Thomas Lord Department of Computer Science
Media Coverage

USC selected by Department of Defense for Microelectronics Commons hub

Sep 20, 2023

The university will lead one of eight regional innovation hubs funded by the CHIPS and Science Act.

Intel: Swabha Swayamdipta Receives Intel 2023 Rising Star Award

Sep 20, 2023

Swabha Swayamdipta, an assistant professor of computer science, is among 15 early-career academic researchers selected by Intel this year.

The Economist: Could AI transform science itself?

Sep 17, 2023

Yolanda Gil tells The Economist that cross-disciplinary research will become more common due to AI

LA Times: These family robots can play trivia and act as security. Can they cure loneliness?

Aug 06, 2023

Maja Matarić was interviewed about the potential for socially assistive robotics

WIRED Middle East: Robots are teaching other robots to learn more stuff

Aug 06, 2023

New research by Laurent Itti and Ph.D. student Yunhao Ge was featured.

The Conversation: Emilia Ferrara Explains How To Tame Bias in AI

Jul 26, 2023

Computer Science Professor Emilio Ferrara explains why blindly eliminating biases in AI can have unintended consequences. Instead, he says, bias in AI can be controlled to achieve a higher goal: fairness.

Politico: Artificial Intelligence Can’t Work Without Our Data

Jul 07, 2023

Barath Raghavan and co-author Bill Schneier suggest an “AI Dividend”

Github ReadMe Project: Coding Accessibility: Disability as Catalyst for Creativity

Jun 28, 2023

Computer science student Paul Chiou’s research focuses on automatically finding and fixing keyboard accessibility issues in both web and Android apps.

Brainchip: Podcast With USC Professor Gaurav Sukhatme On Innovation In AI, Robotics & Autonomy

Jun 25, 2023

Executive Vice Dean Gaurav Sukhatme was interviewed about his career trajectory and the state of the robotics field

Spectrum News : USC invests $1 billion into advancing computing research

Jun 25, 2023

Dean Yortsos and PhD student Emily Nguyen were featured about the FOC Initiative, Nguyen discussed her work applying AI towards treatments for ovarian cancer.

New York Times: How Sexist is Hollywood?

Jun 25, 2023

The SAIL Lab was mentioned as a collaborator with the Geena Davis Institute to address bias through media intelligence

LA Business Journal: Cyber Crusaders

Jun 25, 2023

Cliff Neuman was quoted on network security.

CBS Radio: Companies are adopting AI, how it can echo biases and spread misinformation

May 21, 2023

Wael Abd Almageed was interviewed and discussed the danger of misinformation spread

Spectrum News : Robots Deployed to Fight Toxic Alage

May 21, 2023

Isabel Rayas and Christopher Denniston were interviewed about their work in the Robotics Embedded Systems Lab

Dot.LA: USC Invests $1 Billion in New Computing School to Teach Ethical AI Use

May 14, 2023

Dean Yortsos was interviewed about “Frontiers of Computing” and how “Computer science, data sciences and AI have become essentially an extension of the original fundamentals.”

Wall Street Journal: How AI will change the workplace

May 14, 2023

Jon Gratch shared his research on how interacting with an AI changes human behavior

KABC: USC Wants to Prepare Students for the Future of AI

May 14, 2023

Cyrus Shahabi was interviewed about how AI can address LA’s problems and the Frontiers of Computing Initiative

Forbes: University of Southern California Launches $1 Billion Advanced Computing Initiative

May 07, 2023

Forbes highlighted FOC and quoted Dean Yortsos saying “The world needs engineers and computer scientists to solve the grand challenges we face.”

USC News: USC launches $1B-plus initiative in advanced computing

May 04, 2023

Viterbi to create a School of Advanced Computing and rename the Computer Science Department for benefactor Thomas Lord

NPR: For Earth Day, Faculty Talk Sustainability Research on “Academic Minute”

Apr 21, 2023

Research by Bistra Dilkina, Thomas Petersen and Essam Heggy was featured.

American Academy of Arts & Sciences: Maja Matarić Elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences

Apr 19, 2023

Expert in socially assistive robotics joins leaders selected from academia, the arts, industry, policy, research, and science

WIRED: ChatGPT Email Scams

Apr 16, 2023

Wired published a piece by Barath Raghavan and a colleague

Scientific American: How to Tell If a Photo Is an AI-Generated Fake

Apr 02, 2023

Wael Abd Almageed spoke to SA about the state of detection for AI generated images

Los Angeles Business Journal: USC Launches AI Research Center

Mar 26, 2023

This article mentions that Bill Swartout will co-lead the new Center on Generative AI.

The Guardian: Venmo users on discovering secrets on the app

Mar 19, 2023

A study conducted by experts at USC found that two in five Venmo users publicly revealed sensitive information

Apple Machine Learning Research: Computer Science Student Named 2023 Apple Scholar in AI/ML

Mar 08, 2023

Published on March 8th, 2023Last updated on March 8th, 2023

VICE: ChatGPT and Essays

Mar 05, 2023

Swabha Swayamdipta discussed the status of large language models.

OfficeChai: The Indian Researchers Whose Work Led To The Creation Of ChatGPT

Feb 27, 2023

The article mentions USC Viterbi computer science alumni, Ashish Vaswani and Niki Parmar, are key contributors to the research that led to ChatGPT

ARSTechnica: Twitter ditches free access to data

Feb 12, 2023

Kristina Lerman was interviewed about the effects of Twitter API change on scientific research

The Conversation: ChatGPT is great – you’re just using it wrong

Feb 05, 2023

Jonathan May contributed a piece on possible uses of ChatGPT

IEEE Signal Processing Magazine : Signal Processing Comes to the Senses

Feb 01, 2023

A haptic texture detection method developed by computer science doctoral student Shihan Lu, advised by Heather Culbertson, is featured in IEEE.

Philadelphia Inquirer: AI tools can create new images, but who is the real artist

Jan 29, 2023

Wael Abd-Almageed commenting on A.I. generated art and other content.

MIT Tech Review : We Could Run Out of Data To Train AI Language Programs

Jan 26, 2023

Swabha Swayamdipta, an assistant professor of computer science, discusses ways to overcome data constraints for large language models.

Quanta : The Computer Scientist Who Finds Life Lessons in Games

Jan 25, 2023

Quanta interviews Shang-Hua Teng, a USC computer science professor who has twice won the Gödel Prize, a top honor in theoretical computer science, but often explores playful applications, like board games.

Toronto Star: These AI images look just like me.

Jan 15, 2023

Wael Abd Almageed was quoted about the future of deepfakes

NBCLA: Does Your Middle-Class Tax Refund Debit Card Have a $0 Balance?

Jan 15, 2023

Cybersecurity expert Cliff Neuman was interviewed about how cards might be compromised

LA Times: Is ChatGPT a marvel or a farce?

Dec 11, 2022

Jesse Thomason was interviewed about the significance of ChatbotGPT

NPR: Today’s interactive Google Doodle honors Jerry Lawson, a pioneer of modern gaming

Dec 04, 2022

The story mentions the USC Games’ Gerald A. Lawson Fund that was set up at USC Games to support the next generation of gamers

Yahoo!: Forget Spotify Wrapped, here’s how to make your own Spotify festival lineup

Dec 04, 2022

Computer Science student Anshay Saboo was featured in various outlets after launching his app Instafest, that went viral.

Google: Using AI to study 12 years of representation in TV

Nov 27, 2022

The latest report from Google, the USC SAIL Lab and Geena Davis Institute on media representation was highlighted.

KTLA: Dark Patterns

Nov 27, 2022

Cliff Neuman was interviewed about dark patterns and what consumers could do to protect themselves against online marketing practices.

AI Hub: Designing Better Voting Systems, With a Little Help From the Animal World

Oct 28, 2022

Taking a cue from the animal world, USC researchers discovered a simple voting rule that optimally reflects voters’ opinions about candidates. Lead author Fatih Kizilkaya, a computer science doctoral student, discusses the IJCAI Distinguished Paper Award-winning work.

Indian Express: Our Own Devices with Nandagopal Rajan

Oct 23, 2022

Jon May was featured in a podcast focused on developing tools for more civil online communication

Amazon Science: Amazon and USC name three new ML Fellows

Oct 04, 2022

PhD students will receive fellowship funding and be mentored by Amazon scientists.

Dot.LA: Homophobia Is Easy To Encode in AI

Sep 25, 2022

Research by Katy Felkner to mitigate AI bias towards the LGBTQ+ community was highlighted

LA Times: Student information remains at risk after massive cyberattack on Los Angeles Unified

Sep 11, 2022

Cliff Neuman was quoted on about a recent LAUSD cyber attack and why the district was targeted

CNN: These robot engineers are inspired by cats (and dogs)

Sep 05, 2022

The labs of Francisco Valero-Cuevas and Quan Nguyen were featured in on “Techfor Good” segment on robots and biomimcry

VICE: Privacy Phone Network Intended to Mask Your Identity

Aug 28, 2022

A startup by Barath Raghavan and Paul Schmitt was featured.

Cosmos: Busting homophobic, anti-queer bias in AI language models

Aug 14, 2022

AI research by doctoral student Katy Felkner was highlighted.

CBS: Disneyland Instagram Hacked

Jul 10, 2022

Cliff Neuman explains how the Disneyland hack may have occurred.

Amazon re: MARS: Luminaries – Maja Matarić, Computer Scientist, Roboticist, AI Researcher

Jun 05, 2022

Professor Matarić is one of 6 scientists and engineers featured by Amazon in its MARS “Luminaries” series. Matarić is featured for her work in the field of socially assistive robotics.

IGN: USC Games Expo 2022 to Feature World Premieres of Over 50 Student-Made Games

May 02, 2022

The upcoming USC Games Expo was featured

Study Finds: Are your finances exposed? 2 in 5 Venmo users publicly reveal sensitive information

May 01, 2022

A study about personal information exposed on Venmo was featured

Washington Post: USC scholarship aims to help Black, Indigenous workers enter games industry

Apr 17, 2022

The USC Games Gerald A. Lawson Endowment Fund for Black and Indigenous students was highlighted; The forthcoming Games Expo was highlighted.

Argonne National Lab: Ancient art meets AI for better materials design

Apr 07, 2022

Inspired by a type of origami, Viterbi researchers apply autonomous reinforcement learning to develop materials for wearable electronics.

CNET: Extinct Ice Age Animals Will Be Digitally Resurrected In the Metaverse

Mar 13, 2022

A collaboration among the La Brea Tar Pits, NHLA and USC to apply AR as educational tools was highlighted.

San Bernadino Sun: Cyberthreats from Russia

Mar 13, 2022

Cliff Neuman was interviewed about how the challenges of cyberwarfare and cyber defense

News 18 : USC Viterbi Launches Center for Autonomy and AI

Mar 11, 2022

New research Center led Rahul Jain and Jyo Deshmukh was highlighted

21 Questions with Cheyenne Gaima

Feb 28, 2022

Day in the Life of a Skateboarder, Piercer, Poet and Coder

Science: Dream Machine

Feb 16, 2022

Maja Matarić discusses how robots can be used in school to increase social interaction and engagement.

National Academy of Sciences: Our Future Robot Companions

Feb 13, 2022

Maja Matarić gave a virtual talk at the National Academy of Sciences Science & Entertainment Exchange

Dot LA: USC Expands AI Education With New Research Center, Amazon Partnership

Feb 13, 2022

DotLA covered two pieces of Viterbi news this week, Dean Yortsos was interviewed adding, “some sort of a digital literacy will become as important as other general education requirements”

WIRED: Maybe Green Energy Needs Information Batteries Too

Feb 06, 2022

New research by Barath Raghavan was featured

Analytics India Magazine: Can You Express Your Feelings Through A Haptic Armband, Just Like A Hug?

Jan 09, 2022

Professor Culbertson’s research on virtual touch was featured.

Psychology Today: New Synthetic AI Data May Improve Brain-Computer Interfaces

Dec 05, 2021

Research by Laurent Itti that applies the same method that is used to create deep fakes for the benefit of brain- machine interfaces for individuals with disabilities, was featured

CIFellows 2021: CIFellowships Support Post-Doctoral Research

Nov 29, 2021

Emmanuel Johnson and Jasmine Berry have received 2021 Computing Innovation (CI) Fellowships, which help recent and soon-to-be Ph.D. graduates launch their careers in uncertain economic times.