Dr. Francine Berman is the Edward P. Hamilton Distinguished Professor of Computer Science at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI). She is a Fellow of the Association of Computing Machinery (ACM), a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), and a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). In 2009, Dr. Berman was the inaugural recipient of the ACM/IEEE-CS Ken Kennedy Award for "influential leadership in the design, development, and deployment of national-scale cyberinfrastructure." In 2015, Dr. Berman was
nominated by President Obama and confirmed by the U.S. Senate to become a member of the National Council on the Humanities. In 2019, Berman was
elected to be a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Dr. Berman's research and leadership have focused on data stewardship, preservation and cyberinfrastructure, particularly with respect to the policy, practice, technical infrastructure and community agreements needed to ensure the integrity and longevity of the data on which modern research relies. Dr. Berman's current work focuses on the social and environmental impact of the Internet of Things (IoT) -- a deeply interconnected ecosystem of billions of devices and systems that are transforming commerce, science and society. IoT technologies can be used to make our lives safer, more efficient and more convenient, as well as to disrupt, exploit, bias, bully and intrude. Berman is exploring the larger social and environmental ecosystem needed to develop an IoT that maximizes benefits, minimizes risk, and promotes individual protections, the public good, and planetary responsibility.
Dr. Berman is a founder of the
Research Data Alliance (RDA), a community-driven international organization created to accelerate research data sharing world-wide. From 2012 to 2019, she served as Chair of RDA/US (all U.S. members of RDA) and was Co-Chair of RDA's international leadership Council until 2018. She served as Vice President for Research at RPI from 2009 to 2012.
From 2001-2009, Dr. Berman served as Director of the San Diego Supercomputer Center (SDSC). In this role, she led a staff of 250+ interdisciplinary scientists, engineers, and technologists. She also directed the National Partnership for Advanced Computational Infrastructure (NPACI), a consortium of 41 research groups, institutions, and university partners with the goal of building national infrastructure to support research and education in science and engineering. Concurrently, Dr. Berman was Professor in the U.C. San Diego Department of Computer Science and Engineering and first holder of the High Performance Computing Endowed Chair in the Jacobs School of Engineering.
Currently, Dr. Berman is a member (and former Chair) of the Anita Borg Institute Board of Trustees, a member (and former co-Chair) of the National Science Foundation Advisory Committee for the Computer and Information Science and Engineering (CISE) Directorate, a member of the Board of Trustees of the Sloan Foundation, and a member of the National Council on the Humanities. She has served on national leadership groups including the National Science Foundation's Engineering Advisory Committee, the National Institutes of Health's NIGMS Advisory Committee, the U.S. President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) Networking and Information Technology Research and Development (NITRD) Review Working Group, and others.
Dr. Berman was previously co-Chair of the National Academies Board on Research Data and Information (BRDI), co-Chair of the US-UK Blue Ribbon Task Force for Sustainable Digital Preservation and Access, and Chair of the Information, Computing and Communication Section (Section T) of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). For her accomplishments, leadership, and vision, Dr. Berman was recognized by the Library of Congress as a "Digital Preservation Pioneer", as one of the top women in technology by BusinessWeek and Newsweek, and as one of the top technologists by IEEE Spectrum.
