Volunteering for research leads to first paper

Purdue Computer Science has 11 departmental research areas. The work is completed by faculty, post docs, visiting scholars, and graduate students, though many undergrad students find a way to contribute.

Andrew Chu is an undergraduate computer science student performing research with Professor Berkay Celik.

CELIK: "Andrew volunteered to do a research project with my group. Initially I assigned him two research projects, one on fuzzing to find the software bugs and the other one is on social aspects of security that we identify illegal activities in e-commerce platforms. We plan to submit his work to a top-tier security conference. Andrew is a hardworking and respectful person. He has a high sense of responsibility and a positive attitude that makes him succeed in his research projects. He is open to criticism; he considers all my comments as feedback to improve himself. Additionally, he is humble, thoughtful, and always smiling. This type of maturity and leadership quality is a rare quality to have and serves as a good indicator of future graduate student success.”

CHU: "I first got in touch with Professor Celik a few weeks before the fall semester began, simply asking if he had any research opportunities available for undergrad students. Dr. Celik was immediately both very responsive, and supportive in helping me learn about performing research, and made time to meet with me on a consistent basis. By the spring semester, I was working with a PhD student (Ozgur Ozmen), had been given a fascinating research topic, and began to help write my first paper. Our current work on identifying fraud in e-Commerce will be submitted to a top-tier security conference, and future efforts will focus on security of sensors and actuators in Internet of Things (IoT) and Cyber Physical Systems (CPS). My advice to other undergrads hoping to do research is to reach out to professors doing interesting work. Purdue’s CS faculty are world-class leaders in their respective areas, and all who I’ve talked with are very open to discussing ideas with students."