Nihar Bhadresh Shah, an associate professor in the School of Computer Science's Machine Learning Department and Computer Science Department, received an inaugural alumni award from the Indian Institute of Science (IISc).

The IISc, a research university in Bengaluru, recognizes notable alumni who have made significant contributions in their fields of study, society and more. Shah was selected as one of two recipients for a new award, the Young Alumnus/Alumnae Medal, which recognizes a notable alumni younger than 40.

Shah's research focuses on two main areas: distributed human evaluations and research on research. His work on the former deals with processes that occur when a set of items are assessed by a group of individuals; for example, how papers are peer-reviewed. Shah aims to address the challenges, such as fraud or biases, that arise when evaluations are decentralized. Shah has developed algorithms used in the peer review process for tens of thousands of papers submitted for publication. His work also looks to address issues in scientific research and evaluations.

Shah received his master of engineering in telecommunication from IISc before earning his Ph.D. at the University of California, Berkeley. He joined the School of Computer Science in 2017.