Grants & Awards

The generous research support from the funding agencies is greatly appreciated.

Grants

1. AI-Driven Cyber Breach Risk Prediction: Capturing Complex Dependence via Deep Learning Models, Society of Actuaries & Casualty Actuarial Society, 2025–2026 (PI).
2. Advancing Predictive Models with SDOH Integration in Healthcare, Connected Communities Initiative (Illinois State University & OSF HealthCare), 2024–2025 (PI; Co-PIs: Mehdi Karimi, Xiaotian Dai).
3. Bayesian Nowcasting Data Breach IBNR Incidents, Society of Actuaries & Casualty Actuarial Society, 2023–2024 (PI).
4. A Framework for Digital Asset Risks with Insurance Applications, Society of Actuaries, 2023–2024 (PI: Jianxi Su; Co-PI: Jimmy Yuen).
5. Cyber Risks in the Smart Home Ecosystem: Identification, Modeling, and Pricing, Society of Actuaries, 2022–2023 (PI; Co-PI: Shouhuai Xu).
6. Pricing Cyber Risks Over Modern Networks via Bayesian Attack Graphs, Casualty Actuarial Society, 2022–2023 (PI).
7. Statistical Modeling of Data Breach Risks: Time to Identification and Notification, Casualty Actuarial Society, 2021–2022 (PI).
8. Actuarial Professional in the New Era of IoT: Cybersecurity Risks in Fog Computing, Society of Actuaries, 2020–2021 (PI; Co-PI: Jianxi Su).
9. Cybersecurity Catastrophe Bonds: Modeling and Pricing, CKER, 2019–2020 (PI).
10. Malicious Data Breach: Modeling and Ratemaking, Society of Actuaries, 2018–2019 (PI).
11. Pricing Cyber Insurance for a Large-scale Network, CKER & Casualty Actuarial Society, 2017–2018 (Co-PI; PI: Lei Hua).
12. Cybersecurity Insurance: Modeling and Pricing, Society of Actuaries, 2016–2017 (PI; Co-PI: Lei Hua).
13. TMV-based Capital Allocations for Multivariate Risks, Casualty Actuarial Society, 2014–2015 (PI).
14. A Statistical Framework for Analyzing Cyber Threats, Army Research Office (Subcontract No. W911NF-13-1-0141), 2013–2016 (PI).

Awards

• Janice Witherspoon Neuleib Award for Outstanding Scholarly Achievement, Illinois State University, 2025.
• Faculty Research Award, Illinois State University, 2025.
• Dean’s Research Challenges Award, Illinois State University, 2024.
• Outstanding Department Research Award, Illinois State University, 2022.
• Best Paper Award, Society of Actuaries, 2019.
• Highly Commended Finalists of Best Paper, Journal of Applied Statistics, 2017.
• Mathematics and Statistics Readers' Award, Taylor and Francis, 2015.
• University Research Initiative Award, Illinois State University, 2013.