Robyn R. Lutz is an American computer scientist whose research involves

software engineering Software engineering is a branch of both computer science and engineering focused on designing, developing, testing, and maintaining Application software, software applications. It involves applying engineering design process, engineering principl ...

, including modeling and checking

software requirements Software requirements for a system are the description of what the system should do, the service or services that it provides and the constraints on its operation. The IEEE Standard Glossary of Software Engineering Terminology defines a requiremen ...

and software system safety. She is a professor of computer science at

Iowa State University Iowa State University of Science and Technology (Iowa State University, Iowa State, or ISU) is a Public university, public land-grant university, land-grant research university in Ames, Iowa, United States. Founded in 1858 as the Iowa Agricult ...

Education and career

Lutz majored in English at the

University of Kansas The University of Kansas (KU) is a public research university with its main campus in Lawrence, Kansas, United States. Two branch campuses are in the Kansas City metropolitan area on the Kansas side: the university's medical school and hospital ...

, graduating with the highest distinction in 1974, earned a master's degree in Spanish there in 1976, and completed a Ph.D. in Spanish in 1980, under the supervision of Raymond Souza. Despite this non-technical background, she became a member of the technical staff at the

Jet Propulsion Laboratory The Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) is a Federally funded research and development centers, federally funded research and development center (FFRDC) in La Cañada Flintridge, California, Crescenta Valley, United States. Founded in 1936 by Cali ...

, associated with the

California Institute of Technology The California Institute of Technology (branded as Caltech) is a private research university in Pasadena, California, United States. The university is responsible for many modern scientific advancements and is among a small group of institutes ...

, in 1983, and continued to hold an affiliation there until 2012. Returning to graduate study, she earned a master's degree in computer science in 1990 from Iowa State University. She held an affiliate assistant professor title there from 1994 to 2000. In 2000 she became a regular-rank associate professor, and in 2005 she was promoted to full professor.

Recognition

Lutz was named a Distinguished Scientist in 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 2014. In 2021, she received the lifetime service award from the IEEE International Requirements Engineering Conference. She was elected as an

IEEE Fellow , the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) is an American 501(c)(3) public charity professional organization for electrical engineering, electronics engineering, and ot ...

in 2022, "for contributions to software requirements for safety-critical systems".

Personal life

Lutz is married to Jack Lutz, a professor of mathematics and computer science at Iowa State University; their son Neil Lutz is also a computer scientist and a visiting assistant professor of computer science at

Swarthmore College Swarthmore College ( , ) is a Private college, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, United States. Founded in 1864, with its first classes held in 1869, Swarthmore is one of the e ...

. They have published together on

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 ...

DNA computing DNA computing is an emerging branch of unconventional computing which uses DNA, biochemistry, and molecular biology hardware, instead of the traditional electronic computing. Research and development in this area concerns theory, experiments, a ...

References

External links

Home page
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Lutz, Robyn Year of birth missing (living people) Living people American computer scientists American software engineers American women computer scientists Software engineering researchers University of Kansas alumni Iowa State University alumni Iowa State University faculty Fellows of the IEEE