Karthik Mahadevan
*(Photo by Matt Hintsa)*

U of T Department of Computer Science PhD student Karthik Mahadevan has been awarded a 2022 Google PhD Fellowship in Human-Computer Interaction (HCI).

Mahadevan’s interests lie in the design of systems and techniques to support natural and intuitive human-robot interaction. Prior to joining U of T, he completed an MSc in computer science at the University of Calgary, where he studied the interaction between pedestrians and autonomous vehicles.

He is supervised by Tovi Grossman, associate professor in the Department of Computer Science, and Anthony Tang, associate professor in the Faculty of Information.

The Google PhD Fellowship Program recognizes “outstanding graduate students doing exceptional and innovative research in areas related to computer science and related fields,” and “who seek to influence the future of technology,” according to Google.

“I am very humbled to have been named a Google PhD Fellow in HCI,” said Mahadevan. “It is a great acknowledgement of the research that my collaborators and I have been pursuing on human-robot collaboration.”

“I am particularly excited about the opportunity to be mentored by researchers at Google who are at the forefront of robotics research,” he added. “This would not have been possible without the support of my amazing advisors Dr. Tovi Grossman and Dr. Anthony Tang who have encouraged me to pursue this line of research since I began my PhD. I would also like to acknowledge all the mentors I have had the privilege to work with over the years.”