AI infrastructure, machine learning, probabilistic modeling for genomics and drug discovery.

Nithin is in his final semester of the BS/MCS Program. His passions are computer vision and algorithms, and he has an interest in game design as well. He was a course assistant for CS 415 and helped design a new MP for the course. Outside of class, he enjoys bouldering, reading fantasy novels, and getting boba with his friends.

Daniel is in his junior year of his Computer Science and Physics double major. He is actively conducting LLM research at the Conversational AI Lab @ UIUC. In his free time, he frequents the gym, does competitive swimming, and enjoys social time. You can find him this summer in Sunnyvale, CA, where he'll be interning at Google.

Audrey is in the 1st year of her bachelor’s degree. She received the William and Ruth Witt scholarship and the State Farm Computer Science. Both recognize excellence and exceptional promise in Computer Science. She’s also secured a freshman summer internship at State Farm.

Maanvi is a graduating senior at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign studying Computer Science. Passionate about technology's potential in sustainability and digital agriculture, she has pursued projects that use CS to solve real-world problems. As an international student, she has embraced UIUC's community through clubs, research, and pushing her comfort zone. She is a recipient of the Suhirtha Raj Scholarship and aspires to one day launch her own company at the intersection of tech and agriculture. In her free time, she enjoys writing short stories, cooking and playing mahjong. Following graduation, she will be joining Slack as a Software Engineer.

Nevin is a BS/MCS student at Illinois, where his academic focus lies at the intersection of Intelligence and Big Data. With four semesters of experience as a Course Assistant for CS 361, he found his most rewarding experiences in students' "aha" breakthroughs during office hours. Post-graduation, Nevin aspires to pursue a career in Intellectual Property law. Outside of school and work, he is an avid runner and hiker.

Jessica is a first-year Ph.D. student working with Professor William Moses. Her research focuses on compiler optimizations for high-performance scientific computing. Previously, she earned her bachelor’s degree in computer science, applied mathematics, and music from Augustana College. She received the Chambliss Astronomy Achievement Student Award for her work in gravitational-wave astrophysics. Outside of research, she enjoys playing the violin and singing.

Fatima Ali is a second-year PhD student in CS at UIUC, working in the SALT Lab advised by Prof. Yun Huang. Her research interests are in human-AI interaction, with a current focus on using generative AI to design introspective, self-reflective experiences that support mental well-being. She was awarded the Sohaib and Sara Abbasi Award in Fall 2025 and completed her undergraduate degree in CS in Pakistan.

I am a fifth-year PhD candidate in Computer Science at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC), working with Professor Matthew Caesar. My research focuses on understanding and verifying complex network systems through high-level language abstractions and formal methods.

Sachin Ashok is a Ph.D. candidate in Computer Science at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, advised by Professors Radhika Mittal and Brighten Godfrey. Before Illinois, he was a Research Fellow at Microsoft Research India and earned his bachelor's from NIT Trichy. He works on cloud systems, microservices, and networked systems, and is grateful for the chance to teach alongside his research. He will be on the job market this year and hopes there will still be human jobs left by the time he graduates.

Debangshu is a 4th-year PhD student in Computer Science at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, advised by Prof. Gagandeep Singh. His research lies at the intersection of machine learning and formal methods, focusing on building self-evolving LLM agents with provable correctness and user-controlled safety guarantees. He is a recipient of the Bloomberg Infrastructure & Security Research PhD Fellowship (2025) for his work on verified agent synthesis with formal contracts. He completed his undergraduate studies in computer science at IIT Guwahati.

Xijia is a first year CS PhD student advised by Prof. Xiaojing Liao. At Illinois, his research focuses on LLM and agent security. He received bachelor's and master's degrees from Tsinghua university, as a recipient of the National Scholarship and the Outstanding Graduate Award.

Chaoran is a fifth-year Ph.D. candidate in the Siebel School of Computing and Data Science. His research interests primarily span multiple aspects of generative modeling, with a particular theoretical focus on manifold learning. His work extends to various generative tasks in AI4Science domains. Actively engaged in the MMLI and CABBI initiatives, Chaoran strives to build versatile machine learning platforms that address complex real-world challenges of protein design in the pharmaceutical industry.

Ashish is a PhD student working with Prof. Sibin Mohan on Real-Time Systems, focusing on networking for predictability and performance guarantees.

Tomoyoshi (“Tommy”) Kimura is a first-year PhD student in Computer Science at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, advised by Tarek Abdelzaher. His research focuses on cyber-physical system intelligence, developing methods that bridge physical sensing and AI to enable robust, real-world decision making. He holds both bachelor’s and master’s degrees in computer science from UIUC, with prior work in multimodal learning for IoT sensing systems.

Sherry Li is a 1st year Computer Science Ph.D. student under the advisorship of Prof. Nancy Amato. Her research focuses on robotics foundation models, task and motion planning, and embodied agentic systems. A recent recipient of the Amazon AI PhD Fellowship, Sherry also holds master's degrees from Gies College of Business, Carnegie Mellon University and Peking University. She was inducted into the Tau Beta Pi Engineering Honor Society in 2025.

Chih-Hao has been working on 3D vision, simulation, and generative models with Prof. Shenlong Wang. He was a TA for the CS 598-3D Vision class and selected as an Outstanding Teaching Assistant.

Miri is a 1st year CS PhD student under the supervision of Professor ChengXiang Zhai and Professor Jiawei Han. Currently, she works on AI for scientific discovery with a focus on scientific novelty evaluation and hypothesis generation. She previously graduated from UCLA with a double B.S. in computer science and in mathematics. At UCLA, she was an undergraduate researcher in the PLUS Lab, where she co-authored two papers on creative generation, one of which received an Outstanding Paper Award at EMNLP 2024.

Amruta is a first-year PhD student working with Prof. Hari Sundaram and Prof. Dilek Hakkani-Tur. Her research interests are in multimodal and conversational AI, specifically reasoning.  She completed her B.Tech. in Electrical Engineering and M.Tech. in Artificial Intelligence and Data Science from IIT Bombay.

Rahul is a first-year CS PhD student working with Professor Saurabh Gupta on sim-to-real transfer for robotic manipulation. He received his B.Tech from IIT Hyderabad and spent a summer at EPFL, where his work evaluating multimodal foundation models on vision tasks was published at ICLR 2026. His current research focuses on learning contact-rich manipulation policies in simulation.

Jingyi is a second-year CS PhD student advised by Professor Wenzhen Yuan. Her research focuses on tactile sensing for robotic manipulation, and she has helped develop CS 498 Robot Manipulation in Fall 2025. Jingyi obtained her Bachelor's degree from Illinois ECE with Highest Honors.

Ali is a fifth-year PhD candidate specializing in security and privacy in machine learning. He has published papers in reputable venues, including ICML, ICLR, and AISTATS. In addition to his research, he has served as a teaching assistant for machine learning course (CS446) and as the lead teaching assistant for applied machine learning (CS441) over several semesters.

Rahul Bothra is a Ph.D. candidate at UIUC, and a member of the Systems Research Group at Google. His ongoing research tackles practical challenges on making inter-datacenter Networking more efficient. His past work has now been adopted by industry groups at Microsoft Teams, Oracle, and Clockwork.

Ikhyun is a fifth-year Ph.D. candidate at the Siebel School of Computing and Data Science. He has served as a Teaching Assistant for eight semesters, earning the "Excellent TA" recognition for multiple consecutive terms. His outstanding and sustained dedication to teaching recently culminated in his receipt of the prestigious "Lifetime TA Award."

Sriram is a 2nd year PhD student advised by Prof. Sarita Adve. When not working on datacenter software and hardware research, you will find him dancing, running, hiking, and generally soaking up the great outdoors!

Nirav is 2nd year Ph.D. student in Computer Science at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.  His research interests are in Security and Machine Learning. He also did his MS at UIUC. In his free time, he likes to play squash!

Drishti Goel is a first-year Ph.D. student in Computer Science, where she works on human-centered AI safety in high-stakes domains such as caregiving and mental health at the OnCARE lab. Previously, she was a Research Fellow at Microsoft Research India, where she spent two years working on AI for large-scale cloud services, with publications at venues including ICSE (Distinguished Paper Award) and FSE. She completed her B.Tech in Electrical Engineering from the Dayalbagh Educational Institute, graduating with the University's Founder's Medal---awarded for overall academic excellence, leadership, and service---and as a two-time Director's Medal recipient for highest academic performance.

Michelle is a 1st year Ph.D. candidate advised by Tal August and Koustuv Saha. Her research is generously supported by the NSF GRFP, GEM Fellowship, and the Grainger SURGE Fellowship. Her work develops accessible and sociotechnically-aware health AI for low literacy patients.

Madhav is an MSCS student working with Professors Ram Alagappan and Aishwarya Ganesan in the Distributed and Storage Systems Lab. His research focuses on infrastructure systems for modern AI workloads. Outside UIUC, Madhav is a contributor and maintainer for the Kubernetes project, working on control plane scalability, and a chair for GopherCon, the premier conference on the Go programming language. He is deeply passionate about translating his work into tangible social impact and works closely with NGOs like Aarti For Girls to design ways that can create economic opportunity for underprivileged women in India.

Alyssa is a graduate student whose research focuses on cybersecurity education. She holds a B.S. in Computer Science from Texas A&M University and has interned with IBM and the Naval Research Laboratory. She recently presented her work at the SIGCSE Technical Symposium '26. As a TA for CS 124 for four semesters, Alyssa is dedicated to teaching and mentoring, and she aspires to a career that brings together her love of learning with her commitment to accessible, engaging education. 

Charlotte completed her Ph.D. this semester. She is looking forward to growing as a teacher in her new role of Assistant Professor of Computer Science.

Peizhe is a second year MS student advised by Prof. Tianyin Xu. He received a B.S. from ECE Illinois. At Illinois, he has been a course assistant for CS 125, ECE 385, ECE 391, ECE 411, and currently a teaching assistant for CS 423.

Zhining is a Ph.D. candidate working with Prof. Hanghang Tong. His research broadly focuses on data-centric and trustworthy AI. He has authored 20+ papers with over 1,000 citations at top-tier venues, including ICML, NeurIPS, and ICLR, in collaboration with researchers from Amazon, Microsoft Research, and IBM. Zhining also builds and maintains research-driven open-source projects and software with 4,000+ GitHub stars and 6k+ monthly downloads.

Maleeha Masood is a PhD Candidate in Computer Science at UIUC working at the intersection of systems, networking, and machine learning. Her research explores multi-agent workflows, video systems, recommender systems, CDNs, and satellite networks, with publications at top venues including CHI, SIGCOMM, and MobiCom.

Michael Noguera is a first-year PhD student co-advised by Professors Aishwarya Ganesan and Ram Alagappan. In the Distributed and Storage Systems Lab (DASSL), he investigates better designs for computer systems to store and analyze real-time data "in motion." Before joining Illinois, Michael received his bachelor's degree from UW–Madison, where he researched database systems for securely storing and analyzing data "at rest."

Pedro is a PhD student in Computer Science working with Professor Josep Torrellas. His research focuses on the intersection of computer architecture, distributed systems, and machine learning, working on hardware accelerators for heterogeneous datacenters. Pedro earned his master's degree at EPFL as a "La Caixa" Foundation Scholar and a double bachelor's degree in Mathematics and Computer Science at Universidad Complutense de Madrid, graduating first in the Computer Science department at both institutions.

Antonis is a final year PhD student at Siebel School of Computing and Data Science. He is a Graduate Assistant and Teaching Assistant of CS533, was one of two winners of the Kenichi Miura Award, and was selected as one of the Mavis Future Faculty Fellows (MF3). He has previously interned with Microsoft and NVIDIA. His research focuses on fault-tolerant, high-performance data center systems that leverage Compute Express Link (CXL) for shared-memory and disaggregated architectures.

Ruizhong Qiu is a Ph.D. student in computer science at UIUC advised by Professor Hanghang Tong. His research interests lie broadly in theoretical foundations and methodological advances of machine learning.

Jovan Stojkovic is an incoming assistant professor of Computer Science at the University of Texas at Austin. Jovan holds a Ph.D. from UIUC. Jovan's research interests are in computer architecture and systems for cloud and datacenter computing. He holds six patents for his collaborations with Microsoft and IBM on datacenter computing. His research has been recognized with David J. Kuck Outstanding PhD Thesis Award, HPCA Best Paper Award, IEEE Micro Top Pick Honorable Mention, W. J. Poppelbaum Memorial Award, Kenichi Miura Award, and an invitation to speak at the Heidelberg Laureate Forum.

Trusha Talati is a Master of Computer Science student at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. She works as a Graduate Research Assistant at the Center for Health Informatics, where she studies how climate patterns impact public health, and also conducts independent research using large language models to better understand how people develop reading skills. Trusha is passionate about building reliable and inclusive AI systems and encouraging more women to explore technology through community outreach.

Talha is a fourth-year PhD student at Illinois, advised by Profs. Brighten Godfrey and Radhika Mittal. His research focuses on optimizing load balancing and resource scheduling in the cloud. Previously, he completed his undergrad at LUMS, Pakistan, where he worked on improving video delivery over the network.

Zhichen is a final year CS Ph.D. student at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and a member of the IDEA LAB@UIUC led by Prof. Hanghang Tong. During Fall 2025, he was a teaching assistant for CS 412.

Davis is in the 5^th and final year of the BS/MS joint degree program. His research interests are in wireless sensing and machine learning systems, and he has been working with Professor Deepak Vasisht since his junior year. At University of Illinois, he has been a course assistant for CS 124H, CS 128, and CS 222. In his free time, he enjoys playing tennis, soccer, and basketball with friends.

Junyu Zhang is a second-year Master's student in Computer Science at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Previously, she earned her bachelor’s degree from Huazhong University of Science and Technology, where she received the Outstanding Undergraduate Student Award. Her research interests are broadly in foundation models, embodied AI, and reinforcement learning, with particular interests in building LLM-powered autonomous agents with generalizable abilities to perceive, reason, and interact with the environment.

Yuheng is a fourth-year Phd student advised by Professor Nan Jiang and his research focus on theory of sequential decision making problems. He earned his MS degree in CS from UIUC, advised by Professor Hanghang Tong, and received the “David J. Kuck Outstanding Thesis Award”. He also won a gold medal in ACM-ICPC Regional contest during his undergraduate.