Ryan Kastner

Ryan Kastner is a professor in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at UC San Diego. He received a Ph.D. in Computer Science (2002) at UCLA, a master’s degree in engineering (2000), and bachelor’s degrees (B.S.) in Electrical Engineering and Computer Engineering (1999) from Northwestern University. He spent the first five years after his Ph.D. as a professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

He leads the Kastner Research Group, whose current research interests are broad but generally fall into three areas: hardware acceleration, hardware security, and remote sensing. He is the co-director of the Wireless Embedded Systems Graduate Program – a specialized master’s degree targeting individuals working in local industries. He co-founded and co-directs the Engineers for Exploration (E4E) program, which partners with archaeologists, biologists, ecologists, and marine scientists to create unique embedded computing systems to further their scientific research. Technologies developed by E4E were featured in the 2020 National Geographic Docuseries “Ancient China from Above.” E4E has involved hundreds of undergraduates over the past decade and has operated as a National Science Foundation Research Experience for Undergraduate site since 2013. Kastner has been working in the hardware security space for over 15 years with projects on FPGA security, 3D integrated circuit security, and hardware information flow tracking. He is the co-founder of Cycuity, which develops hardware security verification solutions.

For more information, see QI stories “Two-Sided Coin: Engineers for Exploration Program Pays Off for Students and Scientists,” “Company Based on UC San Diego Technology Gets Infusion of Capital” and “Swarm of Underwater Robots Mimics Ocean Life” or Kastner’s website.