Alexander Barg

     
Home
Research
Publications
Students
Teaching
Editorial Boards
Seminar
Contact
Office: AVW 2361
Phone: +1 301 405 7135
[abarg@umd.edu]

Postal address:
Department of ECE
University of Maryland
8223 Paint Branch Dr.
College Park, MD 20742, USA








About me:

I am a Professor in the Department of ECE and Institute of Systems Research of the University of Maryland, with affiliate appointments in the Departments of Computer Science and Mathematics. I am also an affiliate fellow of the UMD/NIST Joint Center for Quantum Information and Computer Science (QuICS).


Research: I am broadly interested in mathematical problems of information and coding theory, related problems in distance geometry and combinatorics, as well as random models of managing and processing information. I have worked on asymptotic estimates of code parameters in various metric spaces, coding problems for digital fingerprinting, random codes and error exponents, estimates of the size of spherical codes with few distances, combinatorics of association schemes of coding theory, and more recently on algebraic code constructions for various models of distributed storage, private distribution estimation, polar codes, and a variety of other problems.

Currently I am interested in quantifying how codes and lattices approximate uniform distributions in their metric spaces, smoothing of codes and lattices, their links to problems in information theory such as channel resolvability and transmission over the wiretap channel, and also links between uniformly distributed codes and problems in computer science (derandomization, approximations and VC dimension). Another recent area of research concerns data representation on graphs (finite and infinite) wherein the contents of a vertex is determined by the values of its neighbors in the graph. I also maintain interest in some of the earlier problems such as algebraic codes for distributed storage (the locality and regeneration problems).

More details about my research appear on the Research and Publications pages accessible through the menu tabs on this page and in my GoogleScholar profile.


Teaching: I occasionally teach a special topics course on "Modern discrete probability". Recently I also taught another topics course on "Classical and Quantum Codes" (co-taught with Victor Albert), both cross-listed between ECE, CS, and Math. I regularly teach graduate courses in Random Processes, Information Theory, and well as undergraduate classes.