Celebrating impact, discovery and research leadership: Dean’s Awards for Research and Graduate Research Excellence
The Monash University Faculty of Information Technology’s 2026 Dean’s Awards for Research and Graduate Research Excellence recognise outstanding research, leadership, impact and graduate research achievement across the Faculty.
This year’s recipients are advancing sustainable transport, healthcare, cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, clean energy and accessibility, while supporting the next generation of researchers.
“Research excellence is about creating knowledge that has impact, building strong collaborations and supporting future researchers. This year’s recipients demonstrate the breadth and quality of research across the Faculty, and the many ways their work is making a difference within academia, industry and the wider community,” said Professor Jesper Kjeldskov, Deputy Dean (Research) at the Faculty of IT.
This year, the Faculty recognises recipients across six award categories.
Early Career Researcher of the Year Award
Recognising research excellence and impact by early career researchers.
Just three years post-PhD, Dr Saman Ahmadi has built an internationally recognised research program in artificial intelligence and sustainable transport. His award-winning algorithms and ARC Early Career Industry Fellowship reflect the strength of his work, while his leadership of the RouteCharge platform has contributed to more than $4 million in funded electric fleet optimisation projects.
Researcher of the Year Award
Recognising sustained research excellence and leadership.
Professor Ron Steinfeld has made landmark contributions to post-quantum cryptography, with foundational research underpinning the 2024 US National Institute of Standards and Technology standards. A recipient of the IACR 2024 ASIACRYPT Test of Time Award, his algorithms are deployed in Google Chrome and downloaded more than 3.45 million times each month.
Ariel Liebman Award for Excellence in Research Engagement and Impact
Recognising outstanding economic or societal impact through research.
ADAPt Research Team
Led by Associate Professor Michael Wybrow, the ADAPt Research Team is transforming how hospitals monitor healthcare quality and safety. Its co-designed dashboards convert electronic medical record data into real-time accreditation insights, freeing hundreds of clinician hours annually, and are currently deployed at Eastern Health with expansion underway across Victoria.
Research Team of the Year Award
Recognising teams achieving exceptional research outcomes through collaboration.
Monash Post-Quantum Cryptography Team
The Monash Post-Quantum Cryptography Team has made significant contributions to cybersecurity, with foundational work underpinning two 2024 US NIST standards. Led by Professor Ron Steinfeld, Associate Professor Amin Sakzad and Dr Muhammed Esgin, the team’s work includes implementations downloaded more than 30 million times and Plover – the world’s first efficient lattice signature resistant to side-channel attacks.
Dean’s Award for Excellence by a Graduate Research Student
Recognising outstanding research achievement by graduate research students.
Chenchen Tan’s research tackles a critical challenge in trustworthy AI: enabling large language models to selectively forget sensitive or outdated information without losing their core capabilities. Her three first-author papers have appeared at leading venues including ICML and NeurIPS.
M Tasdik Hasan co-created the first Bangla Mental Health Sign Language Bank, addressing a major gap in how Deaf communities in Bangladesh communicate about emotional distress. Developed through participatory design, the project introduced more than 60 terms and has been recognised internationally and through national media.
Jinhao Li
Just two years into his PhD, Jinhao Li has produced 15 peer-reviewed publications with 168 citations, including work in IEEE Transactions on Smart Grid and Applied Energy. His research uses AI to help make clean energy technologies more reliable in real-world grids and accelerate decarbonisation.
In just two years of his PhD, Conghui Li has published seven papers across Q1 journals and leading conferences, including a NeurIPS 2025 paper believed to be the first with sole Monash Malaysia affiliation. His research spans structural health monitoring, battery life prediction and real-world industrial applications.
Dean’s Award for Excellence in Graduate Research Supervision
Recognising exceptional supervision, mentoring and training of graduate research students.
Associate Professor Amin Sakzad
Over the past five years, Associate Professor Amin Sakzad has supervised seven PhD completions in cryptography and cybersecurity, with all students receiving only minor thesis revisions. His graduates have gone on to competitive roles at CSIRO, ANU, La Trobe University and AWS.
Congratulations to all of this year’s recipients, whose work reflects the research excellence, collaboration, impact and commitment to developing future researchers that strengthens the Faculty’s research community.