School of Engineering

Past Spotlights on Computer Science

Cowen's Lab at Tufts University

Student highlight

Name: Monsurat Olaosebikan
Degree: Ph.D. in Computer Science
Faculty lab: Professor Lenore Cowen
Hometown: Bridgeport, CT

Why Tufts?
I chose Tufts for two reasons, the opportunity to do interdisciplinary research and my advisor. As someone coming from a non-computer science background (I majored in Mechanical Engineering in undergrad) I wanted somewhere I could gain a strong technical background in Computer Science while also being able to use my prior knowledge in interdisciplinary research. From my first phone call with my advisor, I could tell that she was someone willing to go the extra mile to see her students succeed and that still holds true today. She’s amazing and I am extremely fortunate to have her as an advisor.

Favorite thing about living in the Medford/Somerville and Boston area?
I love the food and startup culture. Boston is a very entrepreneurial city and it’s inspiring to be surrounded by people with great ideas who want to change the world.

Any advice you’d give to prospective students or new graduate students?
For new graduate students, I would say make an effort to get to know the other students in your cohort. A Ph.D. is a long, difficult journey and you want all the support you can get.

Cowen with student at Tufts University

Faculty highlight

Name: Professor Lenore Cowen
Research interests: Data science, graph algorithms, distributed algorithms, approximate routing, classification and clustering for high-dimensional data, coloring and its generalizations, and computational molecular biology

About Professor Cowen: 
Lenore Cowen's research interests span three areas: discrete mathematics, algorithms, and computational molecular biology. Following the completion of her Ph.D. in mathematics from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, she was an NSF postdoctoral fellow and then joined the faculty of the Mathematical Sciences Department (now the Applied Mathematics and Statistics Department) at John Hopkins University. She joined Tufts in 2001.