Monash student awarded summer internship at IBM India

A PhD student from the Faculty of IT has recently been successful with the award of a prestigious internship with the IBM India Research Laboratory.

The 2008 Summer Internship Program in Computer Science, Mathematical Science and Service Science, Management & Engineering is offered in New Delhi and Bangalore. The selected students have the opportunity to work closely with an outstanding research team on challenging problems that range from leading-edge exploratory work to prototyping real-world systems and applications. During the summer internship, the students will also have the opportunity to participate in the dynamic technical environment of the largest Industrial research organisation in the world and network with other top students from many different fields and universities.

Saguna will be working from June 2, 2008 until August 22, 2008 at the IBM India Research Laboratory in Delhi, India. IBM provides airfare to/from Australia and a stipend to cover her living expenses while in India.

After completing her undergraduate studies at home in India, Saguna came to Monash’s Caulfield campus as an international student to finish her postgraduate studies. 

A project undertaken in the final year of her Bachelors degree led to an interest in the field of Networks and Communications for Saguna. It involved the design of a Network Management System (NMS) and she realised that there was a lot more in this field that she wanted to learn. “I wanted to enhance my skills to become the best in the industry,” she says. Saguna’s areas of research interest are Mobile, pervasive and ubiquitous computing, Context-aware systems, Wireless communications and Internetworking. 

Saguna graduated with a Postgraduate Diploma in Digital Communications in 2006 and a Master of Information Technology (Minor Thesis) in 2007. She is confident of her research skills after successfully completing her master’s thesis. “I learned that with an open and curious mind along with hard work, you can overcome all obstacles and succeed. Research taught me to work independently and to persevere, no matter what comes in your way. I believe with my degree from Monash I will be able to achieve my goals and become a leader in my field.”

Saguna's hard work and research methods training, along with significant guidance from her supervisor Assoc. Prof Arkady Zaslavsky at the Faculty of IT have been rewarded with a PhD scholarship and she has just commenced her doctoral thesis in 2008, again under the supervision of Assoc. Prof. Zaslavsky.

Saguna’s proposed PhD thesis topic relates to the field of  “Context Awareness and Mobile Computing”  and this is very closely aligned to the IBM Internship project she will be working on: Telecom Research Integrating the device in Telecom Applications.

"The internship will be crucial in my understanding of how one of the world's biggest research labs undertakes research projects and develops new technology. I believe this experience will be valuable for my PhD," she says.

Staff at the Faculty of IT extend their congratulations to Saguna on her outstanding achievements and wish her the best for her future research study.

Further information about the IBM Internship program can be viewed here