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Henry Pfister

Jeffrey N. Vinik Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Electrical and Computer Engineering
90984, 315 Gross Hall, Durham, NC 27708
140 Science Dr., 305 Gross Hall, Durham, NC 27708

Overview


Henry D. Pfister received his Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering in 2003 from the University of California, San Diego and is currently a professor in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department of Duke University with a secondary appointment in Mathematics.  Prior to that, he was an associate professor at Texas A&M University (2006-2014), a post-doctoral fellow at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (2005-2006), and a senior engineer at Qualcomm Corporate R&D in San Diego (2003-2004).  His current research interests include information theory, error-correcting codes, quantum computing, and machine learning.

He received the NSF Career Award in 2008 and a Texas A&M ECE Department Outstanding Professor Award in 2010.  He is a coauthor of the 2007 IEEE COMSOC best paper in Signal Processing and Coding for Data Storage and a coauthor of a 2016 Symposium on the Theory of Computing (STOC) best paper.  He has served the IEEE Information Theory Society as a member of the Board of Governors (2019-2022), an Associate Editor for the IEEE Transactions on Information Theory (2013-2016), and a Distinguished Lecturer (2015-2016).  He was also the General Chair of the 2016 North American School of Information Theory.

Current Appointments & Affiliations


Jeffrey N. Vinik Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering · 2024 - Present Electrical and Computer Engineering, Pratt School of Engineering
Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering · 2019 - Present Electrical and Computer Engineering, Pratt School of Engineering
Professor of Mathematics · 2021 - Present Mathematics, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences
Member of the Duke Quantum Center · 2024 - Present Duke Quantum Center, Pratt School of Engineering

Education, Training & Certifications


University of California, San Diego · 2003 Ph.D.