Francesco Restuccia
Assistant Professor,
Electrical and Computer Engineering
Office
- 670B EXP
- 617.373.3655
Research Focus
Resilient and Efficient AI/ML, Mobile Computing, FPGAs, Embedded Systems, Wireless Networking
About
Dr. Restuccia’s research aims at creating new and unconventional pathways to push the performance and resilience of mobile computing and networking beyond what is possible today.
Dr. Restuccia’s research is supported by research grants from the National Science Foundation and the Department of Defense. He is the recipient of the 2025 DARPA Young Faculty Award, 2023 ONR Young Investigator Award, 2023 AFOSR Young Investigator Award, and 2019 Mario Gerla Award in Computer Science, Søren Buus Outstanding Research Award from the College of Engineering, and received Best Paper Awards at IEEE INFOCOM and IEEE WOWMOM. He is a Senior Member of IEEE and ACM and serves in the TPC and editorial boards of several prestigious journals and conferences.
Education
- PhD in Computer Science, Missouri S&T, 2016
- MS in Computer Engineering, University of Pisa, 2011
- BS in Computer Engineering, University of Pisa, 2009
Honors & Awards
- 2025 DARPA Young Faculty Award
- 2025 IEEE INFOCOM Best Paper Award
- 2025 Søren Buus Outstanding Research Award
- 2023 AFOSR Young Investigator Award
- 2023 ONR Young Investigator Award
- 2022 IEEE WOWMOM Best Paper Award
- 2022 IEEE INFOCOM Best Paper Award
- 2021 Communications of the ACM Research Highlight
- 2020 ACM SIGMOBILE Research Highlight
- 2019 Mario Gerla Young Investigator Award
Professional Affiliations
- IEEE Senior Member
- ACM Senior Member
Research Overview
Resilient and Efficient AI/ML, Mobile Computing, FPGAs, Embedded Systems, Wireless Networking
Selected Research Projects
- Securing xApps in Open RANs with Reliable and Principled AI Red-Teaming
- – Principal Investigator, National Science Foundation
- Superconducting Deep Neural Networks at the Edge
- DARPA
- FuSe: Deep Learning and Signal Processing using Silicon Photonics and Digital CMOS Circuits for Ultra-Wideband Spectrum Perception
- – Principal Investigator, National Science Foundation
- Resilient-by-Design Data-Driven NextG Open Radio Access Networks
- – Principal Investigator, National Science Foundation
- Assured Wireless Operations Through Dynamic Data-Driven Open Radio Access Systems
- – Principal Investigator, Air Force Office of Scientific Research
- Polymorphic Wireless Computing for Ultra-Wideband 6G Spectrum Dominance
- – Principal Investigator, Office of Naval Research
- Collaborative Research: SWIFT: AI-based Sensing for Improved Resiliency via Spectral Adaptation with Lifelong Learning
- – Principal Investigator, National Science Foundation
- Self-Adaptive Interference-Avoiding Wireless Receiver Hardware through Real-Time Learning-Based Automatic Optimization of Power-Efficient Integrated Circuits
- – Principal Investigator, National Science Foundation
- A Software-Defined Edge Infrastructure Testbed for Full-stack Data-Driven Wireless Network Applications
- – Principal Investigator, National Science Foundation
- RINGS: Internet of Things Resilience through Spectrum-Agile Circuits, Learning-Based Communications and Thermal Hardware Security
- – co-Principal Investigator, National Science Foundation
- Collaborative Research: NeTS: Small: Reliable Task Offloading in Mobile Autonomous Systems Through Semantic MU-MIMO Control
- – PI, National Science Foundation
- Collaborative Research: CCRI: New: RFDataFactory: Principled Dataset Generation, Sharing and Maintenance Tools for the Wireless Community
- – co-PI, National Science Foundation
Research Centers and Institutes
Department Research Areas
Selected Publications
- F. Restuccia, T. Melodia, DeepWiERL: Bringing Deep Reinforcement Learning to the Internet of Self-Adaptive Things, Proceedings of IEEE INFOCOM, 2020
- F. Restuccia, T. Melodia, PolymoRF: Polymorphic Wireless Receivers Through Physical-Layer Deep Learning, Proceedings of ACM MobiHoc, October 2020
- S. D’Oro, L. Bonati, F. Restuccia, M. Polese, M. Zorzi, T. Melodia, Sl-EDGE: Network Slicing at the Edge, Proceedings of ACM MobiHoc, October 2020
- S. D’Oro, F. Restuccia, T. Melodia, Toward Operator-to-Waveform 5G Radio Access Network Slicing, IEEE Communications Magazine, 58(4), 2020
Sep 23, 2025
2025 Stanford University Annual Assessment of Author Citations
The following COE professors are among the top scientists worldwide selected by Stanford University representing the top 2% of the most-cited scientists with single-year impact in various disciplines. The selection is based on the top 100,000 by c-score (with and without self-citations) or a percentile rank of 2% or above.
Sep 09, 2025
Restuccia Receives DARPA Young Faculty Award to Study Resilient AI in Autonomous Systems
ECE Assistant Professor Francesco Restuccia received a Young Faculty Award from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) that will provide research funding for “RADAR: Resource-Aware Dynamic Adaptation for Resilient DNNs in Low-SWaP Tactical Systems.”
Aug 26, 2025
Patent for a Method to Improve Wireless Communication with AI
ECE Assistant Professor Francesco Restuccia and ECE William Lincoln Smith Professor Tommaso Melodia received a patent for “System for frequency sharing in open radio access networks using artificial intelligence.”
Aug 06, 2025
Building the Future of AI-Ready Wireless Testbeds
ECE Assistant Professor Francesco Restuccia and ECE Professor & Associate Dean for Research Josep Jornet, in collaboration with Princeton University, Florida International University, and SUNY Polytechnic Institute, were awarded a $200,000 NSF grant for “DHARMA.AI Digital Hardware + Analog-RF for Multifunctional Apertures with AI.”
Jul 29, 2025
Securing the Next-Generation of AI-Driven Cellular Networks
ECE Assistant Professor Francesco Restuccia, in collaboration with Saint Louis University, was awarded a $900,000 NSF grant for “Securing xApps in Open RANs with Reliable and Principled AI Red-Teaming.”
Mar 13, 2025
AI Tool Could Improve Performance of AR/VR Glasses
ECE Assistant Professor Francesco Restuccia and two PhD students developed an AI tool that helps improve the performance of AR/VR applications, which could lead to less bulky and more esthetic AR/VR glasses.
Feb 07, 2025
Patent for AI-Driven Wireless Beam Management
ECE Principal Research Scientist Michele Polese, Assistant Professor Francesco Restuccia, and Professor Tommaso Melodia were awarded a patent for “Coordination-free mmWave beam management with deep waveform learning.”
Jan 31, 2025
2024 Stanford University Annual Assessment of Author Citations
The following COE professors are among the top scientists worldwide selected by Stanford University representing the top 2% of the most-cited scientists with single-year impact in various disciplines. The selection is based on the top 100,000 by c-score (with and without self-citations) or a percentile rank of 2% or above. The list below includes those who published a paper in 2024 or later.
Jan 30, 2025
Faculty and Staff Awards 2025
Faculty and staff were recognized at the 27th Annual College of Engineering Faculty and Staff Awards for their exceptional service and dedication in support of students, the COE community, and the university during the 2024-2025 academic year.
Jan 14, 2025
Research Uncovers Wi-Fi Security Vulnerability
ECE Assistant Professor Francesco Restuccia is one of several authors of new research that has uncovered a significant security vulnerability in wireless technology found in nearly every Wi-Fi system. The findings will be presented in May at the IEEE International Conference on Computer Communications (INFOCOM).