The Intelligence and National Security Alliance (INSA) will present its 2012 Sidney D. Drell Academic Award to Juergen Pfeffer, assistant research professor in the School of Computer Science Institute for Software Research (ISR), at a Dec. 6 ceremony in Washington, D.C.

The award recognizes Pfeffer's contributions to the intelligence community, particularly in the area of social and organizational network analysis.

"His work allows analysts to handle full data streams as opposed to samples, which is meaningful to large data sets like Twitter feeds," according to the award citation. "His projects aim to describe and detect changes within networks consisting of persons, organizations, subjects and companies of specific countries, as well as the outside involvement from international groups," it says, noting he is involved in research projects analyzing data from emerging conflicts in North Africa and the Middle East.

Pfeffer is one of six young professionals being honored by the INSA as leaders with bright futures within the intelligence and defense communities. WashingtonExec has posted an interview with Pfeffer regarding the award.

Pfeffer earned a bachelor's degree in computer science, a master's degree in computer science management, and a Ph.D. degree in business informatics from Vienna University of Technology. He became a post-doctoral researcher in ISR with Prof. Kathleen Carley in 2010 and joined the faculty this year.