WNCG Professors Brian L. Evans and Scott Nettles Promoted

Profs. Brian L. Evans and Scott Nettles received word in late 2004 that they will both be promoted effective September 1, 2005. Prof. Brian L. Evans will be promoted to full professor while Prof. Scott Nettles to Associate Professor with Tenure.

Prof. Evans joined the UT Austin faculty in Fall 1996 as an Assistant Professor, and received tenure and promotion effective Fall 2000. His research converts theory into low-complexity algorithms, and low-complexity algorithms into embedded software implementations. His group has followed this flow to improve connection speeds in wireline multicarrier transceivers, image quality in desktop printers, and 3-D resolution in sonar beamformers. In all three applications, he has transferred results to industry and/or government, which has led to improved products. Evans has transferred his research through more than 140 peer-reviewed publications, more than a dozen software releases, and 12 PhD and 6 MS students who graduated under his research supervision. Brian's recent research aims to improve connection speeds in next-generation wireless multicarrier systems (in collaboration with Profs. Robert Heath and Jeff Andrews). He also is developing a perceptual image hashing framework for multimedia authentication, databases, and watermarking.

Prof. Scott Nettles received a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Carnegie Mellon University in 1996, where he worked on high-performance garbage collection and transaction systems. From 1995 to 1999, he was an Assistant Professor of Computer and Information Science at the University of Pennsylvania, where he was the recipient of a 1997 NSF CAREER Award. While at Penn, he was part of the DARPA funded SwitchWare project, which was one of the pioneering groups in the area of Active Networking. His group developed PLAN, the first domain-specific programming language for programmable packets, and PLANet, the first purely active inter-network. Since coming to The University of Texas at Austin in 1999, Scott has continued his efforts on the design and implementation and application of Active Networks, including developing the first second generation programmable packet language, SNAP. Most recently, Prof. Nettles has been working closely with other WNCG faculty to apply new architectural approaches (especially Active Networking) to emerging mobile/wireless networks.