Deepak Vasisht

Deepak Vasisht is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC), with affiliate appointments in Electrical and Computer Engineering and the Coordinated Sciences Laboratory. He leads the rural connectivity thrust at the Center for Digital Agriculture and directs a research group focused on next-generation mobile computing and wireless networking systems.

Dr. Vasisht earned his Ph.D. in Computer Science and Engineering from MIT in 2019, advised by Professor Dina Katabi, following an S.M. in Computer Science from MIT in 2015 and a B.Tech. in Computer Science and Engineering from IIT-Delhi in 2013, where he received the President of India Gold Medal for highest CGPA across all departments.

His research spans four primary thrusts: Low Latency Satellite Connectivity for near-realtime Earth observation; Machine Learning for Next Generation Networks focusing on robust and verifiable ML models; Localization and Sensing using radio signals for applications in smart homes, healthcare, and indoor navigation; and Rural Connectivity and Data-driven Agriculture for digital farming solutions. His work has resulted in numerous high-impact publications at top venues including SIGCOMM, MobiCom, NSDI, and MobiSys.

Dr. Vasisht's research has demonstrated significant trends toward space-Earth connectivity, with multiple papers on satellite networking in recent years, alongside continued innovation in wireless sensing and privacy protection systems. His team has developed novel approaches for satellite traffic scheduling, constellation-aware medium access, and radar-based localization.

• NSF CAREER Award (2023)
• Best Community Contribution Paper Award at ACM MobiCom (2024)
• Systems Research Award by VMWare (2023)
• ACM SIGCOMM Doctoral Dissertation Award (2020)
• Multiple Best Paper Awards across top conferences
• List of Teachers Ranked as Excellent by Students at UIUC (2021-2024)

Dr. Vasisht has successfully advised numerous Ph.D. students including Jay Shenoy, Zikun Liu, Bill Tao, and Emerson Sie, with several receiving prestigious fellowships such as the Qualcomm Innovation Fellowship and Rambus Computer Engineering fellowship. His research is generously funded by NSF (including CAREER and RINGS awards), USDA, Microsoft, Cisco, and IBM, supporting his work on satellite networks, wireless sensing, and rural connectivity solutions. He leads the Connected Systems Lab at UIUC, which has developed influential systems including FarmBeats (now a Microsoft product) and innovative approaches to satellite networking, RF privacy, and in-body communication.