James Tuck

About

Tuck received his BE (1999) from Vanderbilt University and his MS (2003) and Ph.D. (2007) from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He has been awarded two IEEE Micro Top Picks Paper Awards, honoring the papers most likely to impact industry. He is a member of Tau Beta Phi, AAAS, and a Senior Member of the IEEE and ACM. His current research focuses on data storage and computation in DNA. This involves" encoding and decoding for DNA as a communication channel; novel molecular organizations to allow dense and sustainable operation of DNA storage systems; and modeling thermodynamic properties of DNA. He was named as Interim Department Head of Electrical and Computer Engineering in May 2026. Before that, we served as the Senior Associate Head for Undergraduate Affairs from 2024 to 2026.

Education

• Ph.D. 2007 Computer ScienceUniversity of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
• Master's 2003 Electrical and Computer EngineeringUniversity of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
• Bachelor's 1999 Computer EngineeringVanderbilt University, Nashville