Kesha Hietala

PhD Student
Computer Science
University of Maryland
kesha@cs.umd.edu

Hi, my name is Kesha and I am a graduate student in Programming Languages at the University of Maryland. My advisor is Mike Hicks. I am interested broadly in program analysis and verification. Recently my focus has been on analyzing programs that run on quantum computers and verifying compilers for quantum circuits.

Publications

• Finding Substitutable Binary Code By Synthesizing Adapters
  Vaibhav Sharma, Kesha Hietala, Stephen McCamant
  Transactions on Software Engineering (TSE), 2019


• Formal Verification vs. Quantum Uncertainty [pdf]
  Robert Rand, Kesha Hietala, Michael Hicks
  Summit on Advances in Programming Languages (SNAPL), 2019


• Quantitative Robustness Analysis of Quantum Programs [pdf]
  Shih-Han Hung, Kesha Hietala, Shaopeng Zhu, Mingsheng Ying, Michael Hicks, Xiaodi Wu
  Principles of Programming Languages (POPL), 2019


• Volume-Based Merge Heuristics for Disjunctive Numeric Domains
  Andrew Ruef, Kesha Hietala, Arlen Cox
  Static Analysis Symposium (SAS), 2018


• Finding Substitutable Binary Code for Reverse Engineering by Synthesizing Adapters
  Vaibhav Sharma, Kesha Hietala, Stephen McCamant
  International Conference on Software Testing, Verification and Validation (ICST), 2018

Drafts

• A Verified Optimizer for Quantum Circuits [pdf, github]
  Kesha Hietala, Robert Rand, Shih-Han Hung, Xiaodi Wu, Michael Hicks
  In submission.


• Quantum Programming Languages [pdf]
  Kesha Hietala
  Writeup for a class project, December 2016. Written for readers with a basic understanding of quantum computation and no background in programming languages.


• Detecting Behaviorally-Equivalent Functions via Symbolic Execution [pdf]
  Kesha Hietala
  Undergraduate Thesis, May 2016

Posters and Presentations

• Tracking Errors through Types in Quantum Programs [abstract, slides, video]
  Kesha Hietala, Robert Rand, Michael Hicks
  Presented by Robert Rand at PLanQC 2020.


• A Verified Optimizer for Quantum Circuits [abstract, slides, video]
  Kesha Hietala, Robert Rand, Shih-Han Hung, Xiaodi Wu, Michael Hicks
  Presented with Kartik Singhal at PLanQC 2020.


• Verified Optimization in a Quantum Intermediate Representation [poster, abstract, slides]
  Kesha Hietala, Robert Rand, Shih-Han Hung, Xiaodi Wu, Michael Hicks
  Poster presented at NISQ 2019 and extended abstract presented at QPL 2019. For more recent developments, see A Verified Optimizer for Quantum Circuits.


• Finding Semantically Equivalent Binary Code By Synthesizing Adaptors [poster]
  Kesha Hietala, Vaibhav Sharma, Stephen McCamant
  Poster presented at the 2017 Grad Cohort Workshop.


• Approaches to Compiling Functional Languages [slides]
  Kesha Hietala
  Two-part lecture given to a seminar on functional programming, University of Minnesota, May 2016.


• A Comparison of Approaches to Compiling Functional Programming Languages [poster]
  Kesha Hietala
  Poster presented at the University of Minnesota Spring 2015 Undergraduate Research Symposium and Winchell Undergraduate Research Symposium, May 2015.

Teaching

• Teaching Assistant, Organization of Programming Languages (CMSC 330), University of Maryland, Fall 2017 & Spring 2018
• Teaching Assistant, Advanced Programming Principles (CSCI 2041), University of Minnesota, Fall 2014 & Spring 2015

Graduate Coursework

• Programming Languages
  • UMN CSCI 5106 Programming Languages
  • UMN CSCI 5161 Introduction to Compilers
  • UMD CMSC 631 Program Analysis and Understanding
  • UMD CMSC 838M Model Checking
  • UMD ENEE 645 Compilers and Optimization


• Security
  • UMN CSCI 5271 Introduction to Computer Security
  • UMN CSCI 5471 Modern Cryptography
  • UMD CMSC 818O Computer and Network Security


• Misc. Math
  • UMN MATH 5248 Cryptology and Number Theory
  • UMN CSCI 5251 Error-Correcting Codes, Finite Fields, Algebraic Curves
  • UMN MATH 5165 Mathematical Logic I
  • UMD CMSC 666 Numerical Analysis I


• Misc. CS
  • UMD CMSC 858K Introduction to Quantum Information Processing
  • UMD CMSC 714 High Performance Computing Systems
  • UMD CMSC 651 Analysis of Algorithms

Service

• Student volunteer at POPL 2020
• Organizer for UMD’s PL reading group, Fall 2018 & Spring 2019
• Mentor for Technica hackathon, 2018 and 2019
• Volunteer for Girls Talk Math summer camp, 2018
• Sub-reviewer for CCS 2017, Oakland S&P 2017, RC 2019, PLDI 2020, QCTIP 2020

Personal

My hobbies include painting, pottery, and spending time with my three cats. My husband, Thomas Rolinger, is also a graduate student in Computer Science at UMD. He focuses on high performance computing.