计算机学院系列讲座名家讲坛第38期——A decade of abstractions: software defining infrastructures for operators (and Agents)

报告题目(Title)：A decade of abstractions: software defining infrastructures for operators (and Agents)

时间(Date & Time)：2026年11月16日，10:00-11:00

地点(Location)：理科二号楼2736报告厅

主讲人(Speaker)：Theophilus A. Benson

邀请人(Host)：吴文斐

报告摘要(Abstract)：

Over the last decade, I developed models, abstractions, frameworks and algorithms to transform network infrastructures at cloud and CDNs into programmable substrates that can be tailored to services and applications.

In this talk, I will describe lessons learned from working on software defined infrastructures and how the search for the abstractions lead to interesting models of data centers, unique theories of consistent updates, and redesign of infrastructure stacks. I will conclude by describing how these programmable infrastructures provide a natural substrate for agentic operators and discuss ongoing works to make infrastructures flexible enough to support complex workflows that agentic operators demand.

主讲人简介(Bio)：

Theophilus A. Benson is an electrical and computer engineering professor at Carnegie Mellon University.  Benson’s research focuses on improving the performance and availability of computer networks. In particular, he works with a broad set of cloud providers to improve their infrastructures. He recently has been developing an initiative to address the digital divide in the global south. His research was recognized by paper awards, including IMC, EuroSYS, and ANRP. Benson received the SIGCOMM Test of Time Award, IMC Test of Time Award, NSF CAREER Award, NEC Faculty Award, Google Faculty Award, Facebook Faculty Award (X2), and Faculty Research and Engagement Program (X2). He currently serves on the steering committee for ACM HotNets.  He served on DARPA’s ISAT (Information Science and Technology) study group, steering committee for ACM CoNEXT, technical program chair for top networking conferences (IMC'22, SIGCOMM'26, NSDI'25) as a member of the external advisory board for the Department of Computer Science at Tufts University. He earned his B.S. from Tufts, Ph.D. from University of Wisconsin-Madison, and post-doctorate from Princeton.

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