Kalyan Nakka
Graduate Assistant - Research
2nd year Doctoral Student, SPIES Research Lab
Department of Computer Science & Engineering
Texas A&M University, College Station, TX
I am a Doctoral student in the Department of Computer Science & Engineering, Texas A&M University at College Station (TAMU). I am advised by Dr. Nitesh Saxena at SPIES research lab, and my research interest lies in the intersection of Adversarial ML and AI Security, focused on AI systems of Small Language Models (SLMs) and Large Language Models (LLMs).
I received my Masters degree (Thesis) from Texas A&M University at Kingsville (TAMUK) in 2023. At TAMUK, I had the oppurtunity to work with Dr. Habib M. Ammari at WiSeMAN Research Lab, on designing reliable, fault-tolerant and energy-efficient Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs), and with Dr. Taesic Kim at CPPES Lab, on the cybersecurity of Distributed Energy Resources (DERs) and Smart Grid.
Prior to joining TAMUK, I was a Senior Software Engineer with 5 years of professional experience (2016-2021), and received my Bachelors degree from Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) at Dhanbad in 2016. At IIT, I worked on the project of Computer-aided design and simulation of Automobile components subjected to various experimental conditions, under the supervision of Prof. L. A. Kumaraswamidhas.
Apart from researching, I am very fond of drawing pencil sketches, creating ambigrams, watching Anime/TV Series/Movies, and playing Video games.
News
Our paper on LiteLMGuard is accepted in IJCNLP-AACL 2025 conference.
Presented our work on developing LiteLMGuard, an On-Device Guardrails for SLMs, at Texas A&M Global Cyber Research Institute Annual Summit 2025.
Our paper on St-k-InDi, a stochastic connected k-coverage protocol for 2D-WSNs, is accepted in STWiMob workshop @ IEEE WiMob 2025 conference.
Our paper on ML framework for assessing cryptographic indistinguishability, led by Jimmy Dani, is accepted in PST 2025 conference.
Presented our On-Device SLMs study at Texas A&M Initiative for Connected Intelligence 2025 Workshop.
Our paper on Het-k-CSqu, a heterogeneous connected k-coverage protocol for 2D-WSNs, is accepted in ACM TOSN journal.
Our paper on blockchain-assisted resilient control platform for DERs, led by Seerin Ahmad, is accepted in IEEE Access journal.
Presented our On-Device SLMs study, for understanding their trust and ethics gap, at Texas A&M Global Cyber Research Institute Annual Summit 2024.
Our paper on blockchain-based security platform for solar farms, led by Bohyun Ahn, is accepted in IEEE ECCE 2024 conference.
Started as a Ph.D. student at CSE @ TAMU, advised by Dr. Nitesh Saxena in the SPIES Research Lab.
Our paper on k-InDi, a connected k-coverage protocol for 2D-WSNs, is accepted in AdHoc Networks journal.
Our paper on PQC-grade IEEE 2030.5 network for DERs, is accepted in IEEE ISGT 2024 conference.
Our paper on k-CSqu is accepted in JPDC journal.
Our paper on St-k-CSqu, a stochastic connected k-coverage protocol for 2D-WSNs, is accepted in IEEE ISCC 2023 conference.
I received my M.S. degree from EECS @ TAMUK. I deeply appreciate all the support and help from my family, advisor, collaborators, and friends!
Received the Distinguished Student Award from College of Graduate Studies @ TAMUK. Many thanks for the acknowledgment.
Presented our work developing k-CSqu, a connected k-coverage protocol for 2D-WSNs, at Texas A&M Graduate Science and Engineering Research Colloquium 2023.
Successfully defended my Master's Thesis at TAMUK, advised by Dr. Habib M. Ammari in the WiSeMAN Research Lab.
Presented (virtually) our work on PQC-grade IEEE 2030.5 network for DERs, at SunSpec Alliance Annual Meeting 2022.
Received the Dean's Merit Scholarship from College of Engineering @ TAMUK. Many thanks for the support.
Received the Rockwell International Scholarship and Computer Science Graduate Scholarship from EECS @ TAMUK. Many thanks for the support.
Started as a M.S. student at EECS @ TAMUK.