Faculty

Mehran Mozaffari Kermani

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Professor

ENB 338 | 813-974-2671

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Biography

Dr. Mehran Mozaffari Kermani is a professor in the Bellini College of Artificial Intelligence, Cybersecurity and Computing at University of South Florida (USF) in Tampa, FL. Prior to his appointment at USF, he was an assistant professor at the Electrical and Microelectronic Engineering Department of Rochester Institute of Technology. His primary research interests are fault diagnosis and tolerance in cryptography, cryptographic engineering, and computer arithmetic. He has been a senior ASIC/layout designer at the Advanced Micro Devices, integrating sophisticated security/cryptographic capabilities into accelerated processing.

Moreover, he has 140+ publications including 65 IEEE/ACM Transactions journals. He has served for several years as an Associate Editor for a number of Transactions journals editing 700+ manuscripts including IEEE TVLSI, IEEE TCAS I, IEEE TCAS II, IEEE TII, IEEE TCSVT, and the ACM TECS. He has Guest Edited (Cryptographic Engineering and Hardware Security) special issues for the IEEE TCBB, the IEEE TETC, and the IEEE TDSC. He has served as the technical committee member for a number of related conferences on embedded systems security and reliability including HOST (Publications Chair), CCS (Publications Chair), DAC, INFOCOM, DATE, FDTC, GLSVLSI, DFT, ISCAS, ISQED, RFIDSec, LightSec, and WAIFI. He was a recipient of the prestigious Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada Post-Doctoral Research Fellowship, the Texas Instruments Faculty Award (Douglas Harvey), outstanding research award at College of Engineering at USF, Nexus Initiative Global Award, and USF university-wide Faculty Outstanding Research Achievement Award. He is a Senior Member of the IEEE, Member of the IEEE CS, Member of the IEEE CASS, and Member of the ACM. Moreover, he has been the Director of Graduate Admissions/Programs with the Bellini College of Artificial Intelligence, Cybersecurity and Computing at University of South Florida (2024-2026), an Associate Director for the Master's in Cybersecurity at USF, and a co-director for the Center for Cryptographic Research (CCR) including the annual outreach "CodeBreakHERS" workshop for high school girls at USF since 2020 till present.

Research Interests

Fault Diagnosis and Tolerance in Cryptography; Post-Quantum Cryptographic Engineering; and Computer Arithmetic

Teaching Interests

Cryptographic engineering; fault-tolerant computing; computer arithmetic; digital systems; VLSI testing

Education

Postdoc in Electrical Engineering Department of Princeton University (2013)
PhD in Electrical and Computer Engineering, Western University, Canada (2011)
MS in Electrical and Computer Engineering, Western University, Canada (2007)
BSc in Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Tehran, Iran (2005)

Honors and Awards

  • Best Paper Award IEEE S&P Workshop (2025)
  • Best Paper Award ICISC Conference (2022)
  • USF Faculty Outstanding Research Achievement Award (2020)
  • USF Nexus Initiative Global Award (2019)
  • USF College of Engineering's Outstanding Junior Research Achievement Award (2018)
  • Faculty Award for Exemplary Research Performance, RIT (Engineering) (2017, 2015)
  • Faculty Award for Engaging Graduate Students in Research, RIT (Engineering) (2017)
  • Elevated to a Senior Member of the IEEE (2016)
  • Featured Faculty in Research, RIT (2014)
  • Texas Instruments Faculty Award (Douglas Harvey) (2014)
    NSERC Postdoctoral Fellowship (PDF) at Princeton University (this two-year award is one of the most prestigious postdoctoral awards in Canada, acceptance rate: 9% in 2011) (2012)
  • Princeton's supplement for postdoctoral fellowship award (2012)

Key Activities

  • Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems II (TCAS II)
  • Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems for Video Technology (TCSVT)
  • Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems I (TCAS I)
  • Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on VLSI Systems (TVLSI)
  • Associate Editor of the ACM Transactions on Embedded Computing Systems (TECS)
  • Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Industrial Informatics- CPS Security (TII)
  • Guest Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Dependable and Secure Computing (TDSC)
  • Guest Editor of the IEEE/ACM Transactions on Computational Biology and Bioinformatics (TCBB)
  • Guest Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Emerging Topics in Computing (TETC)
    TPC and organizing committee member for HOST (Publications Chair), CCS (Publications chair), DAC, INFOCOM, DATE, ISQED, GLSVLSI, RFIDSec, LightSec, WAIFI, FDTC, and DFT