From: Westley Weimer

[ThanhVu Nguyen]

= Westley Weimer

== Professor, University of Michigan

One of my first memories of Deepak was in 2010 when I was just starting as a new professor. We were working on a joint paper with a student, and there had been a potential miscommunication about authorship and attribution -- subjects that can be touchy in academia. Deepak had a reputation for being a rigorous and formal professor, and we didn't know how he would react. Sometimes researchers who are more formal can be more draconian about collaboration. Not so with Deepak. He wrote back to us: 

>> Just like you, I have worked with so many people over a period of time that things average out. Whatever serves [the student]'s interests the best is the way to go in my opinion.

I remember being quite glad that he immediately put the student first, and it gave me a much more optimistic view of working with senior professors and of my role in academia.

In addition, his research with his coauthors went on to influence my teaching. Even as recently as last year (2025), I spent a lecture and a half covering two of his papers in my graduate programming languages course. He has definitely produced ideas that serve as effective stepping stones for newer students starting on the path of research themselves.