Associate Professor
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Texas A&M University
Email: chao Dot tian AT tamu DOT edu
Phone: 979-458-7822
Address: ROOM 301R, WEB Building, 3128 TAMU, College Station TX
Announcement
- Seeking master students for thesis research in machine learning and communications.
- Congratulations to Ruida for winning the 2022-2023 Chevron Scholarship Award and the 2023 ECEN Quality Graduate Student Award!
- The paper “Capacity-achieving private information retrieval codes from MDS-coded databases with minimum message size,” IEEE Trans. Inform. Theory 2020, was selected for the 2020-2021 IEEE Data Storage Best Student Paper Award! Congratulations to Ruida!
Biography
Dr. Tian obtained his B.E degree from Tsinghua University, Beijing China, and his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from Cornell University, Ithaca NY. He worked at AT&T Labs-Research (previously known as the Shannon Labs) as a researcher on communication and signal processing for seven years, before returning to academia. He was with the University of Tennessee Knoxville for a few years before joining Texas A&M University.
Awards
- 2023-2024 IEEE Information Theory Society Distinguished Lecturer.
- Coauthor of 2020-2021 IEEE Data Storage Best Student Paper Award: “Capacity-achieving private information retrieval codes from MDS-coded databases with minimum message size” in IEEE Trans. Inform. Theory 2020.
- 2019 NetApp Faculty Fellowship.
- Coauthor 2017 IEEE Jack Wolf ISIT Best Student Paper Award: “A generic transformation for optimal repair bandwidth and rebuilding access in MDS codes” in ISIT 2017.
- 2014 IEEE Data Storage Best Paper Award: For the paper “Characterizing the rate-region of the (4,3,3) exact-repair regenerating codes” in IEEE JSAC May 2014.
- AT&T Key Contributor Award: For technical contribution in AT&T / 2010, 2011, 2013.
- Liu-Memorial Award, Cornell University: For excellence in graduate study and research / 2004.
Current and Former Group Members
Current Students
- Wenyuan ZHAO
- Yuting CAI
- Tianle ZHANG
Alumni
Postdoctoral Researcher
- Tao GUO, ECE, TAMU, Dec. 2018-Apr. 2020; now Assistant Professor at Southeast University, China.
Ph.D. Students
- Kai ZHANG, Ph.D. degree ECE/TAMU, May 2020; now Assistant Professor at UT-Health School of Biomedical Informatics.
- Tianli ZHOU, Ph.D. degree CE/TAMU, May 2020; now with Google Inc.
- Ruida ZHOU, Ph.D. degree ECE/TAMU, Aug. 2023; next stop: postdoctoral researcher at UCLA.
Master Students
- Sara MOUSAVI, CS Master degree, UTK, Dec. 2017; obtained her CS Ph.D. degree at UTK afterwards.
- Vineet GARG, ECE Master degree, TAMU, May 2019; now with Apple Inc.
- Siqi FAN, ECE Master degree, TAMU, Dec. 2019; currently a Ph.D. student at TAMU.
- Jianfeng SONG, ECE Master degree, TAMU, Dec. 2019; currently a Ph.D. student at TAMU.
- Rachel YEH, ECE Master degree, TAMU, Dec. 2019; currently a software development engineer at Michaels.
- Lizi ZHANG, ECE Master degree, TAMU, May 2020.
- Tianrui CHEN, ECE Master degree, TAMU, Dec. 2021; currently a Ph.D. student at Northwestern Polytechnical University China.
- Wenjing CHEN, ECE Master degree, TAMU, Dec. 2022.
- Chandra Sekhar TEDLA, ECE Master degree, TAMU, May 2023; currently with Aira Techonologies Inc. CA
Visiting Students
- Min CHENG, visiting undergraduate student, University of Science and Technology of China; TAMU, Aug. 2019-Dec. 2019; currently a Ph.D. student at TAMU.
- Zekuan ZHANG, visiting undergraduate student, Southeast University (China); TAMU, Jul. 2019-Sep. 2019.
- Wenjing CHEN, visiting undergraduate student, University of Science and Technology of China; TAMU, Jul. 2018-Oct. 2018.
- Lei ZHENG, visiting Ph.D. student, Southwest Jiaotong University; TAMU, Oct. 2017-Apr. 2019; now Assistant Professor at Guangzhou University, China.
- Jie LI, visiting Ph.D. student, Southwest Jiaotong University; UTK, Oct. 2015-Oct. 2016; now as Senior Researcher at Huawei Technology, Hong Kong.
Teaching
Texas A&M University
- ECEN 601: Mathematical Methods for Signal Processing / Fall 2022-2023
- ECEN 689: Advanced Optimization Techniques and Analysis / Spring 2022
- ECEN 629: Applied Convex Optimization / Spring 2018-2021
- ECEN 446: Information Theory, Inference, and Learning / Spring 2018, Fall 2018, 2020-2023
- ECEN 681: Department seminar / Fall 2019, Spring 2020, Fall 2020
- ECEN 314: Signal and Systems / Fall 2019
- ECEN 681: ISS seminar / Fall 2017, Spring 2018, Fall 2018
The University of Tennessee Knoxville
- ECE 611: Convex Optimization / Fall 2016
- ECE 342: Fundamentals of Communication / Spring 2016, Spring 2017
- ECE 644: Codng and Information Theory / Fall 2015
- ECE 342: Analog Communication, AM and FM / Fall 2014, Spring 2015
Columbia University
- ELEN E6884: Topics in Data Compression / Spring 2011
- ELEN E6718: Algebraic Coding Theory / Fall 2011, 2012, 2013
- ELEN E6712: Communication Theory / Spring 2013
Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne
- IC-62: Source Coding Theory and Practice / Winter 2006
Editorships
Editorship
- Guest Editor for IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Information Theory (JSAIT) on Distributed Coding and Computation / 2021-2022
- Guest Editor for Entropy–Special Issue on Information Theory and Machine Learning / 2021
- Guest Editor for IEEE Selected Areas on Communications-Special Issue on Private Information Retrieval, Private Coded Computing over Distributed Servers, and Privacy in Distributed Learning / 2020-2021
- Associate Editor of IEEE Transactions on Information Theory / Jan. 2020-Jan. 2023
- Guest Editor for Entropy–Special Issue on Information and Coding for Distributed Storage / 2018-2019
- Guest Editor for Science China–Special Issue on Distributed Storage Coding / 2018
- Editor of IEEE Transactions on Communications / Jan. 2016-Jan. 2021
- Associate Editor of IEEE Signal Processing Letters / Feb. 2012-Feb. 2014