Dr. Hussein Sibai’s love for computers can be traced back to his early childhood when his uncle, “the tech guy in the family”, brought home a Windows 95 system for the family. Back then, young Hussein used the computer just to play games.
Today, the Lebanese researcher is a postdoctoral scholar in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences Department of UC Berkeley. His research aims to ensure cyber-physical systems behave as they are intended to.
A cyber-physical system is a computer that interacts with a physical system. This includes aircraft and drones, for example. If such systems have bugs and behave in ways that aren’t accounted for, the results could be catastrophic.
Sibai’s research tries to ensure such disasters are avoided. Generally, this can be done by giving the systems different inputs and testing for as many outcomes as possible. But since there are an infinite number of possibilities for any system, each and every one cannot be tested. This is where Sibai’s work comes in. Using mathematical modeling, programs are used to check if the systems are symbolically satisfying all the required specifications.
“I utilize structural properties that we know about these systems to accelerate existing methods to verify the correctness of dynamic physical systems,” Sibai explained. Sounds complicated, right? That’s because it is - and the field is only becoming more challenging!
“Machine learning and artificial intelligence components are being added to these systems and further complicating the process of checking that requirements are satisfied...but ultimately, our goal is to automate the entire automation process,” he said.
Sibai’s motivation to do the work he does comes from the fact that “there is a point in fixing things in the world and in Lebanon especially. You need to be more knowledgeable to be able to help better - whether it is your family, your country or the whole world,” he said.
He has been working on his research at UC Berkeley since December 2021. But he only has a few months left in this appointment before he heads to Washington University in St. Louis to take up the role of an assistant professor.
“I like it too much here. Maybe I should have stayed longer,” Sibai said with a smile. “The best thing is the people. You meet researchers from different countries who are interested in the same topic as you. The weather is beautiful, nature’s beautiful here. And we’re close to Silicon Valley! Just by being here, one gets to meet amazing people working in related fields.”