• Ömer Eğecioğlu
• Gökay Saldamlı
• Sam Green
• Tim Sherwood
• Werner Schindler
• Serdar Erdem
• Lo’ai Tawalbeh
• Vladimir Trujillo
• Wangchen Dai
• İsmail San

• Jiafeng Xie
• İhsan Çiçek
• Zülfükar Saygı
• Elif Saygı
• Aydın Kübilay
• Mikhail Rakov
• Guan Donghai
• Funda Özdemir
• Zeynep Özger
• Nihal Vatandaş

• Hatice Arslan
• Asuman Dumlu
• Shang Ci
• Hu Sen
• Jipeng Zhang
• Yihan Wang
• Pengzhou He
• Chen Li
• Yue Geng
• Bo Zhao

• Imran Adham
• Mrinalini Anand
• Emilie Barnard
• Jackson Blazensky
• Nat Bunner
• Tiawna Cayton
• Wei Dai
• Christian Daley
• Carly Larsson
• Jieliang Luo

• Samira Madrigal
• Shane Masuda
• Metehan Özten
• Vir Pathak
• Ankita Singh
• Pedro Sosa
• Burak Tahtacı
• Jessica Trinh
• Jesus Vega
• Josephine Vo

Dr. Eğecioğlu received his Ph.D. in mathematics in 1984 from the University of California, San Diego. His prior studies were in Computer and Information Sciences, and Mathematics at the University of Minnesota. Dr. Eğecioğlu has been a faculty member in the Computer Science Department at UCSB since 1985. His current research is in algorithms and combinatorics.   ↑↑

Dr. Gökay Saldamlı completed his PhD degree in Electrical & Computer Engineering from Oregon State University in 2005. He is currently an Assistant Professor in Computer Engineering Department at San Jose State University. He has worked at Samsung Research America, Samsung System LSI, Glenayre Technologies and security-related startups. His research interests include IoT security, applied cryptography (secure multi-party computation, symmetric and public-key encryption), and privacy privacy enhancing technologies for location based services, recommender systems and big data analytics.   ↑↑

Dr. Sam Green is a co-founder of Semiotic AI which is focused on making Fully Homomorphic Encryption simple and efficient to use for ML and AI applications. Previously, he was a Senior Member of Technical Staff, at Sandia National Laboratories. At Sandia, he spent five years performing design analysis and vulnerability assessments of cryptographic hardware. He was also a lead instructor for the Sandia cryptographic engineering course. In 2019, he received his computer science PhD under the supervision of Prof. Koç. His dissertation was on methods for high-performance and efficient deep reinforcement learning. His master’s degree is in applied mathematics with a focus on hardware acceleration using FPGAs.   ↑↑

At UCSB, Dr. Sherwood co-directs the CS Computer Architecture Lab (ArchLab), where his students and he work on all manner of computer architecture problems, from circuits to systems to the applications that run on them. Computer architecture is a great field in that you can use theory, algorithms, and VLSI all together to attack interesting problems. Dr. Sherwood's primary interest is in techniques that allow for the continuous streaming analysis of complex systems. Whether you are trying to find run-time phases, discover suspicious content in the network, handle wireless multipath interference, or uncover bugs in a program -- modern programmable processors are ill equipped to handle these irregular throughput driven applications. The ArchLab website, and his personal webpage both have more information.   ↑↑

Dr. Werner Schindler is experienced in several fields of IT security, notably in cryptography, side-channel analysis and random number generators. He has been active in these fields for more than 20 years. He obtained a master's degree in mathematics (Diplom-Mathematiker) 1989, a doctorate in mathematics (Dr. rer. nat.) 1991, and a postdoctoral lecture qualification for mathematics (Habilitation im Fach Mathematik) 1998, all at Darmstadt University of Technology, Germany. He has been employed at the Bundesamt für Sicherheit in der Informationstechnik (BSI) (Federal Office for Information Security) in Bonn, Germany, since 1993. Since 2005 he is adjunct professor of mathematics (außerplanmäßiger Professor) at the Darmstadt University of Technology, and since 2009 he is principle investigator at CASED (Center for Advanced Security Research Darmstadt). He was the head of the research group CASCADE (Constructive Attacks | Side-Channel Analysis | Secure Design). Werner Schindler is co-founder of the international workshop COSADE and has about 80 scientific publications. He is co-editor of the mathematical-technical reference to the evaluation guidelines AIS 20 (deterministic RNGs) and AIS 31 (physical RNGs). These guidelines have been effective in the German certification scheme according to the Common Criteria for about 15 years.   ↑↑

Serdar Erdem receıved his PhD degree in Electrical & Computer Engineering from Oregon State University in 2002. He is currently an Associate Professor in the Electrical Engineering Department at Gebze Technical University, Turkey. His research interests include applied cryptography, cryptographic algorithm implementations, quantum algorithms, embedded systems, and computer arithmetic.   ↑↑

Dr. Lo’ai Tawalbeh completed his PhD and MS degrees in Electrical & Computer Engineering at Oregon State University in 2002 and. He is currently an Associate Professor in Computer Engineering Department at Jordan University of Science and Technology, and director of the Cryptographic Hardware and Information Security Group. From 2005 till 2017, he worked as an adjunct professor to teach different courses in cyber security for the Master programs at: New York Institute of Technology (NYIT), DePaul’s University and Princess Sumaya University for Technology (Jordan), and Umm Al-Qura University (KSA). Dr. Tawalbeh has over 70 research publications in refereed international Journals and conferences. His research interests include cyber security, applied cryptography, symmetric and asymmetric encryption algorithm implementations, mobile cloud and computing and CPS security.   ↑↑

Vladimir Trujillo-Olaya received his B.S, M.Sc and Ph.D. in Electronics Engineering from Universidad del Valle, Cali-Colombia, School of Electrical and Electronics Engineering in 2004, 2009 and 2014, respectively. His research interests are in hardware implementation of finite fields, cryptosystems, embedded system design, fault tolerant design and hardware implementation of bioinformatics applications. He is a student member of the IEEE. Trujillo-Olaya has been a reviewer of IBERCHIP and LASCAS and some national publications and international conferences. Currently, he is an associate professor at Universidad de San Buenaventura-Cali and an assistant professor at Universidad del Valle-Colombia.   ↑↑

Wangchen Dai received the B.Eng. degree in Electrical Engineering and Automation from Beijing Institute of Technology, Beijing, China, and the M.A.Sc. degree from the University of Windsor, Canada. Now, he is a second year PhD student in the Department of Electronic Engineering, at the City University of Hong Kong. His research interests include reconfigurable computing, public-key cryptography, and homomorphic encryption. He is a visiting student in the Computer Science Department at UCSB in 2016, and works with Dr. Koç and his students on the project "Design, Analysis, Implementation, Test and Validation of Cryptographic Processors" in Koç Lab.   ↑↑

Dr. San is an Assistant Professor in Electrical and Electronics Engineering Department at Anadolu University, Turkey. He received his B.Sc. degree from the same department at Anadolu University (2008); B.Sc. degree from Department of Avionics at Anadolu University (2008); PhD degree from Electrical and Electronics Engineering Department at Anadolu University (2014). He was accepted as a student Intern at IBM Research - Zurich as part of a Great Minds Student Internship program during his PhD studies. He held a visiting research scholar position at UCSB, from 2015 to 2016. His main research interests are in architecture design for communication systems with special focus on efficient implementations for cryptographic applications. His research interests include cryptographic hardware design, high performance computing, and fault tolerant computation.   ↑↑

Dr. Xie received M.E. and Ph.D. from Central South University and the University of Pittsburgh, in 2010 and 2014, respectively. He is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering, Villanova University, Pensylvania. His research interests include cryptographic engineering, post-quantum cryptography, domain-specific hardware accelerator design, hardware security, and VLSI implementation of neural network systems.   ↑↑

İhsan Çiçek received the B.Sc. degree in electronics and telecommunication engineering from Istanbul Technical University in 2002, the M.Sc. degree in microelectronics engineering from Sabanci University in 2004, and Ph.D. degree in electrical-electronics engineering from Bogazici University in 2014. He received Istanbul Technical University high honor, and Northern Telecommunication company scholarships during his undergraduate study, and a full scholarship from Sabancı University during his graduate study. He is the recipient of 2002 Siemens excellence in engineering prize. He joined TUBITAK National Institute of Electronics and Cryptology in 2005, where he has worked as a senior cryptographic hardware designer, and communication security analyst. In 2015 he earned his spot as visiting scholar at Koç Lab at the University of California, Santa Barbara to collaborate on hardware security related projects. His research interests include cryptographic hardware design, true random number generators, integrated circuit design, chaotic systems, and reconfigurable embedded systems.   ↑↑

Zülfükar Saygı is an Associate Professor of Mathematics at TOBB University of Economics and Technology, Turkey. He received his undergraduate and M.S. degrees in Mathematics and his Ph.D. degree in Cryptography from Middle East Technical University, in Turkey, in 2000, 2003 and 2007 respectively. His research interests include finite fields and their applications, coding theory, Boolean functions and cryptography. In 2015 and 2016, Zülfükar visited the Department of Computer Science at UCSB and began working with Professor Koç. His current research focus with Koç Lab is fast arithmetic operations over finite fields.   ↑↑

Elif Saygı is an Assistant Professor of Mathematics at Hacettepe University, Turkey. She received his undergraduate degree in Mathematics and her M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Cryptography from Middle East Technical University, in Turkey, in 2002, 2004 and 2009 respectively. Her research interest include finite fields and their applications, Boolean functions, design and analysis of cryptographic algorithms and sequences. Elif visited the Department of Computer Science at UCSB from 2015–2016 and began working with Prof. Çetin Kaya Koç. Her current collaboration focus with Koç Lab is Boolean functions and fast arithmetic operations over finite fields. Her other interests include education of mental games.   ↑↑

Aydın received BS degree in telecommunications and electronics in İstanbul Technical University and MS degree in electrical engineering in Yıldız Technical University. He worked at Northern Telecom Turkey and Turkish National Institute of Elelctronics and Cryptology. He has been working as an information security consultant and auditor, and also teaching computer science, programming and operating systems courses at İstinye University. His research interests include cryptography and quantum computation.   ↑↑

Mikhail Rakov graduated (summa cum laude) from L’vov Polytechnic Institute in 1956 with a BSci degree in electrical engineering. He received the PhD degree from the Kiev Institute of Electrotechnics in 1962 and the DSci degree from the Moscow Institute of Energetics in 1971. From 1959 to 1993, he held positions of increasing responsibility at the Institute of Physics and Mechanics, Ukrainian Academy of Sciences, where he conducted research on multiple-valued logic, abstract algebraic systems, digital signal processing, and network architecture. The main focus of this research was on developing practical applications for advanced mathematical constructs. He was appointed a professor of information theory and computer science in 1978 and was elected a member of the International Academy of Informatization in 1993. Dr. Rakov is author or coauthor of 10 scientific books, more than 250 published articles, and more than 100 patents in the former Soviet Union and in the US. Since emigrating to the US, he has been working as an independent scientific consultant. He has been affiliated with the Computer Science Department at the University of California, Santa Barbara, as a Research Scientist since 2002.   ↑↑

Dr. Guan Donghai, associate professor of College of Computer Science and Technology, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics (NUAA). In 2009, he received his Ph.D. degree from Kyung Hee University (KHU) in South Korea and worked as a postdoctoral fellow at KHU from 2009 to 2011. From 2012 to 2014, he was an assistant professor in the Department of Computer Engineering, Kunming University of Science and Technology. Since 2014, he has been an associate professor at NUAA. His research interests include artificial intelligence and its applications. He is the PI for several national research projects in China and published more than 80 research papers.   ↑↑

Funda Özdemir received her BSc degree in Mathematics from Boğaziçi University, Istanbul, in 2010, and her MSc and PhD degrees in Mathematics from Sabancı University, İstanbul, in 2012 and 2016. During her PhD, she stayed in Paris for five months for a research visit at Telecom ParisTech. She worked as a postdoctoral researcher at Sabancı University between 2016-2018. Her research interests are algebraic coding theory, post-quantum cryptography and homomorphic cryptography. She is a co-author of the book "Partially Homomorphic Encryption" published by Springer. Currently, she is an Assistant Professor in Computer Science Department at İstinye University, Istanbul.   ↑↑

Dr. Zeynep Ödemiş Özger received her BSc in mathematics from Boğaziçi University in 2008 and her PhD degree in mathematics from Fatih University in 2013. She has been a faculty member in the Engineering Sciences Department at İzmir Katip Çelebi University since 2014. Currently she teaches several mathematics courses for graduate and undergraduate engineering students. Her main research interests are algebraic coding theory, cryptography, and approximation theory.   ↑↑

Nihal received her BS in mathematics from Bogazici University, her MS in computer engineering from Istanbul Sehir University, and her PhD in computer science from the City University of New York. She held teaching roles at City College of New York and participated in an internship program at Microsoft Research during her PhD. She enjoys working on problems in theoretical computer science and cryptography. Her prior research focused on deniable communications, post-quantum cryptography, authenticated key exchange, end-to-end encryption, and ZK-based blockchain protocols. She loves colors, painting, number puzzles, and cats!   ↑↑

Hatice received her BS degree in the Department of Mathematics at Sakarya University and MS degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering at Düzce University. She is currently pursuing the PhD in Computer Engineering at Yıldız Technical University. Her research interests include machine learning, optimization, cyber-physical security and applied cryptography.   ↑↑

Asuman received her BS and MS degrees in Mathematics. She is completed BS degree at Ondokuz Mayıs University and she studied algebra, number theory, coding theory and error correcting codes during her MS studies at Sakarya University. She is first year PhD student at Yıldız Technical University. She is interested in cryptography, information theory, quantum error correcting codes. In her free times she ``tries'' to solve Millennium Problems, especially the P=NP problem.   ↑↑

Shang Ci received the M.S. degree from the School of Computer and Information, AnHui Normal University. He is currently pursuing the Ph.D. degree at Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, majoring in cyberspace security. His research interests include homomorphic encryption and machine learning.   ↑↑

Hu Sen is a first-year PhD student at Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics. He is interested in Homomorphic Encryption, image copyright protection, and machine learning. In his free time he likes to read books, running, and playing unique e-games. He is a cat person.   ↑↑

Jipeng Zhang received his bachelor degree in 2020 from the College of Computer Science and Technology at Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics (NUAA). He is pursuing the Ph.D. degree at NUAA, majoring in Cybersecurity. His research interests include optimized implementation of post-quantum cryptography (PQC) and elliptic curve cryptography (ECC), as well as the integration of optimized (PQC and ECC) implementation into the TLS protocol (e.g. OpenSSL library). He enjoys playing table tennis and badminton.   ↑↑

Yihan Wang holds a master's degree in data science from Monash University, Australia, and she is currently studying cryptography and security at Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, focusing on homomorphic encryption and machine learning. She loves sports very much. She likes playing table tennis, tennis, roller skating, martial arts and so on.   ↑↑

Pengzhou He received BS degree from the University of Science and Technology Beijing in 2019. He is a fourth-year Ph.D. student of Computer Engineering at Villanova University. His research areas include post-quantum cryptography, hardware security, and fully homomorphic encryption.   ↑↑

Chen Li is a first-year graduate student at Nanjing University, majoring in communication and information engineering. He is interested in Homomorphic Encryption and will focus on its software implementations in his research. He likes reading detective fiction in his spare time.   ↑↑

Yue Geng is a fourth year Electronic Science and Engineering student at Nanjing University, where he will continue to study integrated circuits as a graduate student. He is interested in hardware architecture design and optimization. In his free time he likes to read books and watch football matches.   ↑↑

Bo Zhao received his bachelor degree from Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics in 2020, and he is now pursuing master degree. His current research interests are focused on the security and privacy of machine learning, especially poisoning attacks and Byzantine-robust mechanism in federated learning. He takes food, drink and nice clothing as good companions in his daily life.   ↑↑

Imran Adham is a 3rd year Computer Science and Mathematical Sciences major. He is interested in Cryptography, Computability, and Mathematical Logic. His interest in these fields stemmed from when he was introduced to Turing Machines and the Church-Turing Thesis. In his free time he enjoys listening to and exploring different genres of music.   ↑↑

Mrinalini Anand is a second year graduate student at UCSB in the ECE department, majoring in communications and signal processing. Her interests include image processing, computer vision and embedded systems. She is also interested in different aspects of computer science and interned as a full stack developer at VMware. In her free time she likes to sing and read books. Mrinalini now has a position at VMware.   ↑↑

Emilie is a second-year Computer Science Masters student at UCSB, with aspirations to become a community college Computer Science professor. Her research interests include education, foundations, theory and algorithms. This past year, she was the lead Teaching Assistant for CS 8: Intro to Programming. She received two undergraduate degrees from UCSB in 2013: a BS in Computer Science and a BA in Mathematics. Outside of school, she volunteers for a local cat rescue.   ↑↑

Jackson Blazensky is a senior Mathematics major and has taken 100 units in Computer Science. Since 2013 he has had the opportunity to lecture on technologies in which he is self-taught. Primarily these series focused on building a first-principles understanding of Bitcoin and Ethereum, and the technological design decisions which make them possible in practice. His own work involves both the emerging space of distributed cryptographic state machines and the clever use of classical, core cryptography. Time-Lock Cryptography, Homomorphic Encryption, and unconventional Proofs of Work are his areas of contribution in Koç Lab. He cares about the early identification of little-known secrets and knows that locked within them are hidden powers that can improve the quality of life. Outside of research he reads Nassim Taleb, Peter Thiel, Douglas Hofstadter, and Srinivasa Ramanujan. He plays basketball, and makes art with computation, pencil, and paint.   ↑↑

Nat Bunner graduated with a mathematics degree from the College of Creative Studies at UCSB. His academic interests usually lie in the union of the pairwise intersections of algebra, logic, and computability theory. Outside of math and CS, Nat enjoys cooking and running and holds nuanced views on indie rock.   ↑↑

Tiawna Cayton is a second year computer science Master’s student. She received her BS in mathematics from West Texas A&M University in 2013. She then worked for Sandia National Laboratories for a year doing cryptography assessments. Tiawna is now working under Professor Koç, where her research is focused on analysis of simulated side-channel attacks on cryptographic implementations in hardware. Outside of school, Tiawna enjoys spending time running and hiking with her dog.   ↑↑

Wei is going to finish his BS degrees in Mathematics and Computer Science from the the College of Creative Studies this Fall and he is currently pursuing a MS degree in computer science in the College of Engineering. With a good foundation in Mathematics, he is always interested in learning new mathematics and applying them to different subfields of computer science, especially cryptography and machine learning. His current research interests are elliptic curves and pseudorandom number generators. In his spare time, he likes to go outdoors and go rock climbing.   ↑↑

Christian is a 4th year computer science major in the college of creative studies at UCSB. He is interested in cryptography and complexity theory. He will be attending graduate school at UCSB after completing his BS in computer science.   ↑↑

Carly Larsson is a second year computing student in the College of Creative Studies (CCS) at UCSB. She became interested in Cryptography during her first year at UCSB, and has been exploring its different avenues. She is an officer in UCSB's Society of Women Engineers, a member of CCS Student Council, and is an RA at UCSB. In her free time she reads books, and does graphic design.   ↑↑

Jieliang Luo is a PhD student in the Department of Media Arts & Technology, UCSB. His current research interests are autonomous robotic system, computer vision, machine learning, computational photography, and computational aesthetics. Jieliang also devotes himself to introduce international media artists to China for holding workshops and exhibitions. He received his master degree from University of Denver and his bachelor from Beijing University of Posts & Telecommunications.   ↑↑

Samira Carolina Oliva Madrigal is an Applied Cryptographer and Engineer with background in Computer Engineering, Hardware Design, and System Software. Her areas of expertise are in Networking and Cryptography Algorithms. She is interested in Post-Quantum Cryptography and Homomorphic Encryption. She enjoys running, nature, and learning natural languages.   ↑↑

Shane Masuda is a third year physics and computer science student at UCSB. Initially interested in high energy theory, a brief introduction to quantum computing led him to investigate the field of theoretical computer science. Cryptography caught his eye, and he has been fascinated ever since. When he isn't reading research papers, you'll usually find Shane taking long walks on the beach.   ↑↑

Metehan was born in Summit, New Jersey and later moved to Santa Barbara in 1999. He attended UCSB for a degree in Computer Engineering from 2011 to 2015 and later began studying for his MS in Computer Science from 2015 to 2017. Metehan has worked at a variety of different employment positions over the last couple years from L-3 Communications, Oracle to the Department of Energy. He also runs two businesses in on the side, which operating in the space of cryptocurrencies. He received his MS degree in Computer Science Spring 2018.   ↑↑

I am a fourth year mathematics major in the College of Creative Studies at UCSB. My academic interests lie in applications of algebraic geometry, commutative algebra, and number theory to cryptography. In mathematics, I am currently learning about scheme theory and differential geometry. In cryptography, I am currently learning about zero knowledge proofs and interactive protocols. In my free time, I play soccer and am a loyal supporter of FC Barcelona.   ↑↑

Ankita is a UCSB graduate student at UCSB in the Computer Science department. She is interested in different aspects of computer science like full stack web development, scalable web services, cloud computing and applied machine learning. She is currently working on a decentralized secure messaging system that would be more resilient to surveillance and cyberattacks. Ankita is also passionate about cooking, likes to paint and loves to spend her time by the beach. Ankita now has a position at Oracle.   ↑↑

Pedro Miguel Sosa is a Computer Science B.S/M.S student at UCSB. He has interned at AT&T and, more recently, on the security team at Novacoast. He is currently interested in cryptographic algorithms and applied computer security. Being a "Jack of all trades", he is self-motivated and enjoys embarking on all sorts of projects, whether it is devising new cryptographic protocols, illustrating, writing, web development, building guitars, or composing music.   ↑↑

Burak Tahtacı received his BS degree in computer engineering degree at Yıldız Technical University, where he is currently an MS student. He is interested in machine learning, reinforcement learning, computer security and cryptography. He is also working as an R&D engineer. In his free times he enjoys spending time with radio controlled aircrafts.   ↑↑

Jessica Trinh is a third year Computer Science student, minoring in Mathematics. Initially a Chemical Engineering major, she was compelled to study Computer Science in order to equip herself with the tools to build out her own ideas. During an age in which companies monitor almost every aspect of one's life, Jessica aims to research ways to apply cryptography in a practical manner to further enable people's right to privacy. She is a fan of George Orwell's novels Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four. She enjoys spinning up React.JS websites to conceptualize product ideas in her spare time. She has visited sixteen countries and plans to continue pursuing her love for world travel.   ↑↑

Jesus Vega studied Computer Engineering at UCSB. He spent the Summer of 2014 at Koç Lab doing research on cryptographic algorithms on embedded systems using UDOO. In the Summer of 2015 he interned at Ford Motor Company in Michigan in the IT organization where he helped provide Ford-approved solutions to global networking designs. While at Ford he was also involved in trailblazing the space of new gTLDs for Ford Motor Company. His interests include programming, embedded systems, and digital circuit design. Jesus also enjoys spending his free time driving and traveling, playing the ukulele, and playing Destiny. Jesus graduated in 2015 from UCSB, and has been working for Raytheon since then.   ↑↑

Josephine is a 4th year Mathematics and Computer Science student at UCSB. Abstract Algebra, in particular Galois Theory, is the new great love of her life. In terms of more professionally notable things, she likes to read textbooks, and is currently the president of the UCSB Math Club. In her free time she enjoys surfing, ocean conservation, and textbooks   ↑↑