Description:

Wednesday / CS Seminar
October 30th / 12:00 PM
Hybrid / Mudd 3514

Speaker
Lars Bergstrom, Google

Talk Title
Co-design and evolution of mobile hardware and operating systems

Abstract
Every year, owners of mobile devices want them to cost less, last longer, be upgraded for longer, increase security, and to run more demanding applications and services. In this talk, focusing on the Android ecosystem I'll cover some examples of how we work all the way from instruction set and hardware architecture up to operating system and application features in order to deliver on these demands. I will also discuss some of the critical gaps where today there are opportunities to greatly improve the way we measure, model and improve the products and software we design and build.

Biography
Lars Bergstrom is a Director of Engineering at Google on the Android team, working on their platform tools and libraries. He manages the tools that update the Android operating system as well as the Java, C/C++, and Rust toolchains and the supporting libraries. He also serves as Google’s Corporate Director to RISC-V International and is Chair of the Board of Directors of the Rust Foundation. Before Google, he was at Mozilla Research, initially contributing to the Servo browser project and directing the integration of Rust into Firefox and the partner ecosystem. Later, he led Mozilla’s AR and VR work, shipping software and building OEM relationships on many different devices. He received his Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of Chicago in 2013.

Research/Interest Areas: Programming Languages
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Zoom: https://northwestern.zoom.us/j/92361759279
Panopto: https://northwestern.hosted.panopto.com/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=65c7f50d-78da-4faa-99af-b20d00f7ccb8

Description:

Monday / CS Distinguished Lecture
November 4th / 12:00 PM
Hybrid / Mudd 3514

Speaker
Dr. Kristin Lauter, FAIR Labs North America

Talk Title
Cryptography in the "Post-AI" Era: Machine Learning attacks on Post-Quantum Cryptography

Abstract
AI is taking off and we could say we are living in “the AI Era”.  Progress in AI today is based on mathematics and statistics under the covers of machine learning models.  This talk will explain at a high level how these techniques work, and some important applications.  In particular, I will explain recent work on AI4Crypto, where we train AI models to attack Post Quantum Cryptography (PQC) schemes based on lattices.  Understanding the concrete security of these standardized PQC schemes is important for the future of e-commerce and internet security.  So in addition to living in a Post-Quantum era, we can say we are living in a “Post-AI” era.

Biography

"Dr. Kristin Lauter is Senior Director of FAIR Labs North America (2022—present), based in Seattle. Her current research areas are AI4Crypto and Private AI. She joined FAIR (Facebook AI Research) in 2021, after 22 years at Microsoft Research (MSR). At MSR she was Partner Research Manager on the senior leadership team of MSR Redmond. Before joining Microsoft in 1999, she was Hildebrandt Assistant Professor of Mathematics at the University of Michigan (1996-1999). She is an Affiliate Professor of Mathematics at the University of Washington (2008—present). She received all her advanced degrees from the University of Chicago, BA (1990), MS (1991), PhD (1996) in Mathematics. She is best known for her work on Elliptic Curve Cryptography, Supersingular Isogeny Graphs in Cryptography, Homomorphic Encryption (SEALcrypto.org), Private AI, and AI4Crypto. She served as President of the Association for Women in Mathematics from 2015-2017 and on the Council of the American Mathematical Society from 2014-2017.

Lauter has been recognized for her mathematical research and leadership with numerous awards: the Selfridge Prize in Computational Number Theory (2008), as an elected Fellow of the American Mathematical Society (2015), Fellow of the Association for Women in Mathematics (2017), Fellow of the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM) in 2020, and Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (2020). In 2021, Lauter was elected as an honorary member of the Royal Spanish Mathematical Society (RSME). She was awarded the Pólya Lectureship for the Mathematical Association of America (2018–2020) and the SIAM Block Community Prize Lecturer in 2022. She gave a TED talk on Private AI at Congreso Futuro in 2020 and on AI4Crypto in 2023."

Research/Interest Areas:
AI Privacy and Security, AI for Math, Cryptography, Number Theory

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Zoom: https://northwestern.zoom.us/j/91596979165
Panopto: https://northwestern.hosted.panopto.com/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=8e7fb621-a6a1-4802-ae58-b2140108a4a6
DEI Minute: Disability and Accessibility https://tinyurl.com/cspac-dei-minute

Description:

Wednesday / CS Distinguished Lecture
November 6th / 12:00 PM
Hybrid / Mudd 3514

Speaker
Nate Foster, Cornell University

Talk Title
The Network is the Computer: A Programming Language Perspective

Abstract
Historically, the fields of programming languages and networking have operated in relative isolation: applications run on end hosts and communicate with each other using standard network protocols. However, the landscape has changed significantly in the past decade, driven by the needs of large-scale systems and the emergence of programmable network hardware. Today, it is possible to design and implement custom network protocols and even to relocate application-level functionality into the network fabric. This talk will discuss the pivotal role that programming languages are playing in modern networks, highlighting how experiences designing domain-specific abstractions and reasoning tools for networks can provide fresh insights for the field of programming languages, too.

Biography
Nate Foster is a Professor of Computer Science at Cornell University and a Visiting Researcher at Jane Street. The goal of his research is to develop languages and tools that make it easy for programmers to build secure and reliable systems. His current work focuses on the design and implementation of languages and tools for network programming. In the past he has also worked on bidirectional languages (also known as “lenses”), database query languages, data provenance, type systems, mechanized proof, and formal semantics. He received a PhD in Computer and Information Science from the University of Pennsylvania. His awards include a Sloan Research Fellowship, an NSF CAREER Award, the SIGPLAN Robin Milner Award, SIGCOMM Rising Star Award, and Most Influential Paper Awards at ICFP and POPL.

Research/Interest Areas: Programming Languages and Networking
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Zoom: https://northwestern.zoom.us/j/99112784408
Panopto: https://northwestern.hosted.panopto.com/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=210829aa-904b-48b3-ac44-b21a01363ac1
DEI Minute: Neurodiversity https://tinyurl.com/cspac-dei-minute

Description:

Wednesday / CS Seminar
November 13th / 3:00 PM
Hybrid / Mudd 3514

Speaker
Adrian Perrig, ETH Zurich

Talk Title
Reaching Escape Velocity for Layer-3 Innovation: Deployability of a Next-generation Internet Architecture

Abstract

It appears nearly impossible to deploy a new Internet architecture
that innovates at Layer 3 of the networking stack, as the obstacles
seem insurmountable: billions of deployed devices, legacy network
infrastructure with hardware-based packet processing with long
replacement cycles, operating systems of a sprawling complexity, and a
diverse application landscape with millions of developers. As a new
Internet architecture seemingly needs support by all of these
stakeholders, fundamental innovation at the network layer appears
hopeless.

We identify dependency loops as a core barrier to the deployment of a
next-generation Internet architecture. We propose to break the
dependency loops with a virtuous cycle: the availability of
applications using the NGN will result in increasing amount of
traffic, encouraging more NSPs to deploy the NGN, fueling user demand,
inviting more applications to deploy. We postulate that 1 million
users with access to the NGN connectivity suffice to set the virtuous
cycle in motion.

The aim of this talk is to imbue hope for the deployment of a
next-generation Internet architectures. With the expanding real-world
deployment of the SCION secure network architecture, we show how a
next-generation education network can be established and connected to
the commercial network. Applications running on hosts in these
networks can immediately make use of the next-generation
infrastructure thanks to a bootstrapping service, even without OS
support. To provide sufficient incentives to applications to build in
SCION support, we present a path towards reaching 1 million hosts in
SCIONabled networks. On the path toward this vision, 12 R&D
institutions on 5 continents are now connected with native SCION
connectivity ("BGP free"), reaching an estimated 250'000 users /
hosts. We present several applications and use cases that can be used
across these institutions.

Biography
Adrian Perrig is a Professor at the Department of Computer Science at
ETH Zürich, Switzerland, where he leads the network security group. He
is also a Distinguished Fellow at CyLab, and an Adjunct Professor of
Electrical and Computer Engineering at Carnegie Mellon University.
From 2002 to 2012, he was a Professor of Electrical and Computer
Engineering, Engineering and Public Policy, and Computer Science
(courtesy) at Carnegie Mellon University. From 2007 to 2012, he served
as the technical director for Carnegie Mellon's Cybersecurity
Laboratory (CyLab). He earned his MS and PhD degrees in Computer
Science from Carnegie Mellon University, and spent three years during
his PhD at the University of California at Berkeley. He received his
BSc degree in Computer Engineering from EPFL. He is a recipient of the
ACM SIGSAC Outstanding Innovation Award. Adrian is an ACM and IEEE
Fellow. Adrian's research revolves around building secure systems --
in particular his group is working on the SCION secure Internet
architecture.

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Zoom Link
Panopto Link
DEI Minute: 

Description:

Monday / CS Seminar
November 18th / 12:00 PM
Hybrid / Mudd 3514

Speaker
Kyros Kutulakos, University of Toronto

Talk Title
The Ultimate Video Camera

Abstract
Over the past decade, advances in image sensor technologies have transformed the 2D and 3D imaging capabilities of our smartphones, cars, robots, drones, and scientific instruments. As these technologies continue to evolve, what new capabilities might they unlock? I will discuss one possible point of convergence---the ultimate video camera---which is enabled by emerging single-photon image sensors and photon-processing algorithms. We will explore the extreme imaging capabilities of this camera within the broader historical context of high-speed and low-light imaging systems, highlighting its potential to capture the physical world in entirely new ways.

Biography
Kyros is a Professor of Computer Science at the University of Toronto and an expert in computational imaging and computer vision. His research over the past decade has focused on combining programmable sensors, light sources, optics and algorithms to create cameras with unique capabilities---from seeing through scatter and looking around corners to capturing surfaces with complex material properties robustly in 3D. He is currently leading efforts to harness the full potential of technologies such as single-photon cameras and programmable-pixel image sensors, for applications in extreme computer vision and scientific imaging. Kyros is the recipient of an Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship, an NSF CAREER Award, and eight paper prizes at the computer vision field's top conferences, including the best paper award at ICCV 2023 and CVPR 2019.

Research/Interest Areas: Computer vision, computational imaging
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Zoom: TBA
Panopto: TBA
DEI Minute: TBA