Curriculum Vitae

Download my complete academic CV (last updated: May 2011).

Personal Facts

Tom Van Cutsem
Born: 1982, Leuven, Belgium. Nationality: Belgian
PhD in Sciences (Dutch: Doctor in de Wetenschappen), Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB), 2008, Greatest Distinction;
Master of Science in Computer Science (Dutch: Licentiaat Informatica, equivalent by law to a MSc degree), Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB), 2004, Greatest Distinction
Language proficiency: Dutch (Mother Tongue), English (Fluent)
E-mail: tvcutsem at vub dot ac dot be

Experience

  • Feb 2010 - Present: Part-time Assistant Professor at the University of Brussels. Area of expertise: multi-core concurrent programming.
  • Nov 2009 - Apr 2010: Visiting Faculty at Google, Inc. in Google's HQ in Mountain View, CA, USA. Work on various proposals for the next edition of the ECMAScript (aka Javascript) standard.
  • 2008 - Present: Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Brussels. Post-doctoral researcher at the Software Languages Lab, University of Brussels. Area of expertise: programming language theory (especially concurrent, parallel and distributed languages and systems).
  • 2004 - 2008: Research assistant at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Brussels. Obtaining a PhD in computer science. Teaching assistant for Master-level courses such as Computer Graphics and Declarative Programming.
  • August 2001: Internship as software developer in a small software company called Business Solutions in Sint-Katelijne-Waver, Belgium. Maintaining a three-tier application (GUI front-end in VB, database back-end in Microsoft SQL Server).

For a list of my academic publications and talks have a look at my publications page.

Higher Education

  • 2004-2008: Obtained the degree of PhD in Sciences (Grade: Summa Cum Laude) at the Programming Technology Laboratory of the Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Brussels. Promotors: Prof. Dr. Wolfgang De Meuter and Prof. Dr. Theo D'Hondt. My research was funded by means of a grant from the Fund for Scientific Research, Flanders (FWO) which is Belgium's flemish science foundation. It is the most prestigious research funding organisation of the country, funding only first-rate researchers to perform fundamental research in any scientific discipline.
  • 2000-2004: Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Brussels. Obtained the degree of Master of Science in Computer Science (Licentiaat in de Informatica):
    • 1st year / 1ste kandidatuur (july 2001): Magna Cum Laude / Grote Onderscheiding
    • 2nd year / 2de kandidatuur (july 2002): Summa Cum Laude / Grootste Onderscheiding
    • 3rd year / 1ste licentie (july 2003): Summa Cum Laude / Grootste Onderscheiding
    • 4th year / 2de licentie (july 2004): Summa Cum Laude / Grootste Onderscheiding
    • Honors: Received the 'Science Award' of the VUB Faculty of Sciences in July 2004. Awarded yearly by the faculty of sciences to the student with the best merits seen across the entire career of study.

Achievements

  • Together with Mark Miller, developed a concrete proposal for extending the ECMAScript (Javascript) language with proxies.
  • Author of traits.js, a minimal trait composition library for Javascript.
  • Author of stm-in-clojure, a meta-circular implementation of software-transactional memory in Clojure for education.
  • Together with Stijn Mostinckx, designed and implemented the distributed, open-source AmbientTalk programming language.
  • As a CS student, worked on several programming projects including a compiler for a C-like language for the JVM written in C++, a mobile agent travel reservation system in Java, a FFT-based gene sequence detector in Pico and a primitive 3D rendering engine based on Binary Space Partitions, a text-based RPG, and a spreadsheet in PLT Scheme.

Technical Skills and Competences

Writing project proposals, reviewing papers, writing technical documents, research, guiding people, good software design and engineering skills.

I have experience in working in a software development team on small to medium-scale projects. In the context of my PhD research, I developed my own programming language in a team of 6 people. I managed most of the project: designing the system, coding the system, performing task management, version control, unit testing, bug tracking, website maintenance, etc. Task management included setting milestones, deadlines, dividing the work load between team members and the organization of meetings.

I am familiar with the traditional 'waterfall' model, but also have experience with agile programming, extreme programming and iterative development backed by rigorous unit testing.

Knowledge of: Java technology stack, Eclipse, C/C++, Scripting (Python, Ruby, Javascript), MySQL, CVS/SVN. Experience in a wide array of (academic and industrial) programming languages. Expert in object-oriented technology, software development (analysis, design, design patterns and implementation) and programming languages. Thorough knowledge of compiler- and interpreter development, distributed and concurrent platforms and frameworks and metaprogramming. Knowledge of web development (ruby on rails).

References

  • Prof. Dr. Wolfgang De Meuter, Professor at Vrije Universiteit Brussel, my promotor
  • Prof. Dr. Theo D'Hondt, Professor at Vrije Universiteit Brussel, my promotor
  • Dr. Jessie Dedecker, Software/Innovation Engineer at Sirris, former colleague
  • Dr. Mark Miller, research scientist at Google, my host and colleague while working at Google