Short Bio

Prof. Jagat Sesh Challa is presently working as an  Associate Professor at the Department of Computer Science and Information Systems, Birla Institute of Technology & Science, Pilani. He completed his Bachelor's degree - M.Sc. (Tech.) Information Systems (2010), Master's degree - M.E. Software Systems (2012) and Ph.D. in Computer Science (2019), all three from the Department of CSIS, BITS Pilani. He also worked as a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Centre for Ultra-Scale Computing and Information Security (CUCIS) Lab in the ECE Department of Northwestern University, USA (2020). His primary areas of research include Big Data Analytics, Agentic AI for Education, Human-Computer Interaction and AI/ML Applications. He has published 35+ research papers in top-tier conferences and journals and has received grants worth INR 2+ Crores. Presently, he is a core researcher at the Advanced Data Analytics and Parallel Technologies (ADAPT) Lab, BITS Pilani and an active member of GenAI Research Group. He is presently supervising 7 PhD students and also supervises 30+ UG and Masters Project/Thesis students every year. He is also a member of ACM and IEEE. 

Prof. Challa also takes great interest in teaching and specialises in fundamental CS courses like Computer Programming, Logic in Computer Science, and Data Structures and Algorithms, for the on-campus students. He also teaches online courses at BITS Pilani Digital for students of B.Sc. Computer Science (Coursera) and B.S. Data Science and AI Programs.  As a part of this program, he has received the 2023 Coursera Global Innovation Outstanding Achievement Award for the course Introduction to Programming. He has also taught various courses to students who are working professionals as part of BITS Pilani’s Work Integrated Learning Programmes.

Prof. Challa is also a founding member and is in charge of the BITS Pilani x Postman Innovation Lab at the Rakesh Kapoor Innovation Centre at the Pilani Campus, where students work on various projects in domains that include – AR/VR, NueroTech, Game Development, 2D/3D Video Editing, Full Stack Development, AI/ML Theory and Applications, etc. Prof. Challa is also mentoring a few student-run startups. He also works as an Academic Mentor at BITS Pilani Digital, where he is involved in Program and Curriculum Design, Faculty Recruitment, Instructional Planning, Quality Assurance, and Content Development. He has also developed content for a few courses. Prof. Challa is currently serving as the Faculty-in-Charge, Registration and Counselling, for BITS Pilani, Pilani Campus, where he oversees student course registrations and related activities every semester. He also leads the teams that build software tools for various processes related to registration and counselling.