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����AV has named Amarda Shehu Associate Vice President of Research for the Institute for Digital Innovation (IDIA), starting on May 25. This Mason Institute enables researchers, innovators, and scholars to shape the future of computing and digital society, promoting equality, wellbeing, security, and prosperity. Shehu will be based in the recently announced new Fuse building at Mason Square (formerly Arlington Campus).

Shehu, a professor in the department of computer science in the College of Engineering and Computing, is an inaugural founding co-director of the . Shehu obtained her Ph.D. from Rice University in 2008, where she was an NIH predoctoral fellow in the Nanobiology Program and was dually trained in AI and Molecular Biophysics.

“Dr. Shehu is an internationally recognized researcher in AI, machine learning, and algorithmics, as well as for her ground-breaking research that pushes the barriers of our understanding of the physical world,” said Andre Marshall, Mason’s Vice President for Research, Innovation, and Economic Impact. “She will be a key partner in advancing IDIA, new business tenants at FUSE, and other university institutes to a ‘lab to market’ research and collaboration enterprise.”

“I have been privileged to be a part of Mason’s story and to see this wonderfully innovative university grow and make its presence felt in the research, education, and entrepreneurship landscape,” Shehu said. “Mason is finally here. It has found its voice, to which I can only add ‘Let’s Go!’”

Shehu’s recognitions include her Induction to the 2022 College of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE) Fellows, the 2022 SCHEV Outstanding Faculty Award, the 2021 Beck Family Presidential Medal for Faculty Excellence in Research and Scholarship, the 2018 Mason Teaching Excellence Award, the 2014 Mason Emerging Researcher/Scholar/Creator Award, and the 2013 Mason OSCAR Undergraduate Mentor Excellence Award, and the 2012 National Science Foundation (NSF) CAREER Award.

Her research is regularly supported by the National Science Foundation, the Department of Defense, as well as state and private research awards from the Commonwealth of Virginia, the Alzheimer’s and Related Diseases Research Program, the Jeffress Trust Awards Program in Interdisciplinary Research, and the Virginia Youth Tobacco Program.

Shehu is currently on assignment at the National Science Foundation as Program Director of Information Integration and Informatics (III) in the Division of Information and Intelligent Systems (IIS) in the Computer Information Science and Engineering (CISE) Directorate.