Jussi Kangasharju is vising ICSI's Networking and Security group through our Finnish visiting program, which is funded by the Finnish Funding Agency for Technology and Innovation through Aalto University and the Helsinki Institute for Information Technology.

Jussi received his master's degree in computer science at the Helsinki University of Technology in 1998. He did his doctoral work at the University of Nice Sophia Antipolis and at Eurecom Institute, receiving his degree in 2002. He went on to the Technical University of Darmstadt, first as a postdoc and then as an assistant professor. He returned to Finland, his home country, in 2007, to take a position as a professor at the University of Helsinki. He is on a one-year leave from the university, spending the first half as a vising professor at Seoul National University. He will finish the year here at ICSI. His interests include information-centric, opportunistic, and green networking.

Exactum Greenhouse, University of Helsinki

For example, his group in Finland has been working on sustainable ways of cooling data centers, which, because they comprise large numbers of machines in enclosed spaces, get very warm. Rather than using air conditioners and pumping out the hot air, the group designed and built a greenhouse. Servers are placed in a separate structure and cool air is pumped from outside; the warm air is pumped into the greenhouse, where tomatoes and chili peppers grow.

He's also interested in opportunistic networks, particularly floating content. The idea came when he and his colleagues planned over email to meet at a train station and then decide on a place for drinks. After waiting ten minutes, those who had shown up decided to leave - but they also started thinking about technology that would make it possible to leave a virtual note for those who were running late. This is possible by passing data on to mobile phones that are within a certain area. When someone leaves the area, the note is deleted but has been (hopefully) passed on to other phones. More generally, he's interested in how we can take advantage of the huge amounts of information each person carries with him or her through smartphones and other devices. While at ICSI, he will work with Research Initiatives director Scott Shenker on information-centric networks and new network architectures.

Jussi is here with his wife, daughter (aged 5), and son (aged 2). He enjoys cooking and photography (although lately his subjects have been mostly children).