Computer science professor earns ‘well-deserved’ election to NAE

Computer science professor earns ‘well-deserved’ election to NAE
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BY JADE BOYD
Rice News Staff

Rice University computer science professor Moshe Vardi has been elected to the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) for his contributions to the formal verification of hardware and software correctness.

Vardi, the Karen Ostrum George Professor in Computational Engineering and chair of Rice’s computer science department, is among 74 engineers elected to NAE membership this month.

Election to the NAE is among the highest professional distinctions accorded an engineer. Academy membership honors those who have made important contributions to engineering theory and practice, including to the literature of engineering theory and practice, and those who have demonstrated unusual accomplishments in the pioneering of new and developing fields of technology. Vardi becomes the 12th NAE member on Rice’s engineering faculty.

“Moshe Vardi has a unique vision of how information technology reaches beyond the realms of science and engineering to affect society at large,” said Sidney Burrus, dean of Rice’s George R. Brown School of Engineering. “I’m pleased that his insight is drawing national and international acclaim from his peers. His election to the NAE is well-deserved.”

The NAE was established in 1964 under the charter of the National Academy of Sciences as an organization of outstanding engineers. It is autonomous in its administration and in the selection of its members, sharing with the National Academy of Sciences the responsibility for advising the federal government. The NAE also sponsors engineering programs aimed at meeting national needs, encourages education and research and recognizes the superior achievements of engineers. The academy has 2,107 members in the United States and 158 foreign associates.

Vardi joined the Rice University engineering faculty in 1993 and has chaired the Department of Computer Science since 1994. Vardi also serves as the director of Rice’s Computer and Information Technology Institute. He is the recipient of numerous other honors and appointments, including the Gödel Prize for outstanding papers in the area of theoretical computer science, and was named a fellow of the Association
of Computing Machinery in 2000.

Most recently, Vardi was named to receive an honorary doctoral degree from Saarland University at Saarbruecken, Germany. It will be presented at a symposium in his honor titled “On the Effectiveness of Logic in Computer Science,” scheduled for March 4-6 at Saarland University’s International Max Planck Research Institute for Computer Science.

Vardi has served as a board member of the European Association for Computer Science Logic since 1997 and as a board member of the Computing Research Association since 2001.