Highlights from the UNLV Department of Computer Science — department milestones, research awards, and student achievements. For the full story, follow the links to the official UNLV News Center.
UNLV's Computer Science program appears in the 2026 U.S. News & World Report Best Computer Science Schools rankings — a point of pride for our faculty, students, and stakeholders.
View the RankingsSTUDENT ACHIEVEMENT
Team UNLV took first in the nation at the NSA-sponsored National Centers of Academic Excellence (NCAE) Cyber Games Invitational, following a regional event that drew more than 1,100 students. The team drew from Layer Zero, the WiCyS Student Chapter, and the UNLV Cyber Clinic.
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Approved by the Nevada System of Higher Education, the new Nevada Institute of Cybersecurity is a statewide, interdisciplinary hub for cybersecurity research, workforce development, and community education — directed in part by CS faculty.
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Dr. Chuck Tessler and Dr. John Businge each received a National Science Foundation CAREER award — among the most competitive early-career honors in the field — to advance their research programs.
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Dr. Shaikh Arifuzzaman is leading a three-year collaboration with the University of Kansas under NSF's Collaborations in Artificial Intelligence and Geosciences program — over $1 million total, with a $590,000 award to UNLV — applying AI and scalable computing to Earth-system science.
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Dr. Mingon Kang and graduate researcher Louis Dumontet published PEPIC, an explainable AI framework that predicts plastic-degrading enzymes across nine substrate types, in Applied and Environmental Microbiology — surfacing a new candidate enzyme for PET degradation.
Learn MoreNEWSLETTER
The department published its inaugural newsletter, with a note from Chair Laxmi Gewali and highlights spanning the Nevada Institute of Cybersecurity, three new NSF grants, the NCAE Cyber Games win, and faculty research. See the department site for the latest issues.
Visit the CS DepartmentThe latest university headlines are published on the UNLV News Center.
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