Nasir Eisty, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor · Min H. Kao Dept. of Electrical Engineering & Computer Science

The University of Tennessee, Knoxville

Researching AI-Driven Software Engineering with a focus on empirical methods, scientific and research software quality, quantum software engineering: testing, peer code review, technical debt, security, metrics and sustainability.

neisty@utk.edu Schedule a Meeting

Open to Collaborators Welcoming Fulbright scholars, visiting researchers, postdocs & international collaborators worldwide.

Experience

Full History →

Aug 2025 –
Present

University of Tennessee, Knoxville

Assistant Professor, Min H. Kao EECS

Aug 2025 –
Present

University of Tennessee, Knoxville

Director, SAIL — Software Analytics and Intelligence Lab

Aug 2025 –
Present

IEEE Computing in Science & Engineering (CiSE)

Department Editor, Software Engineering & Scientific Computing

Jan 2024 –
Present

United States Research Software Engineering (US-RSE)

Founder and Co-Chair, Software Testing Working Group

Jan 2026 –
Present

Oak Ridge National Laboratory

Guest Scientist

Research Areas

Research Lab →

01 —

Empirical Software Engineering

AI-driven, data-intensive studies of software development practices, developer behavior, and engineering processes in real-world systems to surface actionable insights.

02 —

Scientific Software Quality

Applying AI-augmented software engineering methods to research and computational science software, ensuring reproducibility, correctness, and long-term sustainability.

03 —

AI-Assisted Testing

Leveraging large language models and machine learning to automate test generation, fault localization, and quality assurance across diverse software systems.

04 —

Peer Code Review

Using AI-driven analysis to understand and improve code review effectiveness, comment usefulness, and collaborative decision-making in development teams.

05 —

Software Metrics

Developing AI-informed quantitative measures for software quality, complexity, maintainability, and developer productivity across open-source and scientific codebases.

06 —

Technical Debt

Identifying, quantifying, and managing technical debt using AI-driven detection techniques to improve long-term software maintainability and reduce rework costs.

Latest News

All News →

Oct 2025

Won Best Poster Award at US-RSE 2025 for Ten Simple Rules for Catalyzing Collaborations and Building Bridges Between Research Software Engineers and Software Engineering Researchers with Johanna Cohoon & Jeffrey Carver. Award

Sep 2025

Two articles published in IEEE Computing in Science & Engineering (CiSE). Thanks to all collaborators! Paper

Jul 2025

Paper Shaky Structures: The Wobbly World of Causal Graphs in Software Analytics published in the EMSE Journal in collaboration with Jeremy Husle & Tim Menzies (NC State University). Paper

Jun 2025

NSF grant on formal methods in scientific software funded with Dr. Elena Sherman & Dr. Grady Wright. Grant

May 2025

Paper PVAC: Package Version Activity Categorizer, Leveraging Semantic Versioning in a Heterogeneous System by Shane Panter and Luke Hindman published in the EMSE Journal. Congratulations to Shane! Paper

Apr 2025

Ph.D. student Sharif Ahmed will join University of Central Arkansas CS as a tenure-track Assistant Professor in Fall 2025. Placement

Apr 2025

Mushfiqur Rahman will intern at Oak Ridge National Laboratory this summer. Shane Panter passed his Ph.D. proposal. Milestone

Jan 2025

Paper Testing Research Software: An In-Depth Survey of Practices, Methods, and Tools accepted in the EMSE Journal with Upulee Kanewala & Jeffrey Carver. Paper

Jan 2025

Paper Hold On! Is My Feedback Useful? Evaluating the Usefulness of Code Review Comments accepted in the EMSE Journal. Congratulations to Sharif! Paper

Nov 2024

Sharif Ahmed & Shariful Alam passed their Ph.D. proposals. Eric Melin passed his comprehensive exam. Congratulations to all! Milestone

Sep 2024

Poster Software Testing Practices for Reproducible Open Science accepted to AGU 2024 in Washington D.C.

Jul 2024

Paper Rusty Linux: Advances in Rust for Linux Kernel Development accepted to ESEM 2024 in Barcelona. Congratulations to Shane! Paper

Mar 2024

Attended Dagstuhl Seminar Research Software Engineering: Bridging Knowledge Gaps in Germany.

Dec 2022

Grant ($250K) funded by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. Grant

Sep 2021

Paper Developers’ Perceptions of Peer Code Review in Research Software accepted to EMSE. Paper

Contact

Office: 353 Min H. Kao Building
1520 Middle Drive
Knoxville, TN 37996
Email: neisty@utk.edu
Phone: (865) 974-0994
Schedule: calendly.com/nasireisty
LinkedIn: LinkedIn Profile

Prospective Students & Collaborators

The lab actively welcomes UTK EECS students seeking research advisors, fulbright scholars, visiting researchers, postdocs, and international collaborators. Don’t hesitate to reach out — happy to chat about opportunities.