OS Kernel Protection Professors and Supervisors

Nuno Mateus CoelhoView profile

Associate Professor

Lusophone University of Humanities and TechnologiesPortugal

Nuno Mateus Coelho is an Associate Professor at Lusófona University and an Invited Associate Professor at the Polytechnic Institute of Cávado and Ave, specializing in Cybersecurity. He holds a PhD in Computer Science (Cybersecurity) from the University of Trás-os-Montes e Alto Douro and is a certified European Commission expert in Information Security projects. His professional roles include Cyber Security Adviser at Faurecia Automotive and Nanium Group, CEO of NRMC.PT, and Judicial Expert at the Ministry of Justice. He is also the Editor-in-Chief of the ARIS2 Journal and Director of the LAPI2S Lab. Education: PhD in Computer Science (Cybersecurity) – University of Trás-os-Montes e Alto Douro (2020) MSc in Computer Engineering (Cybersecurity) – Instituto Superior de Engenharia do Porto (2015) BSc in Information Systems Engineering – Instituto Superior de Línguas e Administração (2010) Ongoing Postdoctoral Research in Cybersecurity at Lusófona University Research Interests: Cybersecurity frameworks (e.g., CyberSoc, PCSRA) Blockchain and cryptographic systems (e.g., ChevroCrypto) AI-driven cybersecurity solutions Paranoid Operating Systems for privacy Healthcare cybersecurity and pandemic response (e.g., Vent2Life project) Key Projects & Grants: Lead WP5 of the Horizon 2020-funded CyberSecPro project Recipient of the INNCYBER Innovation Award (2021) for best European research Vent2Life: Repaired 200+ ventilators during the COVID-19 crisis General Chair of the iSCSi International Conference Media & Public Engagement: Regular cybersecurity commentator on CNN Portugal and TVI Keynote speaker at Web Summit, IEEE, and TEDx events Author of opinion columns on cybersecurity trends

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Dimitrios SkarlatosView profile

Assistant Professor

Carnegie Mellon UniversityQatar

Dimitrios Skarlatos is an Assistant Professor in the Computer Science Department at Carnegie Mellon University's School of Computer Science. His research bridges computer architecture and operating systems with a focus on performance, security, and scalability. His work revolves around two central themes: (1) redesigning abstractions and interfaces between hardware and OS layers to improve performance and scalability, and (2) uncovering security vulnerabilities and building defenses at the hardware-OS boundary. Research Focus: Operating system security and vulnerability prevention Virtual memory systems and page table optimizations Serverless computing architectures Hardware-software co-design for security Datacenter resource management Dr. Skarlatos advises five PhD students and has published extensively on systems research. He received his PhD from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where his dissertation received the ACM SIGARCH & IEEE CS TCCA Outstanding Dissertation Award for contributions to redesigning hardware-OS abstractions.

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Pierre OlivierView profile

Senior Lecturer

The University of ManchesterUnited Kingdom

Pierre Olivier is a Senior Lecturer in Computer Architecture specializing in virtualization, hypervisors, systems security, and unikernels. He is affiliated with the Advanced Processor Technology group and has contributed to 37 research outputs since 2017. His work spans embedded systems, cloud computing, and hardware-software co-design, with a focus on improving performance, security, and energy efficiency. Research Interests: Olivier's expertise includes virtual machine optimization, secure software compartmentalization, and cross-architecture execution. His projects, such as HermiTux (a binary-compatible unikernel) and HEXO (offloading compute workloads), highlight his commitment to advancing edge computing and heterogeneous architectures. He collaborates internationally on topics like memory protection and vulnerability mitigation. Key Achievements: He has received the Best Paper Award (2019) and Distinguished Artifact Award (2022) for contributions to unikernel and security research. His work on FlexOS and Secure Code for Capability Hardware (SCorCH) demonstrates his role in advancing secure operating system design. Grants and Projects: Olivier leads or participates in major initiatives like the Centre for Digital Trust and Society and SCorCH, focusing on interdisciplinary cybersecurity and hardware-aware software systems. His datasets, including HermiTux on GitHub, are widely referenced in academic research. Labs/Teams: He contributes to the SCorCH team and collaborates with institutions on projects like Multi-Variant Execution and Heterogeneous-ISA container migration, emphasizing practical applications of theoretical research.

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Zhi ZhangView profile

Lecturer

The University of Western AustraliaAustralia

Zhi Zhang is a Lecturer in the Department of Computer Science and Software Engineering at the University of Western Australia (UWA), affiliated with the UWA Defence and Security Institute. Prior to this role, he worked as a Research Scientist at CSIRO’s Data61. He holds a PhD in Computer Science from the University of New South Wales, focusing on 'Software-only Rowhammer Attacks and Countermeasures.' His research expertise spans system security, rowhammer exploits, adversarial AI, and federated learning security. He has contributed to UN Sustainable Development Goals related to education and innovation. His research focuses on hardware-software co-design vulnerabilities, including rowhammer-based attacks, adversarial machine learning defenses, and data poisoning in federated learning. Notable areas of contribution include interrupt side-channel attacks, thermal event exploitation, and model unlearning mechanisms. He has published extensively in top-tier journals/conferences like IEEE Transactions on Information Forensics and Security, and has received Distinguished Paper Awards in 2023 and 2024. Education: PhD in Computer Science (UNSW, 2021) Key Research Areas: Rowhammer Exploits & Mitigations Adversarial Attacks on DNNs Federated Learning Security Interrupt-Based Side Channels His work bridges theoretical computer security with practical system implementations, addressing critical vulnerabilities in modern architectures. Collaborations span academia and industry, with impactful contributions to hardware-software security domains.

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Amit LevyView profile

Assistant Professor

Princeton UniversityUnited States

Amit Levy is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science at Princeton University. He leads the Praxis lab and co-leads the SNS group, focusing on systems and security research. His work bridges practical system design with rigorous security guarantees, often leveraging programming language tools. Education: BSc in Computer Science and Economics, University of Washington (2009) PhD in Computer Science, Stanford University (2018) Research Interests: Secure system design for embedded and distributed environments Memory and type safety in low-level systems Trade-offs between security and performance Language-driven hardware-software co-design End-to-end data privacy Project Leadership: Principal developer of Tock OS , an embedded operating system written in Rust Co-founder of the Hails framework for web application data privacy Creator of Beetle for Bluetooth Low Energy access control Designer of Stickler for CDN integrity verification Architect of LARPs (Leak-Avoidant Resource Provisioners) for side-channel mitigation Scientific Awards: National Science Foundation CAREER award (2025) PhD Advisees: Natalie Popescu Anja Kalaba Shai Caspin Christopher Branner-Augmon Jingyuan (Leo) Chen Gongqi Huang Leon Schuermann Alumni: David Liu (PhD 2022), Ryan Torok (Masters 2022), Yue Tan (PhD 2024)

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Chia-Che TsaiView profile

Assistant Professor

Texas A&M UniversityUnited States

Chia-Che Tsai is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science & Engineering at Texas A&M University, part of the College of Engineering. He joined the faculty in Spring 2019 after earning his Ph.D. from Stony Brook University in 2017 and completing a postdoc at UC Berkeley's RISE Lab. His educational background includes an M.S. from Columbia University and a B.S. from National Taiwan University. His research focuses on operating systems, software security, and secure hardware, with emphasis on compatibility, performance, and hardware support. Key interests include library operating systems (e.g., Graphene), SGX-based security, and cloud computing. He has received notable awards, including the 2016 EuroSys Best Paper Award and NSF grants for confidential cloud applications and resilient systems. Teaching responsibilities span courses like Operating Systems (undergraduate/graduate), Software Security, Distributed Systems, and Secure Computer Systems. His work integrates practical system design with theoretical principles, addressing challenges in multi-tenant environments and secure execution. Current research explores enclave-based security, deterministic debugging, and virtualization techniques. He leads projects funded by NSF and collaborates with industry partners, emphasizing real-world impact in secure computing systems.

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Taesoo KimView profile

Professor

Georgia Institute of TechnologyUnited States

Taesoo Kim is a Professor at Georgia Tech's College of Computing, jointly affiliated with the School of Cybersecurity and Privacy and the School of Computer Science. He serves as Director of the GTS3 lab and leads research in systems security, operating systems, programming languages, and distributed systems. His work emphasizes foundational security principles and practical tools for system resilience. Education: PhD in EECS from MIT (2014), SM from MIT (2011), BS in Computer Science/Electrical Engineering from KAIST (2009) Affiliations: Georgia Tech's School of Computer Science, School of Cybersecurity and Privacy, ML@GT, and Online Master of Science in Computer Science program Kim's research focuses on building secure computing systems through formal system design, implementation analysis, and trusted component isolation. Notable contributions include tools for automatic vulnerability detection, intrusion recovery frameworks, and secure enclave technologies like SGX-Tor. His work has secured grants from ONR, NSF, DARPA, and industry partners. Awards include the 2015 Internet Defense Prize and a finalist placement in the DARPA Cyber Grand Challenge. Key projects include QSYM (concolic execution engine), RAIN (attack tracing), and FREEDOM (DOM fuzzer). Kim teaches courses on information security and blockchain technologies. His lab (SSLab) collaborates with industry on critical security challenges, including hardware-software co-design for trusted execution environments.

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Vasileios KemerlisView profile

Professor

Brown UniversityUnited States

Vasileios Kemerlis is a Professor of Computer Science at Brown University and Director of the Secure Systems Lab (SSL). His research focuses on OS, systems, and software security, with recent work on kernel hardening techniques using hardware features like ARM's memory tagging and pointer authentication. Research interests include: Operating systems protection against memory-safety vulnerabilities Software supply chain security defenses Hardware-assisted isolation mechanisms eBPF subsystem security Publications demonstrate consistent focus on practical kernel protection solutions, evolving from virtualization-based approaches to hardware-assisted mitigations. Recent works leverage ARM CPU features for efficient kernel isolation against heap-based attacks. Awards include: Distinguished Paper Award at ACM ASIACCS 2023 Distinguished Reviewer Award at ACM CCS 2024 Directs the Secure Systems Lab with PhD students working on kernel protection, speculative execution attacks, and software hardening. Lab regularly presents at top security conferences including IEEE S&P, USENIX Security, and ACM CCS.

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Davide BalzarottiView profile

Professor

EurecomFrance

Davide Balzarotti is a Professor and Head of the Digital Security Department at EURECOM. His expertise spans reverse engineering, forensic memory analysis, advanced malware analysis, and web security. He holds a PhD in Computer Engineering from the Polytechnic Institute of Milan (2006), followed by a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of California, Santa Barbara (2006–2008), and an HDR (Habilitation à Diriger des Recherches) from EURECOM in 2015. His research focuses on understanding malware behavior, improving forensic techniques, and enhancing web security through machine learning and static analysis. Notable contributions include frameworks like ModSec-Learn for boosting intrusion detection and PhishEye for monitoring phishing kits. He has received multiple awards, including the Best Paper Award at SAC 2017 and the ACM Europe Student Best Paper Award at CCS 2016. His work bridges academic research and practical cybersecurity challenges, addressing topics such as adversarial attacks, embedded system security, and evasion techniques in malware. His projects include evaluations of voting machine security (Project Everest) and collaborations to improve vulnerability detection in software. Education: PhD in Computer Engineering, Polytechnic Institute of Milan (2006) Postdoctoral Research at UCSB (2006–2008) HDR, EURECOM (2015) Awards: Best Paper Award (2017) ACM Europe Student Best Paper Award (2016) Best Student Paper Award (2013) Distinguished Paper Award (2011) Key Research Themes: Memory forensics Malware analysis Fuzzing and vulnerability discovery Web application security

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Reto AchermannView profile

Assistant Professor

University of British ColumbiaCanada

Reto Achermann is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science at the University of British Columbia (UBC), affiliated with the Systopia Lab. His research focuses on resilient and efficient systems at the intersection of operating systems, applied formal methods, and hardware models. He holds a PhD from ETH Zurich and previously served as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at UBC under Prof. Margo Seltzer. Education: PhD in Computer Science from ETH Zurich (advised by Prof. Timothy Roscoe), MSc in Computer Science from ETH Zurich. Research interests include memory and storage systems, formal verification, device drivers, and software synthesis. He contributed to the Barrelfish OS project, particularly in memory management and hardware abstractions. Key achievements: Won distinguished artifact awards at ASPLOS'25 and SOSP'24 for 'Velosiraptor' and 'Verus'. Received UBC's Faculty of Science Excellence in Service Award for educational contributions. Served on program committees for ASPLOS, PLDI, EuroSys, and USENIX ATC. Current roles: Actively supervises graduate students in thesis-based MSc/PhD programs. Engages in interdisciplinary research and collaborates on grants. Previously advised undergraduate research projects and directed studies.

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Anton BurtsevView profile

Associate Professor

University of UtahUnited States

Anton Burtsev is an Associate Professor at the Kahlert School of Computing, University of Utah. His research focuses on redefining operating system architectures to address modern challenges like security attacks, data center workloads, and heterogeneous hardware. He leads the Mars Research Group, developing systems like the formally verified Atmosphere microkernel in Rust/Verus, and the high-performance DRAMHiT hash table. Key projects include Rust for Linux kernel integration, verified drivers (Veld), and isolation mechanisms like RedLeaf OS. Research interests include kernel isolation, formal verification, language safety (Rust), and overcoming the memory wall. Current work emphasizes clean-slate OS designs and retrofitted security solutions for existing kernels. Collaborative projects include Horizon (secure scientific cloud computing) and RedLeaf OS verification efforts. Advising undergraduate to PhD students interested in OS research. Notable grants include NSF CAREER (NgOS) and collaborative NSF grants on verified systems. Active in the MARS reading group and open-source contributions via repositories.

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