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The Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at the University of Wyoming is offering the EECS Colloquium series as a service to all who are interested in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. Most seminars in Spring 2026 are scheduled for Mondays 3:10PM -- 4:00PM in EERB 251. For help finding the locations of our seminar meetings, consult the on-line UWyo campus map. For questions about this page or to schedule talks, please contact Diksha Shukla: dshukla@uwyo.edu. Here is a list of seminar schedules. Previous EECS Colloquium Speakers. |
EECS Colloquium Schedule, Spring 2026
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EECS Colloquium Can we trust untrusted monitoring? Speaker: Morgan Sinclaire, PhD Student, EECS, University of Wyoming, Laramie, WY. When: 3:10PM ~ 4:00PM, Monday, March 09, 2026 Abstract: As AIs are deployed in increasingly critical settings with little human supervision, how do we ensure this doesn't lead to bad outcomes? AI control is a new field which develops and evaluates protocols for safety and usefulness, by adopting the principles of insider-threat cybersecurity. Our new paper is the first deep dive into untrusted monitoring, where the untrusted AI's outputs are overseen by a separate instance of a similar AI. The safety of this protocol is determined by our ability to trick the monitor with honeypots to ensure its fidelity. We developed new collusion strategies which tripled the red team's win rate over previous work, according to our fine-tuning experiments with GPT-4.1. We also sketched a conditional safety case for untrusted monitoring, highlighting the unsolved challenges needed to argue for the safety of this protocol. Bio: Morgan Sinclaire is a 4th year PhD student in the UWyo EECS department, with research spanning theoretical computer science and empirical AI safety. He taught a seminar on transformers/LLMs, and spent last Fall working in London with the UK AI Security Institute (AISI) on the present AI control project. |
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EECS Colloquium Trends in HPC and Computational Science. HPC at a Crossroads: Opportunities for Wyoming Speaker: Dr. Edward Seidel, President, University of Wyoming, Laramie, WY. When: 3:10PM ~ 4:00PM, Monday, April 06, 2026 Abstract: High-performance computing (HPC) plays a central role in modern scientific discovery, enabling researchers to simulate complex systems, analyze massive datasets, and accelerate innovation across all disciplines. Computational Science is the use of advanced computing techniques to address complex problems across these disciplines. In recent years, rapid changes in computing architectures, the growth of artificial intelligence, and the expansion of data-driven research have begun to reshape the entire landscape of computational science, and puts new demands every dimension of computing. This talk will explore major trends influencing the future of HPC, including the convergence of simulation, data analytics, and AI; evolving software and algorithmic challenges; and the emergence of new computing platforms and infrastructures. It will also discuss the opportunities and challenges facing federal agencies, including NSF, DOE, and others, universities and research institutions as they adapt to these changes. The talk will further explore the opportunities for Wyoming, at UW, for the NWSC supercomputing center in Cheyenne, and for the state in terms of education and economic development. As computing techniques and their applications continue to evolve, our future will increasingly depend not only on advances in hardware but also on new approaches to software development, interdisciplinary collaboration, and workforce training in computational science. The University of Wyoming is at a unique moment in history to step up and seize the opportunity. Bio: Dr. Edward Seidel is President of the University of Wyoming and an internationally recognized leader in high-performance computing (HPC) and computational science. His research has focused on large-scale numerical simulations in gravitational physics and the development of advanced cyberinfrastructure to support data-intensive and simulation-driven science. Before joining the University of Wyoming, Dr. Seidel served as Vice President for Research and Innovation for the University of Illinois System and held leadership roles at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Earlier in his career, he directed the Center for Computation and Technology at Louisiana State University and held research positions at the Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics. His work has contributed to advances in computational methods and the use of large-scale computing for scientific discovery across multiple disciplines. |
