John Byers joined the BU faculty in 1999 as an assistant professor of computer science and was promoted to full professor in 2014. He is the Associate Dean of the Faculty for Mathematical & Computational Sciences. 

Professor Byers, who is also a Data Science Fellow at the Hariri Institute, has been associate chair (2007–09) of the computer science department, director of graduate studies (2012–13), chair of faculty search committees, and part of the Provost’s search advisory committee for the dean of the Questrom School of Business. 

His academic research centers on data-analytic and algorithmic challenges in two disciplines: the empirical study of internet platforms and the science of computer networking. He received his B.A. in computer science, economics, and mathematics at Cornell University (1991) and his Ph.D. in computer science at the University of California at Berkeley (1997).

Prior to his appointment at BU, he was a post-doctoral researcher at the International Computer Science Institute in Berkeley. His professional honors include the ACM SIGCOMM Test of Time Award in 2009 for his work on scalable loss-resilient multicast, the IEEE ICDE Best Paper Award in 2004 and the ICDE Influential Paper Award in 2014 for his work on networked sensor databases, and a National Science Foundation CAREER Award. He is also the founding chief scientist and a member of the board of directors at Cogo Labs, a technology incubator based in Cambridge, MA.