Faculty
Shareef Ahmed
Assistant Professor
ENB 367
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Biography
Shareef Ahmed is an assistant professor who joined the USF Bellini College of Artificial Intelligence, Cybersecurity and Computing in 2025. He teaches an operating systems course, a core undergraduate class that explores how modern computing systems manage resources and run safely and efficiently. In future semesters, he also expects to teach advanced courses in real-time systems and algorithms, subjects that connect directly to his research in safe, dependable computing.
Research Interests
Ahmed’s research sits at the intersection of computer systems and theoretical computer science. He develops foundational approaches to make cyber-physical systems, such as self-driving cars and autonomous drones, more predictable, dependable, and safe. Ahmed focuses on creating mathematical guarantees that ensure these systems behave reliably before they are deployed. He is especially interested in developing scheduling and analysis techniques for complex real-time systems and understanding how to prove those systems will work under defined constraints.
At USF, Ahmed plans to launch a research lab focused on cyber-physical systems and real-time computing. His goal is to build small-scale experimental platforms, such as miniature autonomous vehicles, which demonstrate how formal methods can ensure predictable behavior in dynamic environments. He envisions the lab as a space for both graduate and undergraduate students to collaborate and innovate, and he hopes it may one day inspire K-12 outreach and engagement.
Honors and Awards
Ahmed is a two-time recipient of the Outstanding Paper Award, receiving this honor at the Euromicro Conference on Real-Time Systems (ECRTS) in 2021 and in 2024. In 2020, he received the Best Paper Award at the IEEE International Conference on Embedded and Real-Time Computing Systems and Applications.
He has presented at numerous conferences beyond these, including the IEEE Real-Time and Embedded Technology and Applications Symposium, the IEEE Real-Time and Embedded Technology and Applications Symposium, and the Theory and Applications of Models of Computation (TAMC).
He was also named a CPS Rising Star by the University of Virginia in 2024 and earned a Dissertation Completion Fellowship from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Education
Ahmed earned a PhD in Computer Science from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in Chapel Hill, NC. His bachelor’s and master’s degrees, both of which are in computer science and engineering, were earned at the Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology in Dhaka, Bangladesh.