At Michigan State University, excellence is measured not only by recognition, but by the impact our work has on people, communities and the future. Across the College of Engineering, faculty are advancing research, earning national and international recognition and strengthening connections with industry and communities. Their work reflects the many ways Spartan Engineering is helping turn knowledge into solutions, build new partnerships and help power the future. Spartans Will.
Anil Jain
Research.com has ranked Anil Jain No. 1 in the United States and No. 2 in the world in its 2026 Edition of Ranking of Best Scientists in computer science. The ranking is based on the D-index (Discipline H-index) metric, which includes papers and citation values for the discipline. Jain’s D-index is 215, with 279,306 and 1,012 publications, making him the top-cited computer science expert in the country (according to Google Scholar, his H-index is 223 with 290,999 citations). Jain is a University Distinguished Professor and the Douglas E. Zongker Endowed Professor of Computer Science and Engineering. In October, he was appointed to the board of directors of Rank One Computing Corp., a company highly ranked by the National Institute of Standards and Technology for accuracy and speed in biometric identification.
Other recent accomplishments include:
Surya S.C. Congress
Surya Congress, assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering, received the 2026 Arthur Casagrande Professional Development Award this spring during a ceremony in Utah. The honor recognizes exceptional leadership, innovative research, practical applications and dedication to the profession.
Laura Genik
Laura Genik, director of Applied Engineering Sciences, represented MSU at the 2026 EDS Leadership Summit in Nevada in May. She joined university professors and industry leaders to discuss engineering education, student recruitment, internships and the future workforce while highlighting Michigan State’s Applied Engineering Sciences program and its connections with industry.
Bill Jin
An MSU research paper was featured on the cover of the American Chemical Society journal ACS Omega. Qingxu "Bill" Jin, assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering, said the recognition was special because Engineering doctoral student Diego Aparicio designed the cover art. Their paper introduces a new class of ductile well cement that bends instead of breaking, addressing a critical challenge in wellbore integrity for oil, gas and geothermal energy infrastructure.
Hui Liu
Hui Liu and collaborators won the Senior Area Chair highlight award for their paper at the 64th Annual Meeting of the Association for Computational Linguistics (ACL) in July. ACL is one of the top AI conferences, especially for natural language processing and large language models (LLMs). Their research investigated whether LLMs' attention patterns can effectively identify important personalization signals for intelligent context compression. Liu is an assistant professor of computer science and engineering.
Liu and colleagues in North Carolina and Tennessee also received a highly competitive Genesis Mission grant of $750,000 from the U.S. Department of Energy. The project aims to safeguard federal research investments and help establish a national standard for trustworthy and resilient AI in science.
Sijia Liu
Sijia Liu is among 74 accomplished, early-career engineers selected to participate in The Grainger Foundation Frontiers of Engineering 2026 Symposium, a signature activity of the National Academy of Engineering. Engineers performing exceptional research and technical work in a variety of disciplines and across academia, industry and government came together in September in Austin, Texas, to share new techniques and approaches and build professional networks among the next generation of engineering leaders. Liu is the Red Cedar Distinguished Professor of Computer Science and Engineering.
Xiaobo Tan
Xiaobo Tan and his research team received the Best Joint Journal/Conference Paper Award on Mechatronics from ASME Dynamic Systems and Control Division, for their research using inductive curvature sensors for shape reconstruction and force estimation for soft actuators. Tan is an MSU Research Foundation Distinguished Professor of electrical and computer engineering and the Richard M. Hong Endowed Chair. Of note: Professor Jun Zhang, the vice chair of the Mechatronics Technical Committee who presented the award, is a Spartan Engineer and MSU electrical and computer engineering graduate.
Guan-Hua Tu
Guan-Hua Tu, associate professor of computer science and engineering, and his research team and their collaborators won the Best Paper Award at the 24th International Conference on Mobile Systems, Applications, and Services (MobiSys) in June in Cambridge, United Kingdom. The paper was named the best of 302 submissions. It uncovers critical security risks in current lost/stolen phone reporting services and identifies six novel vulnerabilities.
Navid Yazdi
Navid Yazdi, professor of electrical and computer engineering, and collaborators received the IEEE RFID 2026 Best Paper Award for their research on battery less sensing technology for continuous environmental monitoring. The award highlights their work to develop sensing technologies that can support continuous environmental monitoring without relying on conventional battery power. Yazdi presented the work at the conference in New Mexico in June.
Hongtao Zhong
Hongtao Zhong, assistant professor of mechanical engineering, received a 2026 Ralph E. Powe Junior Faculty Enhancement Award from Oak Ridge Associated Universities. The $5,000 award, matched by MSU, supports Zhong’s “Laser-induced plasma metamaterials” project. His team is exploring patterned plasmas that can manipulate electromagnetic waves, with potential applications in communications, sensing and imaging.
Written by Patricia Mroczek and Austin Witt
MSU College of Engineering Media and Public Relations page