Impact
Selected research contributions and their real-world impact.
Beyond publications, my research has contributed to real-world systems, testbeds, and technology transfer. This page highlights selected contributions and the impact they have had.
From Idea to Real-World Impact
My software debloating research started as an idea with no use case or commercialization plans. It grew into a publication at EuroS&P’22, a US patent filed through WARF, the FitStack startup ($500k in commercialization funding), and the LMCAS prototype transferred to the Office of Naval Research — together representing about $1M in funding and technology transfer.
Innovation Journey: From idea to real-world impact
IoT Security Testbed — iTrust, SUTD
As a Research Assistant at iTrust, the Center for Research in Cyber Security at the Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD), I contributed to building an automated security testbed for IoT devices. The testbed supports security testing such as penetration testing and detection of compromised IoT devices, and realistically simulates environmental conditions (e.g., location, light, and motion) to uncover context-based attacks against smart wearables and other connected devices.
The research team posing in front of the IoT testbed.
This work was featured in the iTrust Times newsletter: Research & Security Innovation Lab for IoT — iTrust Times, Issue 5 (PDF) (see the Research Updates section, page 5).
Mentoring Junior Researchers
I have mentored junior researchers and students throughout my career. Some of the notes I have received from them mean as much to me as any publication:
I personally wanted to thank you for your continued support and guidance throughout this project. You have a plethora of knowledge around this domain of software security, which has been evident in the [constructive] criticism you provided at various stages. […] I learn[ed] several things from this project around research, and I want to thank you for this, as well as for always being motivating and appreciative.
— Junior researcher, software security project
Thank you for being a great mentor and showing me the ropes to research. You will always be a fundamental keystone in whatever career I pursue, by being my very first boss. I really do appreciate all that you have done and our time working together.
— Junior researcher I mentored
Excerpts from messages I received; anonymized, with personal details removed.