Sriram Pemmaraju

Professor, Department of Computer Science, The University of Iowa

Coordinates:
256 Macbride Hall, Department of Computer Science, The University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA 52242-1419
319 353 2956 (voice)
sriram-pemmaraju@uiowa.edu

Office Hours:
TBA for Fall 2025

Research:
I have a two-track research program. My primary research program is in theoretical computer science, more specifically in the foundations of distributed graph algorithms. Here I am interested in trade-offs between different resources used by distributed algorithms (e.g., rounds, messages, bandwidth, network topology, randomness, initial knowledge, etc.). My research in distributed graph algorithms has intersections with other areas in theoretical computer science such as approximation algorithms, combinatorial optimization, communication complexity, graph theory, information theory, and randomized algorithms.

In addition, I am part of the interdisciplinary Computational Epidemiology Group at Iowa. As part of my work with this group, I work on problems related to disease-diffusion, disease-inference and disease-mitigation on contact networks. I design algorithmic solutions to these problems that have low-cost implementations in healthcare settings. A particular focus of our group is healthcare associated infections and we are part of the CDC funded MInD Healthcare group.

Recent Publications:

• Analyzing greedy vaccine allocation algorithms for metapopulation disease models
  with Jeffrey Keithley, Akash Choudhuri, and Bijaya Adhikari
  PLOS Computational Biology 2025   • journal version   • medRxiv version
• Message Optimality and Message-Time Trade-offs for APSP and Beyond
  with Fabien Dufoulon, Shreyas Pai, Gopal Pandurangan, and Peter Robinson
  PODC 2025   • conference version   • arxiv
• Sublinear-Time Sampling of Spanning Trees in the Congested Clique
  with Sourya Roy and Joshua Z. Sobel
  PODC 2025   • conference version   • arxiv
• Fast Deterministic Massively Parallel Ruling Sets Algorithms
  with Hongyan Ji, Kishore Kothapalli, and Ajitanshu Singh
  ICDCN 2025   • conference version
• Faster Set Cover in the MPC Model
  with Hongyan Ji, Shreyas Pai, and Joshua Z. Sobel
  ICDCN 2025   • conference version
• The Message Complexity of Distributed Graph Optimizationi
  with Fabien Dufoulon, Shreyas Pai, Gopal Pandurangan, and Peter Robinson
  ITCS 2024   • conference version   • arxiv
• Towards Singular Optimality in the Presence of Local Initial Knowledge.
  with Hongyan Ji
  SIROCCO 2024   • conference version   • arxiv

Student mentoring:

• Current PhD advisees: Joshua Z. Sobel, Jeffrey Keithley, Hongyan Ji.
• Former PhD advisees: Hankyu Jang (2023, Amazon), Shreyas Pai (2021, IIT Madras), Talal Riaz (2019, Yelp), Vivek Sardeshmukh (2016, Google), Mauricio Monsalve (2015, CIGIDEN), Andrew Berns (2012, U of Northern Iowa), Donald Curtis (2011, Google), Saurav Pandit (2010, Pond5), Imran Pirwani (2008, Google), Kevin Lillis (2008, St.Ambrose University), Rajiv Raman (2007, IIIT Delhi), Mirela Damian (2000, Villanova University), Arobinda Gupta (1996, IIT Kharagpur)

Current Teaching (Fall 2025):

Computer Science I: Fundamentals

Here you can find course pages of classes I have taught since 2001.

Other Recent Activities:

• Conference organization: DISC 2019 (PC), SSS 2019 (PC), ICDCN 2019 (PC Chair), ICDCN 2020 (General Chair), FST&TCS 2021 (PC), SIROCCO 2022 (PC).
• I am a mentor in the NSF REU on Computing for Health and Well Being.

Graduate Programs in CS at the University of Iowa
Visit the Graduate Programs pages to learn more about the graduate degrees (PhD and MCS) offered by the Department of Computer Science at the University of Iowa.

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