Anna R. Karlin is an American computer scientist, the Microsoft Professor of Computer Science & Engineering at the

University of Washington The University of Washington (UW and informally U-Dub or U Dub) is a public research university in Seattle, Washington, United States. Founded in 1861, the University of Washington is one of the oldest universities on the West Coast of the Uni ...

Biography

Karlin was born into an academic family. Her father, Samuel Karlin, was a mathematician at

Stanford University Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a Private university, private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth ...

, and her brother, Kenneth Karlin, is a professor of chemistry at

Johns Hopkins University The Johns Hopkins University (often abbreviated as Johns Hopkins, Hopkins, or JHU) is a private university, private research university in Baltimore, Maryland, United States. Founded in 1876 based on the European research institution model, J ...

. Karlin went to Stanford for her undergraduate studies, receiving a bachelor's degree in 1981.Curriculum vitae
retrieved 2012-02-23. She stayed at Stanford for graduate school, and earned Ph.D. in 1987 under the supervision of

Jeffrey Ullman Jeffrey David Ullman (born November 22, 1942) is an American computer scientist and the Stanford W. Ascherman Professor of Engineering, Emeritus, at Stanford University. His textbooks on compilers (various editions are popularly known as the dr ...

. She continued to work near Stanford, at the

DEC Systems Research Center The Systems Research Center (SRC) was a research laboratory created by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) in 1984, in Palo Alto, California. DEC SRC was founded by a group of computer scientists, led by Robert Taylor, who left the Computer ...

, for five years, before moving to the University of Washington in 1994. She was program chair of the IEEE

Symposium on Foundations of Computer Science The IEEE Annual Symposium on Foundations of Computer Science (FOCS) is an academic conference in the field of theoretical computer science. FOCS is sponsored by the IEEE Computer Society. As writes, FOCS and its annual Association for Computing ...

in 1997.Speaker biography
for Grace Hopper Lecture Series, University of Pennsylvania School of Engineering and Applied Science, retrieved 2012-02-23. Karlin was also one of the founding members of the rock music band Severe Tire Damage, and in 1993 as part of the band she participated in the first live music broadcast on the Internet.

Research

Karlin's research interests are in the design and analysis of

online algorithm In computer science, an online algorithm is one that can process its input piece-by-piece in a serial fashion, i.e., in the order that the input is fed to the algorithm, without having the entire input available from the start. In contrast, an of ...

s and

randomized algorithm A randomized algorithm is an algorithm that employs a degree of randomness as part of its logic or procedure. The algorithm typically uses uniformly random bits as an auxiliary input to guide its behavior, in the hope of achieving good performan ...

s, which she has applied to problems in

algorithmic game theory Algorithmic game theory (AGT) is an interdisciplinary field at the intersection of game theory and computer science, focused on understanding and designing algorithms for environments where multiple strategic agents interact. This research area com ...

system software System software is software designed to provide a platform for other software. An example of system software is an operating system (OS) (like macOS, Linux, Android, and Microsoft Windows). Application software is software that allows users to d ...

distributed computing Distributed computing is a field of computer science that studies distributed systems, defined as computer systems whose inter-communicating components are located on different networked computers. The components of a distributed system commu ...

, and

data mining Data mining is the process of extracting and finding patterns in massive data sets involving methods at the intersection of machine learning, statistics, and database systems. Data mining is an interdisciplinary subfield of computer science and ...

. She has written heavily cited papers on the use of randomized packet markings to perform IP traceback, competitive analysis of

multiprocessor Multiprocessing (MP) is the use of two or more central processing units (CPUs) within a single computer system. The term also refers to the ability of a system to support more than one processor or the ability to allocate tasks between them. The ...

cache coherence In computer architecture, cache coherence is the uniformity of shared resource data that is stored in multiple local caches. In a cache coherent system, if multiple clients have a cached copy of the same region of a shared memory resource, all ...

algorithms, unified algorithms for simultaneously managing all levels of the

memory hierarchy In computer architecture, the memory hierarchy separates computer storage into a hierarchy based on response time. Since response time, complexity, and capacity are related, the levels may also be distinguished by their performance and contr ...

, web proxy servers, and

hash table In computer science, a hash table is a data structure that implements an associative array, also called a dictionary or simply map; an associative array is an abstract data type that maps Unique key, keys to Value (computer science), values. ...

s with constant worst-case lookup time.

Awards and honors

In 2012, Karlin was named as a fellow of the

Association for Computing Machinery The Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) is a US-based international learned society for computing. It was founded in 1947 and is the world's largest scientific and educational computing society. The ACM is a non-profit professional membe ...

. In 2016 she became a fellow of the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (The Academy) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and other ...

. She was awarded the 2020 ACM Paris Kanellakis Theory and Practice Award, "For the discovery and analysis of balanced allocations, known as the power of two choices, and their extensive applications to practice." She was elected to the

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, NGO, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the ...

in 2021 and to the

National Academy of Engineering The National Academy of Engineering (NAE) is an American Nonprofit organization, nonprofit, NGO, non-governmental organization. It is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM), along with the National Academ ...

in 2022.

Selected publications

*. *. *. *. *. *. *.Reviews of ''Game Theory, Alive'': * *

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Karlin, Anna R. Living people 1960 births American theoretical computer scientists American women computer scientists Stanford University alumni Digital Equipment Corporation people University of Washington Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science & Engineering faculty 2012 fellows of the Association for Computing Machinery Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences American game theorists American women academics 21st-century American women