Weekly Announcements

Presentations this week

Tuesday, September 15, 2026

PhD Defence • Systems and Networking
Data-driven Fault and Performance Management of Virtualized Networks
Seyed Soheil Johari, PhD candidate
David R. Cheriton School of Computer Science
3:00 p.m. • Hybrid: DC 1331  |  Online PhD defence
Supervisor: Professor Raouf Boutaba

Wednesday, September 16, 2026

Seminar • Algorithms and Complexity
Chasing Submodular Objectives
David Wajc, Professor
The Technion
12:00 p.m. • Hybrid: DC 1304  |  Online seminar

Thursday, September 17, 2026

PhD Defence • Software Engineering
Performance Optimizations for AI-assisted Coding with CodeLLMs
Kishanthan Thangarajah, PhD candidate
David R. Cheriton School of Computer Science
11:30 a.m. • Online PhD defence
Supervisor: Professor Mei Nagappan

Friday, September 18, 2026

Master’s Thesis Presentation • Data Systems
MADBench — Measuring Agentic Databases: Quantifying the Protocol Tax of MCP-Mediated Query Workloads
Yaseen Ahmed, Master’s candidate
David R. Cheriton School of Computer Science
1:00 p.m. • DC 3301 (DSG Lab)
Supervisor: Professor Tamer Öszu

PhD Seminar • Systems and Networking
Learning-based Joint Slice Admission Control and Virtual Network Embedding in 5G and Beyond Networks
Muhammad Sulaiman, PhD candidate
David R. Cheriton School of Computer Science
1:00 p.m. • DC 2314
Supervisor: Professor Raouf Boutaba

Upcoming presentations

Monday, September 21, 2026

Data Systems Seminar Series
Beyond Sets and Bags — The Behavioral Perspective in Data Management
Matthias Weidlich, Professor
Hasso Plattner Institute, University of Potsdam
10:30 a.m. • DC 1304

Tuesday, September 22, 2026

PhD Seminar • Software Engineering
Automated Dependency Optimization for Artifact-Based Build Systems
Hongxu Xu, PhD candidate
David R. Cheriton School of Computer Science
1:00 p.m. • Hybrid: DC 2310  |  Online PhD seminar
Supervisor: Professor Chengnian Sun

Wednesday, September 23, 2026

PhD Defence • Systems and Networking
Architecting for Performance and Extensibility From Networking to Processors
Siyao Zhao, PhD candidate
David R. Cheriton School of Computer Science
9:00 a.m. • DC 2314
Supervisor: Professor Ali Mashtizadeh

Thursday, September 24, 2026

Master’s Thesis Presentation • Software Engineering
How Well Do Automated Code Reviewing Tools Detect Bugs?
Ayinde Yakubu, Master’s candidate
David R. Cheriton School of Computer Science
10:00 a.m. • Hybrid: DC 2314  |  Online master’s thesis presentation
Supervisor: Professor Mei Nagappan

Tuesday, September 29, 2026

PhD Seminar • Software Engineering
Recovering Pull Request Revisions in Altered History
Gengyi Sun, PhD candidate
David R. Cheriton School of Computer Science
1:00 p.m. • DC 2564
Supervisor: Professor Shane McIntosh

Monday, October 5, 2026

PhD Defence • Artificial Intelligence  |  Machine Learning
Data for Language Agents: Rewards, Trajectories, and Interfaces
Dongfu Jiang, PhD candidate
David R. Cheriton School of Computer Science
12:30 p.m. • Online PhD defence
Supervisor: Professor Wenhu Chen

Wednesday, October 7, 2026

PhD Defence • Artificial Intelligence  |  Machine Learning
Enhancing Neural Network Efficiency: Novel Approaches to Knowledge Distillation
Aref Jafari, PhD candidate
David R. Cheriton School of Computer Science
9:30 a.m. • M3 3001
Supervisor: Professor Ali Ghodsi

Tuesday, October 13, 2026

PhD Defence • Human–Computer Interaction
Where The Explanation Is: Building Shared Understanding Between Humans and AI
Marvin Pafla, PhD candidate
David R. Cheriton School of Computer Science
11:00 a.m. • DC 2314
Supervisors: Professors Kate Larson, Mark Hancock

Monday, October 19, 2026

Data Systems Seminar Series
Redesigning Cloud Databases for AI Data Centers
Qizhen Zhang, Assistant Professor
Department of Computer Science, University of Toronto
10:30 a.m. • DC 1304