CHICAGO, March 24 – The University of Chicago has appointed Michael Franklin, a prominent computer scientist and data science leader, as Deputy Dean for Computational and Mathematical Sciences in its Physical Sciences Division.

Franklin will oversee strategic planning and initiatives aimed at advancing computational and mathematical disciplines, while fostering collaboration across the university.

Since joining UChicago, Franklin has been instrumental in elevating the institution’s profile in computer science and data science. He was the inaugural holder of the Liew Family Chair of Computer Science and served as founding Faculty Co-Director of the Data Science Institute (DSI). Under his leadership, the DSI invested in shared research infrastructure, including a high-performance computing cluster that supports work in climate science, neuroscience and particle physics. He also holds the title of Morton D. Hull Distinguished Service Professor of Computer Science and serves as Senior Advisor to the Provost for Computing and Data Science.

Prior to UChicago, Franklin was the Thomas M. Siebel Professor of Computer Science at the University of California, Berkeley, where he co-founded the AMPLab. The lab’s open-source projects, including Apache Spark, reshaped data analytics. He is a Fellow of the ACM and the American Association for the Advancement of Science, a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and a two-time recipient of the ACM SIGMOD Test of Time Award.

The appointment underscores UChicago’s push to strengthen its leadership in computational and mathematical sciences.