Ruta Mehta

For More Information

• Ruta Mehta's DBLP page
• Ruta Mehta's Homepage

Education

• Doctor of Philosophy, Computer Science and Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Bombay, 2012
• Masters of Technology, Computer Science and Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Bombay, 2005
• Bachelor of Engineering, Computer Engineering, Maharaja Saiyajirao University (MSU) Baroda, 2003

Biography

Ruta Mehta is an Associate Professor of Computer Science, an affiliate of Coordinated Science Laboratory, and a founding member of AImpact Center at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Prior to joining UIUC, she was a postdoctoral fellow at Simons Institute, UC Berkeley, and at College of Computing, Georgia Tech. She received her Ph.D. from the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, India. Her research is at the intersection of theoretical computer science, economics, games theory, and machine learning. She on the editorial board of Math. of Operations Research (MOR) and Algorithmica, and has served as chair for flagship conferences and events. For her research, she has received the NSF CAREER Award, the Simons-Berkeley Research Fellowship, and the Best Postdoctoral Award (given by CoC@GT). Her Ph.D. thesis won the ACM India Doctoral Dissertation Award and the IIT-Bombay Excellence in Ph.D. Thesis Award.

Academic Positions

• Affiliate Associate Professor, Coordinate Science Laboratory, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, 2023-present
• Associate Professor, Siebel School of Computing and Data Science, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, 2023-present
• Assistant Professor, Department of Computer Science, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, 2016-2023
• Postdoctoral Fellow, Host: Prof. Allistair Sinclair, Simons Institute for Theory of Computing, University of California at Berkeley, July 2015-Dec. 2015
• Postdoctoral Fellow, Host: Prof. Vijay V. Vazirani, College of Computing, Georgia Institute of Technology, Sept. 2012-July 2015

Other Professional Employment

• Software Engineer and Developer, Sybase India, Aug. 2005-July 2007

Major Consulting Activities

• Founding Member, AImpact Center, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, 2024-Present

Professional Highlights

• Founding Member of the AImpact Center, Illinois
• Co-founder of the EC (AGT) Mentoring Workshop, co-located with the ACM Economics and Computation Conference.
• Area Chair, 22nd ACM Conference on Economics and Computation (EC), 2021.
• Program Co-Chair, The 16th Conference on Web and Internet Economics (WINE), 2020.
• Associate Editor, Mathematics of Operations Research (MOR), INFORMS, since 2020.

Course Development

• CS 580: Topics on Algorithmic Game Theory

Research Statement

My research is primarily in theoretical computer science. It looks at the fundamental solution concepts from economics, game theory, and social choice from the computational lens. I am also interested in understanding questions related to fairness in society, and evolution in nature.

My main research interests lie in the areas of algorithmic game theory, mathematical economics, and in design efficient and trustwothy systems. More recently, I am interested in exploring trustworthy machine learning systems, emerging economies based on data and AI agents, and online+stochastic fair division. This being said, I never stop exploring the fundamental computational questions at the intersection of NP and co-NP.

Research Interests

• Algorithmic Game Theory: Equilibrium Computation and Complexity, Learning in Games, Strategic and Dynamic Aspects
• Interdisciplinary: Trustworthy Machine Learning, Data Economies, Fair & Efficient Multi-Agent Systems

Articles in Conference Proceedings

• Bhaskar Ray Chaudhury, Christian Kroer, Ruta Mehta, and Tianlong Nan. "Atonement Dynamics for Fisher Markets with Chores." To appear in the Proceedings of the 58th Annual ACM Symposium on Theory of Computation (STOC), 2026. (Acceptance Rate: Unavailable)
• Eleni Batziou, John Fearnley, Spencer Gordon, Ruta Mehta, and Rahul Savani. "Monotone Contractions." In Proceedings of the 57th Annual ACM Symposium on Theory of Computing (STOC), page numbers pending, 2025. Assocation for Computing Machinery (ACM). (Acceptance Rate: ~ 29.8%)
• Pooja Kulkarni, Ruta Mehta, and Parnian Shahkar. "Online Fair Division: Towards Ex-Post Constant MMS Guarantees." In Proceedings of ACM Conference on Economics and Computation (EC), 26th Edition, page numbers pending, 2025. (Acceptance Rate: ~24%)
• Vasilis Livanos and Ruta Mehta. "A Unified and Distribution-Optimal Analysis of the Max and Min IID Prophet Inequality." In Proceedings of ACM Conference on Economics and Computation (EC), pp. 1157-1179, 2025. Association for Computing Machinery (ACM). (Acceptance Rate: ~24%)
• Jinghan A. Zeng and Ruta Mehta. "On the Structure of Envy-Free Orientations on Graphs." In Proceedings of the 24th International Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems (AAMAS), arXiv: 2404.13527, 2025. International Foundation for Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems (IFAAMAS). (Acceptance Rate: ~24.5% full-paper; ~40% overall)
• Jiaxin Song, Parnian Shahkar, Bhaskar Ray Chaudhury, and Ruta Mehta. "You Get What You Give: Reciprocal Fair Federated Learning." In Proceedings of the 42nd International Conference on Machine Learning (ICML), PLMR, Vol. 258, 2025. (Acceptance Rate: ~26.9%)
• Maya Viswanathan and Ruta Mehta. "On the existence of EFX under picky or non-differentiative agents." In Proceedings of the 23rd International Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems (AAMAS), pp. 2534-2536, 2024. International Foundation for Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems (IFAAMAS). (Extended Abstract) (Acceptance Rate: ~20% full papers)

Conferences Organized or Chaired

• Co-organizer: New Perspectives on Algorithmic Game Theory, Stonybrook Game Theory Conference, 2026
• Co-organizer: Foundations of Data Economics Workshop, ACM Conference on Economics and Computation, 2026
• Co-organizer: AImpact Workshop, AImpact Center, Illinois, 2026
• Program Committee Chair: Track A, 45th IARCS Annual Conference on Foundations of Software Technology and Theoretical Computer Science (FSTTCS), 2025
• Program Committee Track Chair: ACM Conference on Economics and Computation (EC), 2025
• Co-organizer: Dagstuhl Workshop on Fair Division: Algorithms, Solution Concepts, and Applications, 2024
• Area Chair: 24th ACM Conference on Economics and Computation (EC), 2023
• Co-organizer: Equilibrium Computation@EC Workshop, ACM Conference on Economics and Computation (EC), 2023
• Co-organizer: Mini-Symposium on Algorithmic Game Theory, CanaDAM, 2023
• Co-organizer: EC Mentoring Workshop, ACM Conference on Economics and Computation (EC), 2022
• Area Chair: 22nd ACM Conference on Economics and Computation (EC), 2021
• Program Committee Co-Chair: 16th Conference on Web and Internet Economics (WINE), 2020
• Co-organizer: Rising Stars in EECS Workshop, 2019
• Founder and Organizer: EC Algorithmic Game Theory Mentoring Workshop, ACM Conference on Economics and Computation (EC), 2018
• Co-organizer: Session on Career Advice for Graduate Students, ACM Conference on Economics and Computation (EC), 2017
• Tutorial Chair: 13th Conference on Web and Internet Economics (WINE), 2017
• Co-organizer: Game Theory Workshop, Hausdorff Center for Mathematics, Universitat at Bonn, 2015
• Co-organizer: 31st Conference on the Foundations of Software Technology and Theoretical Computer Science (FSTTCS), 2011

Professional Societies

• Panelist: Job Market, EC Mentoring Workshop, 22nd ACM Conference on Economics and Computation (EC), 2021
• Member: Association of Computing Machinery (ACM), 2017

Service on Department Committees

• Chair: CS CARES Committee, SSCDS, Illinois, 2025-present
• Vice Chair: CS CARES Committee, CS, Illinois, 2023-2025
• Member: Advisory Committee, CS, Illinois, 2023-2024
• Member: At-Large Secondary Committee, Faculty Recruiting, CS, Illinois, 2021-2023
• Member: CS CARES Committee, CS, Illinois, 2020-2023
• Member: Graduate Study Committee, CS, Illinois, 2019-2020
• Member: Diversity Committee, CS, Illinois, 2018-2019
• Member: Outreach Committee, CS, Illinois, 2017-2019
• Member: Undergraduate Study Committee, CS, Illinois, 2016-2019
• Panelist: Women in Computing Visit, CS, Illinois, 2016-2017

Service on College Committees

• Member: Council for Community, Opportunity, and Engagement (CCOE), Grainger College of Engineering, Illinois, 2025-present

Service on Campus Committees

• Founding Member: AImpact Center and Seminar Series, Illinois, 2025-present

Service to Federal and State Government

• Panelist: European Research Council (ERC)
• Reviewer: United States-Israel Binational Science Foundation

Other Outside Service

• Panelist: Tech Pulse 2030-The Reliable Agent Challenge: Building AI You Can Trust, Chicago, 2026
• Invited Participant: Theoretical Computer Science (TCS) Visioning Workshop, 2020

Honors

• Dean's Award for Excellence in Research, Associate Professor, 2026 (2026)
• Campus Award for Excellence in Guiding Undergraduate Research, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, 2025 (2025)
• College Award for Sustained Excellence in Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, SSCDS, Illinois, 2025 (2025)
• NSF CAREER Award, 2018 (2018)
• Simons-Berkeley Research Fellow, 2015 (2015)
• Outstanding Post-Doctoral Researcher Award, College of Computing, Georgia Tech, 2014 (2014)
• ACM India Doctoral Dissertation Award, 2012 (2012)

Recent Courses Taught

• CS 374 AL1 (CS 374 AYA, CS 374 AYB, CS 374 AYC, CS 374 AYD, CS 374 AYE, CS 374 AYF, CS 374 AYG, CS 374 AYH, CS 374 AYJ, CS 374 AYK, ECE 374 AL1, ECE 374 AYA, ECE 374 AYB, ECE 374 AYC, ECE 374 AYD, ECE 374 AYE, ECE 374 AYF, ECE 374 AYG, ECE 374 AYH, ECE 374 AYJ, ECE 374 AYK) - Intro to Algs & Models of Comp
• CS 473 (CSE 414, MATH 473) - Algorithms
• CS 580 - Topics in Algrthmc Game Theory
• CS 598 RM - Algorithmic Game Theory
• CS 598 TH1 - Recent Advances in TCS