We are pleased to congratulate Mark Harman on winning the 2019 IEEE Computer Society’s Harlan D. Mills award. Established in memory of Harlan D. Mills, the award recognizes researchers and practitioners who have made lasting, meaningful contributions to the field of software engineering. Mark’s best-known contribution is search-based software engineering (SBSE), described in his co-authored paper Search Based Software Engineering: Trends, Techniques and Applications as an “approach to software engineering in which search-based optimization algorithms are used to address problems in software engineering.” To learn more about the work that won Mark the award, see this article on code.fb.

Mark joined Facebook London in 2017 where he currently manages the Sapienz team. In addition to his full-time role at Facebook, Mark is a part-time professor of computer science at University College London (UCL), working as one of several Facebook researchers bridging the gap between academia and industry. In his interview with IEEE Computer Society, Mark delves into partnerships like these and how they are mutually beneficial, to both academics and industry professionals. “[Facebook] is full of interesting, challenging, scientific problems. There are far too many for just us to solve on our own,” he explains. “[And] as a scientist in an engineering discipline, you want to see the work used.”

Facebook engages with academia through a variety of programs, including events such as the Testing and Verification (TAV) Symposium, which aims to build meaningful collaboration and exchange between Testing and Verification scientific research and academia and industry. The symposium included a one-day TAV workshop, where the winners of the Testing and Verification research award were invited to share their winning proposals. Mark organized and emceed the second annual TAV Symposium at Facebook London in November 2018.

You can read the full interview on the IEEE Computer Society website at publications.computer.org.