Interview with ACM Fellow and SIGMM Chair Prof Klara Nahrstedt

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[SIGMM Editor] “Why do societies such as ACM offer Fellows status to some of its members?”

Prof Klara Nahrstedt: The ACM society celebrates through its ACM Fellows Status Program the exceptional contributions of the leading members in the computing field. These individuals have helped to enlighten researchers, developers, practitioners and end-users of computing and information technology throughout the world. The new ACM Fellows join a distinguished list of colleagues to whom ACM and its members look for guidance and leadership in computing and information technology.
 

[SIGMM Editor] “What is the significance for you as an individual research in becoming an ACM Fellow?”

Prof Klara Nahrstedt: Receiving the ACM Fellow Status represents a great honor for me due to the high distinction of this award in the computing community.  The ACM Fellow award recognizes my own research in the area of “Quality of Service (QoS) management for distributed multimedia systems”, as well as the joint work in this area with my students and colleagues at my home institution, the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, and other institutions, research labs, and companies with whom I have collaborated over the years.  Furthermore, becoming an ACM Fellow allows me to continue and push new ideas of QoS in distributed multimedia systems in three societal domains, the trustworthy cyber-physical infrastructure for smart grid environments, the collaborative immersive spaces in tele-health-care, and robust mobile multimedia systems in airline-airplane maintenance ecosystem.
 

[SIGMM Editor] “How is this recognition perceived by your research students, department, and University? “

Prof Klara Nahrstedt: My research students, department and university are delighted that I have received the ACM Fellow status since this type of award very much reflects the high quality of students that get admitted to our department and I work with, colleagues I interact with, and resources I get provided by the department and university.

[SIGMM Editor] “You have been one of the important torch bearers of the SIGMM community. What does this recognition imply for the SIGMM Community?”

Prof Klara Nahrstedt: SIGMM community is a relatively young community, having only recently celebrated 20 years of its existence. However, as the multimedia community is maturing, it is important for our community to promote its outstanding researchers and assist them towards the ACM Fellow status.  Furthermore, multimedia technology is becoming ubiquitous in all facets of our lives; hence it is of great importance that SIGMM leaders, especially its ACM Fellows, are at the table with other computing researchers to guide and drive future directions in computing and information technologies.

[SIGMM Editor] “How will this recognition influence the SIGMM community?”

Prof Klara Nahrstedt: I hope that my ACM Fellow status recognition will influence the SIGMM community at least in three directions: (1) it will motivate young researchers in academia and industry to work towards high impact research accomplishments in multimedia area that will lead to the ACM Fellow status at the later stage of their careers, (2) it will impact female researchers to strive towards recognition of their work through the ACM Fellow Status, and (3) it will increase the distinguished group of ACM Fellows within the SIGMM, which again will be able to promote the next generation of multimedia researchers to join the ACM Fellows ranks.