Maryam Fazel

Assistant Professor

Electrical Engineering Department,
University of Washington

Office: Paul Allen Center, CSE 230
Address:: University of Washington
Department of Electrical Engineering
Campus Box 352500
Seattle, WA 98195-2500
Phone: (206) 616-4781
Fax: (206) 543-3842
E-mail:: mfazel (at) ee(dot)washington(dot)edu
URL:: http://faculty.washington.edu/mfazel

I joined UW EE in December 2007. Prior to that, I was a Research Scientist at the Control and Dynamical Systems Department at Caltech. I received my PhD in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University where I was part of the Information Systems Lab.

News and Events

Link to the events page (including: weekly Compressed sensing reading group; Visitors; and Seminars):
Events Wiki page
Our group acknowledges new funding from NSF!
NSF CAREER Award ``Parsimonious Modeling via Matrix Rank Minimization" (9/2009--9/2014).

Research Interests

Broadly speaking: Convex optimization; systems and control theory

Current focus:

Matrix rank minimization and parsimonious modeling
- connection to compressed sensing and sparse signal recovery
- applications in: machine learning, system identification
- algorithms for rank minimization
Applications of convex optimization and control theory in systems biology

Other interests:

Algebraic methods in optimization, Sum of Squares relaxations
Network resource allocation; distributed optimization; optimization in communication networks

Research group

Students:

Karthik Mohan, Grad student in EE (BS IIT Bombay, India)

Dvijotham Krishnamurthy, Grad student in CSE (BS IIT Bombay, India)

De Meng, Grad student in EE (BS Zhejiang Univ, China)

Teaching

2009-2010:

EE/AA/ME 578: Optimization in System Sciences (a.k.a. Convex optimization and its applications)
Winter 2010

Topics in Convex Optimization
Spring 2010

2008-2009:

EE235: Continuous-time Linear Systems (Signals and Systems)
Spring 2009
Course Webpage

EE/AA/ME 578: Optimization in System Sciences (a.k.a. Convex optimization and its applications)
Winter 2009
Course Webpage

2007-2008:

EE/AA/ME/ChemE 591: Seminar series in Optimization and Engineering Applications
Spring 2008
Seminar Webpage

EE/AA/ME 578: Optimization in System Sciences
Winter 2008
Course Webpage
Course Announcement

Education

Ph.D. Electrical Engineering, Stanford University, CA, March 2002
M.S. Electrical Engineering, Stanford University, CA, June 1997
B.Sc. Electrical Engineering, Sharif University of Technology, Tehran, Iran, 1995

Publications

Preprints:

B. Recht, M. Fazel, P. Parrilo, Guaranteed Minimum-Rank Solutions of Linear Matrix Equations via Nuclear Norm Minimization. (updated version; August 2008)
Published in Journal or Peer-reviewed Conference:
N. Yamamoto, M. Fazel, Computational Approach to Quantum Encoder Design for Purity Optimization. Physical Review A, vol. 76, no. 1, July 2007. Available at http://link.aps.org/abstract/PRA/v76/e012327
B. Recht, M. Fazel, P. Parrilo, Guaranteed Minimum-Rank Solutions of Linear Matrix Equations via Nuclear Norm Minimization. Allerton Conference, Allerton House, Illinois, Sep 2007.
M. Lobo, M. Fazel, and S. Boyd, Portfolio Optimization with Linear and Fixed Transaction Costs. Annals of Operations Research, special issue on Financial Optimization, 152(1):376-394, July 2007.
D. Gayme, M. Fazel, J. Doyle, Complexity in Automation of SOS Proofs: An Illustrative Example. Proc. Conference on Decision and Control, San Diego, California, Dec 2006.
M. Fazel, D. Gayme, M. Chiang, Transient Analysis for Wireless Power Control. Proc. Globecom Conference, San Francisco, California, Nov 2006.
H. El-Samad, M. Fazel, X. Liu, A. Papachristodoulou, S. Prajna, Stochastic Reachability Analysis in Complex Biological Networks. Proc. American Control Conference, Minneapolis, Minnesota, June 2006.
A. Fakheri, M. Fazel, A Methodology for Optimization of Shell and Tube Heat Exchangers in Series . International Journal of Heat Exchangers, volume VII, number 1, June 2006.
M. Fazel, M. Chiang, Network Utility Maximization with Nonconcave Utilities Using Sum-of-Squares Method. Proc. Conference on Decision and Control, Seville, Spain, Dec 2005.
T.-M. Yi, M. Fazel, X. Liu, T. Otitoju, A. Papachristodoulou, S. Prajna, and J. Doyle, Application of Robust Model Validation Using SOSTOOLS to the Study of G-Protein Signaling in Yeast . In Proc. Foundations of Systems Biology and Engineering, Santa Barbara, California, August 2005.
M. Sharif, C. Florens, M. Fazel, B. Hassibi, Amplitude and Sign Adjustment for Peak to Average Power Reduction . IEEE trans. on Communications, volume 53, number 8, pp. 1243--1247, August 2005.
M. Fazel, H. Hindi, and S. Boyd, Rank Minimization and Applications in System Theory. Proc. American Control Conference, Boston,
Massachusetts, June 2004.
M. Sharif, C. Florens, M. Fazel, B. Hassibi, Peak to Average Power Reduction Using Amplitude and Sign Adjustment. Proc. International Conference on Communications, Paris, France, June 2004.
M. Fazel, H. Hindi, and S. Boyd, Log-det Heuristic for Matrix Rank Minimization with Applications to Hankel and Euclidean Distance Matrices. Proc. American Control Conference, Denver, Colorado, June 2003.
M. Fazel, H. Hindi, and S. Boyd, A Rank Minimization Heuristic with Application to Minimum Order System Approximation. Proc. American Control Conference, Arlington, Virginia, June 2001.
Technical reports:
M. Fazel, J. Goodman, Approximations for Partially Coherent Optical Imaging Systems. Technical Report, Stanford University, 1998.
M. Fazel, S. Boyd, T. Kailath, Electron-beam Proximity Correction Using Convex Optimization. Technical Report, Stanford University, 1997.

Ph.D. Thesis

Matrix Rank Minimization with Applications. Elec. Eng. Dept, Stanford University, March 2002.
Thesis: (ps file), (pdf file), (gzipped ps file)

Related papers:
- Log-det Heuristic for Matrix Rank Minimization with Applications to Hankel and Euclidean Distance Matrices (M. Fazel, H. Hindi, and S. Boyd).
- A Rank Minimization Heuristic with Application to Minimum Order System Approximation (M. Fazel, H. Hindi, and S. Boyd).
- Portfolio Optimization with Linear and Fixed Transaction Costs and Bounds on Risk (M. Lobo, M. Fazel, and S. Boyd).
- Rank Minimization and Applications in System Theory (M. Fazel, H. Hindi, and S. Boyd). A short tutorial paper on rank minimization.

*** Page under construction! ***
Last modified: March 2009