Olgica Milenkovic facts for kids

Olgica Milenkovic is a brilliant scientist who works with computers and information. She's an expert in something called coding theory, which is all about how we can store and send information safely and efficiently. She's especially known for her work on compressed sensing, which helps us get a lot of information from a little bit of data, and low-density parity-check codes, which are special ways to find and fix errors in data. She also explores how we can use DNA to store huge amounts of digital information! She is a professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign.

Her Journey in Science

Olgica Milenkovic grew up in what used to be called Yugoslavia. She started her university studies at the University of Niš in 1996. There, she earned her first degree in electrical engineering. Her project was about how much information different types of signals could carry.

Advanced Studies

After that, she moved to the University of Michigan in the United States. She continued her studies there, focusing on how to store information on things like computer hard drives and CDs. She earned her master's degree in 2001.

She then completed her Ph.D. at the University of Michigan in 2002. Her Ph.D. research looked at tricky math problems related to how computer programs work and how to create special codes for information.

Teaching and Research

After finishing her Ph.D., Dr. Milenkovic began teaching at the University of Colorado Boulder. In 2007, she moved to the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign. She became a full professor there in 2015. This means she is a top expert and leader in her field.

In 2019, she helped lead a special project. This project focused on the amazing work of another scientist named V.I. Levenshtein.

Amazing Discoveries

Dr. Milenkovic's research is super interesting! One of her big projects involves using DNA to store digital information. Imagine storing entire Wikipedia articles or famous speeches like the Gettysburg Address inside tiny strands of DNA! This could be a way to store huge amounts of data for a very long time.

Awards and Honors

Dr. Milenkovic has received several important awards for her work:

• The NSF Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Award. This award helps promising young professors with their research.
• The DARPA Young Faculty Award. DARPA is a special agency that supports new technologies.
• The Dean's Excellence in Research Award. This award recognizes her outstanding research at the university.

Special Recognition

In 2015, Dr. Milenkovic was chosen as a distinguished lecturer for the IEEE Information Theory Society. This means she traveled to share her knowledge with other scientists.

In 2018, she was elected as a Fellow of the IEEE. Being a "Fellow" is a very high honor. It means she is recognized as a top expert in her field. She received this honor for her important work on how to compress and understand genetic information.