Koushik Kar

Professor
Department of Electrical, Computer & Systems Engineering,
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

Contact Information:

ECSE Department, JEC 6048,
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute,
Troy, NY 12180, USA.
Ph :  (518) 276-2653
Email : kark@rpi.edu

Brief Bio

I have been with the Department of Electrical, Computer and Systems Engineering at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) since Fall 2002. I obtained the Ph.D. degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of Maryland, College Park in 2002, and the M.S. degree in Electrical Engineering from the same university in 1999. I received the B.Tech. degree in Electrical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, India, in 1997. I have also held visiting research positions at Bell Laboratories, NJ, and IBM TJ Watson Research Center, NY.

My core specialization is in control and optimization of networks and networked systems, with special focus on communication networks and energy flow networks. More details on my research, teaching and other professional acitivities can be found below.

Research

Most of my research has been in the field of computer and communication networks - in particular on performance modeling, analysis and optimization questions for the Internet as well as wireless networks. At a high level, a unifying theme that characterizes much of my research activities in this context is the design and analysis of solution approaches that can optimize usage of critical resources like bandwidth and energy in wired and wireless networks, with the goal of attaining maximum global network utility or fair sharing of resources in the network. A significant part of this research is focused on solutions/algorithms that can be implemented in a distributed manner, through local coordination, often only requiring limited information about the network topology and conditions. Of late, I have also been working on economic issues related to the use of the wireless spectrum.

In recent years, I have also been interested in control and optimization questions for the smart grid/power distribution networks with the goal of attaining better spatio-temporal load distribution through demand-response strategies, as well as attain better energy efficiency through adaptive thermal control of smart buildings.

A distinguishing feature of my work is the use of linear, non-linear and stochastic optimization and control techniques, to study these network algorithm design/resource allocation questions. Some of my recent work also have a game-theoretic and financial engineering flavor.

Major research interests/projects are listed below. Some of the key papers that I have written on each topic can be found by clicking on the specific links.

My recent/ongoing research interests (2014--) have been mainly on the following topics:

My primary interests prior to 2014 have been in the following topics, some of which I am still pursuing (the topic of adaptive video transmission over the Internet, in particular):

My research has been funded by the National Science Foundation, MIT Lincoln Labs, Office of Naval Research, US Army Research, Department of Energy, IBM Research, and Cisco Systems.

I am a part of the Center of Pervasive Computing and Networking, Lighting Enabled Systems & Applications, and Center for Future Energy Systems at RPI.

Uncategorized Selection of Recent Papers, Technical Reports and Preprints (For publication listing by topic, please click on my research interest topics as provided above. For a more comprehensive list of my recent publications, see my Google Scholar page.)