My name is Swami Iyer (禹师文). I am a Senior Lecturer I in the Computer Science department at the University of Massachusetts Boston.
By day I study how things evolve on complex networks, build things with code and AI, and obsess a little over teaching. By night — and on good days, all the time — I practice presence, read, enjoy good food, listen to and play music, and travel.
Note: You don’t need an appointment to see me during office hours — just stop by. If you want to see me at a different time, please make an appointment for a remote zoom meeting.
I was born in the southern Indian city of Chennai and raised in Mumbai, where I received my primary and secondary education at Model English School. I went on to complete my higher secondary education at Ruparel College, and during my second year there, I attended the renowned — now defunct — Agrawal Classes. In 1996, I earned my bachelor’s degree in Electronics and Telecommunication from VESIT, after which I spent two years at Tata Interactive Systems as a software engineer, implementing multimedia-rich e-learning software.
In 2001, I received my master’s degree in Computer Science from the University of Massachusetts at Boston (UMB). I then worked for five years as a product developer at BMC Software, where I developed system- and application-level performance-monitoring software. In 2006, I decided to pursue a doctoral degree with the goal of an academic career, and I received my PhD in Computer Science from UMB in 2013. My dissertation, Evolutionary Dynamics on Complex Networks, was directed by Prof. Timothy Killingback of the Mathematics department.
After a one-year postdoc in the Physics department at UMB, I joined the Computer Science department as a Lecturer in Fall 2014 and was promoted to Senior Lecturer I in Fall 2021.
You can find my full CV — including publications, courses taught, and everything else — here.