Kaikai Liu

Kaikai Liu

Associate Professor
(408) 924-7847
Kaikai.liu@sjsu.edu
ENG257
 

Bio

Kaikai Liu is an Associate Professor, NVIDIA University Ambassador, and Cisco Corporate Chair Professor in the Department of Computer Engineering. His research focuses on Intelligent and Autonomous Systems, Deep Learning and Large Language Models (LLMs), Multimodal LLMs, Artificial Intelligence of Things (AIoT), Integrated Sensing and Communication (ISAC), and AI for Radio Access Networks (AI-RAN). He has published over 50 peer-reviewed journal and conference papers, authored one book, and holds four patents (licensed by three companies). He earned his Ph.D. in Computer Engineering from the University of Florida (UF), advised by Dr. Xiaolin (Andy) Li, and was a member of the NSF Big Learning Center (formerly the Scalable Software Systems Laboratory).

Dr. Liu’s research has been supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF), the Hawaii Department of Health, the Knight Foundation, and industry leaders including Intel, Arista, and Cisco. He currently serves as Principal Investigator (PI) of an NSF-funded project under the Resilient and Intelligent Next-Generation Systems (RINGS) program—NSF’s largest effort to date engaging public and private partners such as Google, Apple, Intel, Qualcomm, Ericsson, and IBM. SJSU's team lead by Dr. Liu is one of only seven RINGS award recipient teams in California, alongside UC Berkeley, UCLA, USC, UCSD, and UCSB.

He has been honored with awards such as, four Outstanding Achievement Awards from UF, the Apple WWDC Scholarship (2013 and 2014), the Innovator Award from the UF Office of Technology Licensing (2014), the NSF I-Corps Top Team Award (Bay Area, 2015), the UF Gator Engineering Attribute Award for Creativity (2015), and multiple best paper and demo awards (IEEE SWC 2017, IEEE SECON 2016, ACM SenSys 2016). Additional recognitions include the CoE Kordestani Endowed Research Professorship (2016), the CoE Research Professor Award (2017 and 2018), the Faculty Mentoring Award for CSU Student Competition (2018), and the College of Engineering Award for Excellence in Scholarship (2020).

Dr. Liu has also played key leadership roles in service and innovation. He has served as Technical Program Chair for IEEE Mobile Cloud (2020, 2023) and as a program committee member and reviewer for numerous IEEE/ACM conferences and journals. 

Since 2022, Dr. Liu has served on SJSU’s Patent Review Board, where he helped establish the university’s patent review process. In 2024, he was granted the title of NVIDIA University Ambassador after a rigorous selection process that included coding assessments and interviews. In this role, he offers training workshops and certification programs, including three NVIDIA certificates in Large Language Model (LLM) application and customization. He also serves as an NVIDIA Certification Subject-Matter Expert (SME) in the Generative AI/LLM domain, contributing to the development of NVIDIA’s LLM certification programs.

News

[2026] Publication Chairs, International Conference on Artificial Intelligence and Agents (ICAIAgent 2026)

[2025] NVIDIA Subject Matter Expert (SME) for the NVIDIA Certified Professional - Gen AI Exams [link]

[2025] Speaker at NVIDIA GTC 2025 (also got Jensen's signature) [photo]

[2024] NVIDIA University Ambassador [Nvidia Profile Page]

[2024] Meet NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang in Nvidia Train-for-the-Trainer event at Nvidia Campus [photo]

[2024] NVIDIA Deep Learning Institute (DLI) certificate in "Rapid Application Development Using LLMs", "Building LLM Applications with Prompt Engineering", and "Efficient Large Language Model (LLM) Customization".

[2024] Our DMV-licensed Autonomous Driving Test Vehicle (lincoln mkz) [photo]

[2023] "OHANA Center of Excellence on Empowering Behavioral Health" is a five-year project funded by The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) of the U.S. Department of Health in collaboration with the Department of Health of Hawaii -- Role: Senior Personnel (SJSU side Co-PI)

[2023] Our full-stack Autonomous Driving Sensors Stack in labs [photo]

[2022] "RINGS: Enabling Joint Sensing, Communication, and Multi-Tenant Edge AI for Cooperative Perception Systems" funded by National Science Foundation (NSF) -- Role: Principal Investigator (PI) [link]

[2022] Technical Program Chair, IEEE Mobile Cloud 2023.

[2021] "Intelligent Edge Computing Platform" funded by Intel ( through SJSU Tower Foundation) -- Role: PI

[2021] "Best Practices in Disaster Public Communications" funded by Knight Foundation (through SJSU Research Foundation) -- Role: PI

[2020] 2020 College of Engineering Award for Excellence in Scholarship

[2019] Technical Program Chair, IEEE Mobile Cloud 2020.

[2018] Our own developed Nvidia AI Edge Motherboard [photo]

[2018] Faculty Mentoring Award for CSU Student Competition

[2018] CoE Research Professor Award 2018;

[2018] Cisco Cooperate Chair Professorship;

[2018] My book "Mobile SmartLife Via Sensing, Localization, and Cloud Ecosystems",  CRC Press. [CRC Press] [Amazon]

[2017] System Demonstration at 2017 NSF CPS PI Meeting [link] [video];

[2017] Local Chair, 2017 AI Frontiers Workshop in Silicon Valley [link];

[2017] Our own designed hardware "SJGateway" has been shipped [photo];

[2017] System Benchmark Chair, NVIDIA AI City Challenge 2017;

[2017] Best Paper Award, IEEE Smart World Congress (SWC) 2017;

[2017] My student team won the First Prize in 2017 Juniper SDN Throwdown;

[2017] 2017 CoE Research Professor Award;

[2016] ACM SenSys 2016 Best Demo - Runner Up;

[2016] PI, NSF EAGER "Creating a Community Infrastructure for Interoperable Emergency Connectivity", $200,000, Period Covered: 8/15/2016 - 7/31/2018, Award No. CNS 1637371;

[2016] IEEE SECON 2016 Best Paper Award;

[2016] PI, Arista Network Funded Research;

[2016] 2016 Kordestani Endowed Research Professor;

[Others] CoE Faculty Mini Grant; SJSU UGA Grant; Outstanding Achievement Award at UF (four times); Apple WWDC Scholarship (2013 and 2014); the Innovator Award from the Office of Technology Licensing at UF (2014); the Top Team Award at NSF I-Corps Winter Cohort (Bay area, 2015);  the 2015 Gator Engineering Attribute Award for Creativity at UF; the National Scholarship of China (the highest honor for nationwide undergraduates in China). 

Funded Projects

  • "OHANA Center of Excellence on Empowering Behavioral Health" is a five-year project funded by The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) of the U.S. Department of Health in collaboration with the Department of Health of Hawaii.
    • The project focuses on Asian American Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander populations. 
    • As senior personnel, I oversee the data infrastructure, which comprises the data dashboard, data store/lake, data-driven analytics, and data mining algorithms.
  • RINGS: Enabling Joint Sensing, Communication, and Multi-Tenant Edge AI for Cooperative Perception Systems (Funded by NSF), Role: PI
    • The RINGS (Resilient and Intelligent Next-Generation Systems) program is NSF's single largest effort to date to engage public and private partners to jointly support a research program
    • There are seven RINGS award recipient teams in California: UC Berkeley (2), UCLA, USC, UCSD, UCSB, and SJSU.
  • Best Practices in Disaster Public Communication (Funded by Knight Foundation), Role: PI
  • Intelligent Edge Computing Platform (Funded by Intel), Role: PI
  • Health Monitoring and Tracking System for First Responders (Funded by Redline Safety), 
    Role: PI
  • Creating a Community Infrastructure for Interoperable Emergency Connectivity (Funded by NSF)
  • AI Traffic Intersection (Funded by Cisco)
  • Autonomous Assistance System for People with Special Needs (Funded by CoE)
  • Multi-Tenant Network Acceleration Scheme for OpenStack (Funded by Arista Network)
  • Software-Defined Edge Cloud for Smart City (Funded by CoE)

Open Source Projects

Check my [Github page] for my open source projects.

Current Courses (Fall 2024)

  • CMPE258 Deep Learning
  • CMPE249 Intelligent Autonomous Systems

Courses Taught

  • Autonomous Systems: CMPE249 Intelligent Autonomous Systems (new course)
  • AI: CMPE258 Deep Learning, CMPE188 Machine Learning, CMPE255 Data Mining, CMPE256 Large-Scale Data Analytics
  • IoT and Embedded Systems: CMPE146 Computer Networks, CMPE148 Real-time Embedded System Co-Design, CMPE181 Internet-of-Things Platform (new course)
  • Software Systems: CMPE220 System Software, CMPE235 Mobile Software System Design, CMPE277 
    Smartphone Application Development, CMPE 287: Software Quality Assurance and Testing

Links

SJSU People Profile

Google Scholar

Github

Youtube