Elif Ak (IEEE Member, ACM Member) is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Memorial University (MUN) since January 2025. Prior to this, she was a Postdoctoral Fellow at MUN, where she worked with Prof. Dr. Trung. Q. Duong. She also served as a non-tenure track faculty member at Istanbul Technical University (ITU) in Turkiye from 2019 to 2024. She earned both her B.Sc. and PhD degrees in Computer Engineering from ITU, in 2018 and 2024, respectively, where she completed her doctoral studies under the guidance of Prof. Dr. Berk Canberk. Her research focuses on AI-enabled networked systems and digital twins, with particular emphasis on sustainable, carbon-aware network management and the use of quantum computing for optimization and next-generation network design.

Her doctoral research received recognitions, including the IEEE ComSoc Communications Software Technical Committee Student Achievement Award in 2024, and two Best Paper Awards, presented at IEEE ICC 2024 and IEEE IWCMC 2024. Additionally, her dissertation received the Distinguished PhD Thesis Award (2024) from ITU, and she was also the recipient of the Prof. Dr. M. Kemal Karhan Award. She has published 30+ journal articles and conference papers, one book chapter and holds two approved U.S. patents along with 6 provisional patents. Since 2020, she has contributed to securing over $150K in research funding as a principal investigator, grant writer, or co-investigator. She currently serves as an Associate Editor for IEEE Communications Letters and Elsevier Software Impacts, and actively contributes as a reviewer for several IEEE journals and conferences. She is also engaged in the academic community through her roles as an Organizing Committee Member and as both TPC Chair and Member at various international conferences.