Varun Jog
Contact
Information
431.4 Jon M. Huntsman Hall
3730 Walnut St.
Philadelphia, PA 19104
Phone: (510) 883-3017
E-mail: varunjog@wharton.upenn.edu
WWW: www-stat.wharton.upenn.edu/~varunjog
Research
Interests
Information theory, convex geometry, graphical models, networks
Employment
University of Pennsylvania, The Warren Center for Network & Data Sciences
Postdoctoral fellow
September 2015 — present
Jointly hosted by the Department of Statistics and Computer and Information Sciences (CIS)
Education
University of California, Berkeley
Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences, August 2015
Dissertation topic: “Convex geometric tools in information theory”
Advisor: Venkat Anantharam
India Institute of Technology, Bombay
B.Tech., Electrical Engineering, August 2010
Cumulative Performance Index: 9.55/10
Honors and
Awards
IEEE Jack Keil Wolf Best Paper Award at ISIT 2015
Eli Jury Award 2015, UC Berkeley EECS Department dissertation award for outstanding achievement in Systems, Communications, Control, or Signal Processing
EECS Berkeley Departmental Fellowship, 2010-2011
Represented India at the International Mathematics Olympiad (IMO), 2005-Mexico and 2006Slovenia, and was awarded bronze medals in both
Graduated ranked 2nd in EE Department, IIT-Bombay, 2010
Secured an all India rank of 110 in IIT-JEE entrance exam, 2006
Awarded National Talent Scholarship (NTSE) and Kishore Vaigyanik Protsahan Yojana Scholarship
(KVPY) in 2004 by the Government of India
Publications
and preprints
Jog. V. and Loh, P. 2015. Persistence of centrality in random growing trees. Submitted.
Jog. V. and Loh, P. 2015. Information-theoretic bounds for exact recovery in weighted stochastic
block models using the Renyi divergence. Proceedings of the Allerton Conference on Communication,
Control, and Computing, October 2015.
Jog, V. and Anantharam, V. 2015. On the geometry of convex typical sets. Proceedings of the IEEE
International Symposium on Information Theory (ISIT), June 2015
(Best paper award)
Jog, V. and Anantharam, V. 2015. A geometric analysis of the AWGN channel with a (σ, ρ)-power
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constraint. Proceedings of the IEEE International Symposium on Information Theory (ISIT), June
2015
Jog, V. and Loh, P. 2015. On model misspecification and KL separation for Gaussian graphical
models. Proceedings of the IEEE International Symposium on Information Theory (ISIT), June
2015
Jog, V. and Anantharam, V. 2014. An energy harvesting AWGN channel with a finite battery
Proceedings of the IEEE International Symposium on Information Theory (ISIT), 2014
Jog, V. and Anantharam, V. 2014. Convex relative entropy decay in Markov chains. Proceeding of
the Conference on Information Sciences and Systems (CISS), 2014
Jog, V. and Anantharam, V. 2014. The entropy power inequality and Mrs. Gerber’s lemma for
groups of order 2n . IEEE Transactions on Information Theory, vol. IT-60, 2014
Geng, Y., Jog, V., Nair. C., and Wang, Z. 2013. An information inequality and evaluation of
Marton’s inner bound for binary input broadcast channels. IEEE Transactions on Information
Theory, vol. IT-59, 2013
Jog, V. and Nair, C. 2010. An information inequality for the BSSC channel. Proceedings of the
Information Theory and Applications (ITA) workshop, 2010
Talks
“A geometric analysis of the AWGN channel with a (σ, ρ)-power constraint.” ISIT-2015, Hongkong,
June 2015
“On the geometry of convex typical sets.” Semi-plenary session at ISIT-2015, Hongkong, June
2015
“Convex geometric tools in information theory.” Networking and Communications Seminar, UC
Berkeley, May 2015
“Convex geometric tools in information theory.” ITA workshop, La Jolla, February 2015
“A geometric analysis of the AWGN channel with a (σ, ρ)-power constraint.” IIT-Bombay, Mumbai,
January 2015
“How fast does a cube + ball grow?” Simon’s Institute industry day talks, Berkeley, November 2014
“An energy harvesting AWGN channel with a finite battery.” ISIT-2014, Hawaii, July 2014
“Convex relative entropy decay in Markov chains.” CISS-2014, Princeton, March 2014
“The entropy power inequality and Mrs. Gerber’s lemma for groups of order 2n .” ISIT-2013, Istanbul,
July 2013
Teaching
Experience
EE-126: Probability and random processes
Graduate student instructor for EE-126
January 2015 - May 2015
GSI for the undergraduate course EE-126: Probability and random processes. Workload of 20
hours/week, which involved holding regular discussion sessions and office hours every week, preparing
exams and homeworks, and grading.
Instructor: Prof. Abhay Parekh
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EE-226A: Random processes and systems
Graduate student instructor for EE-226A
August 2014 - December 2014
GSI for the graduate course EE-226A: Random processes and systems. Workload of 10 hours/week,
which involved holding regular discussion sessions and office hours every other week, preparing
homeworks, and grading.
Instructor: Prof. Thomas Courtade
Work
Experience
Morgan Stanley, Mumbai, India
Quantitative Researcher
May 2010 - July 2010
Worked on creating mathematical models for pricing the American option.
Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong
Graduate student intern
May 2009 - August 2009
Research intern with Prof. Chandra Nair at the Department of Information Engineering. Worked
on a specific information inequality related to Shannon capacity of broadcast channels, which is a
long standing open problem.
Professional
Service
Reviewer, IEEE Transactions on Information Theory
Reviewer IEEE/ACM Transactions on Networking
Reviewer, IEEE International Symposium on Information Theory
Reviewer, IEEE Information Theory Workshop
Relevant
Courses
Statistical Learning Theory; Introduction to Convex Optimization; Random Processes and Systems
(A, B); Probability Theory (A, B); Topology and Measure Theory (A, B); Information Theory and
Coding; Information Theory and Statistics; Undecidability, Unsolvability, and Incompleteness.
Other
Activities
Organizer of the Networking, Communication and DSP (NCD) Seminar 2013-2015. This is a seminar
course in the EECS Department which has an invited talk once a week throughout the semester.
Berkeley electrical engineering graduate student association (EEGSA) officer, 2010-2011.
EECS Visit Day Host, 2013-2015. Hosted prospective students during their Berkeley visit.
Peer advisor for admitted students, 2015. Point of contact at Berkeley for two admitted students in
EECS, for all their questions about Berkeley and choosing graduate schools.
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