Department of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering

The IEEE Baltimore Electron Devices Society chapter, in collaboration with ARL, will be hosting a one day Colloquium on Energy Harvesting Devices at the University of Maryland, College Park on Tuesday, September 25, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. in the Stamp Student Union Building, Benjamin Banneker Room (Room 2212).

Invited speakers include:

Dr. Edward Shaffer, Army Research Laboratory
Prof. Vikram Dalal, Iowa State University
Prof. Santosh Kurinec, Rochester Institute of Technology
Dr. James Horwitz, Dept. of Energy (DOE)
Prof. Edward Yu, University of Texas,Austin
Prof. Rajendra Singh, Univ. of South Carolina
Prof. Agis IliadisUniv. of MD, College Park

Panel discussion on paths to reliable, efficient and low cost solar cell development (Dr. Anu Kaul/NSF, Chair, Dr. Mike Wraback ARL, Mr. Scott Stephens, DOE).

Attendance is free. To register, please contact: Dr. Naresh C. Das () or Dr. Victor Veliadis ()

For more information, visit the website and download the flyer.

Photo: devanwells.blogspot.com

While The Wire has been referred to by critics as “the greatest TV drama of all time,” its portrayal of Baltimore isn’t exactly an all-encompassing one.  Because despite its reputation, Charm City has a lot that makes it charming: a growing entrepreneurial spirit, top-notch universities, and a pool of untapped talent.

The brains behind Baltimore unWIREd recognize that. “The point of Baltimore unWIREd is to find out what we can accomplish by connecting these points of strength. Together we can create change — developing solutions to critical social problems and make a difference,” explains the website.

From August 24-25, the event brings together innovators, creatives, and government officials to brainstorm and mingle. On Friday there will be a series of “lightening talks” on efforts that are currently underway. Saturday follows an “open campus” model, as participants break into teams and tackle a key social problem. Baltimore unWIREd is followed by Groundwork in September, a hackathon focused on putting these strategies and solutions to the test.

For more information about unWIREd, visit the website.

Baltimore unWIREd takes places from August 24-25 in John Hopkins University’s Maryland Hall.

Question: What’s one part new media, one part gaming, and one part nerd party?

Answer: It’s Intervention, Maryland’s only “Internet convention.”

For the third year in a row, Intervention brings together digital media enthusiasts for three-days of workshops, panels, educational content, children’s programming, board and video gaming, Live Action Roleplaying, musical performances, and more. This year, it’s held in Rockville’s Hilton Hotel from September 21-23.  

“[co-founder] James Harkenell and I wanted to put together an event that would compliment the existing print-centric conventions-we wanted to showcase the creators who use the Internet as their primary publishing method. We felt that web creators needed their own space. We’re giving them that with Intervention,” says Onezumi Hartsein on the website. She’s the creator of a couple of online comics: My Annoying Life and Stupid & Insane Defenders Against Chaos.  

The guest lineup is still being compiled, but confirmed guests include: Daniella Pineda from CollegeHumor.com, A.J. Rosa, creator of My Life With Sega, Christopher Baldwin, creator of Spacetrawler, Cinematic For the People, a “live-action bad movie riffing experience”, and Cosplay Burlesque. Showings of classic cult flicks like Dork of the Rings, Harvey Putter and the Ridiculous Premise, and Ninjas Vs. Monsters can be expected.

Check out interventioncon.com to register for the convention. Then, download the iPhone app.

The 2012 Maryland Cyber Challenge (MDC3) will be held this fall with qualification rounds in September and the finals at the Cyber-Maryland Conference in the Baltimore Convention Center on 16-17 October. MDC3 is a statewide cyber competition and conference designed to interest more students and young professionals in pursuing careers in cybersecurity. The goal of the Maryland Cyber Challenge is to help strengthen Maryland’s position as a cybersecurity leader by bringing teams of current and prospective cybersecurity professionals together to develop the skills and techniques needed to protect vital information systems. Founders of the event include SAIC, UMBC, the National Cyber Security Alliance, the Maryland Department of Business and Economic Development, and the Tech Council of Maryland.

UMBC students who are interested in MDC3 or cybersecurity in general are encouraged to contact the UMBC Cyber Defense Team, aka the Cyberdawgs.

MDC3 team registration is now open for the 2012 challenge. Questions about the Cyber Challenge can be sent to Kelli-Ann Tucker (kelli-ann.tucker at saic.com).

Did you know that Computer Science isn’t a required course in most Maryland High Schools (or colleges for that matter)? For most students, a lack of exposure early on translates to total avoidance once they reach college. For a subject as ubiquitous as computing, it is essential to Maryland's continued success as a technology leader that we make a commitment to improve access to and quality of the computing curriculum across the state.

That’s why the folks behind Computing Education for the 21st Century (CE21) aim to do something about it. One way is through their upcoming Computer Science Education Mini-Summit, to be held August 8, 2012 throughout the Information Technology/Engineering (ITE) Building on UMBC’s main campus.

The free mini-summit invites high school teachers, college professors, and anyone else interested in expanding Computer Science offerings in Maryland high and middle schools to attend. “We hope to explore what is currently being done to increase student interest in computer science and what can be done in the future,” explains the website.

Summit attendees can expect to do the following:

1. Learn more about computer science high school education across the state of Maryland;
2. Network with others with an interest in computer science education;
3. Exchange strategies with other education professionals; and
4. Plan with others to help expand student interest and to increase the number and diversity of students studying computer science in Maryland.

Take a look at the summit schedule:

Those interested in attending must register here. For more information, visit the CE21 website, or contact .

Tired of playing Diablo III?

If you head to Gamescape next weekend, you'll have a chance to try your hand at over a dozen original video games dreamed up by local students and indie game developers. As part of Artscape–the country's largest free arts festival–the annual three-day video game celebration will take place in MICA's Bunting Center from July 20-22.

Among developers like Pure Bang Games (makers of Zombie Chess) and Crankshaft Games (Eternal Silence), representatives from UMBC's own Game Developers Club will be in attendance with three games of their own. The game concepts, explains club president Alex Grube (CS '13), were conceived during a 48-hour game jam last September, and the group has been hard at work developing the games since the beginning of the 2011-2012 school year. They are:

Black Fowl is a 3D hack and slash third person role playing adventure game. You play Max, a young orphan on a quest to discover his roots. Set in the Middle Ages, highlights of the game include the ability to use magical powers (like flying), and to engage in combat while riding a bull.

Cosmoknights is a 2D multiplayer that follows a capture-the-flag concept. Two combating astronauts are stranded in an asteroid field. Your mission is to collect spare parts for your out-of-commission spaceship and get home first. Oh, and try not to get hit by an asteroid.

X-Zip-It! boasts the tagline: "It's Skyrim with zippers, but without the Skyrim."  In this 2D mobile phone game, you must unzip the zipper while avoiding obstacles like buttons, Velcro, buckles, and necklaces.

UMBC's Game Development Club will discuss Black Fowl, Cosmoknights, and X-Zip-It on Sunday, July 22nd from 12 p.m. to 1 p.m. To learn more about the event, check out the website.

The Second Baltimore Hackathon will be held this weekend, starting at 6:00pm Friday June 8 and ending at 6:00pm Sunday. At a hackathon people get together to build a hardware or software project from idea to prototype, in this case in one weekend. You can do it individually or as a team. You can come as part of a team or find one when you get there. It’s a great way to meet people and have fun.

The hackathon will take place at Advertising.com‘s offices in Tide Point (1020 Hull Street, 1st Floor Ivory Building, Baltimore, MD 21230).

You can register online (tickets are limited) for just $10, which includes a t-shirt and food for the weekend. Significant prizes will be awarded in six different categories: technical complexity, smart design, civic service, aesthetics, crowd favorite, and hacker/DIY.

See the Baltimore Hackathon site for more information.

Congratulations to CSEE graduate students Josiah Dykstra (Computer Science, Ph.D.) and Han Dong (Computer Science, M.S.) for winning the Computer Science and Electrical Engineering (CSEE) Department's 2011-2012 awards for best research by a Ph.D. student and best research by an M.S. student, respectively.

Winners were chosen based on the scientific merit (significance, originality, notriviality, correctness) and the writing style of their research papers.

Josiah's (pictured left) research, entitled "Acquiring Forensic Evidence from Infrastructure-as-a-Service Cloud Computing: Exploring and Evaluating Tools, Trust, and Techniques", deals with digital forensics for cloud computing, including frameworks, tools, and legal analysis to facilitate forensic investigations of remote Infrastructure-as-a-Service clouds. You can read Josiah's full paper here. 

Han's (pictured right) research, entitled "Cross-Platform OpenCL Code and Performance Portability for CPU and GPU Architectures Investigated with a Climate and Weather Physics Model", investigates the portability of OpenCL across CPU and GPU architectures in terms of code and performance via a

representative NASA GEOS-5 climate and weather physics model. Han discovered that OpenCL's vector-oriented programming paradigm assists compilers with implicit vectorization and creates significant performance gains. You can read Han's full paper here.

CSEE graduate students Karuna Joshi (Computer Science, Ph.D.) and James MacGlashan (Computer Science, Ph.D.) were awarded honorable mention.

As this year's winners, both Josiah and Han will present their work at this year's CSEE Research Review, which takes place this Friday, May 4 from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. in the large conference room of the UMBC Technology Center's business incubator and accelerator building.

photo courtesy Nintendo

What do The Legend of Zelda, Halo 2, and Super Mario World have in common?

They're all featured video games in the Smithsonian American Art Museum's latest exhibition The Art of Video Games.

The exhibition–which celebrates 40 years of video game history–takes a look at 80 video games that pushed the artistic and technological boundaries of their era. The ubiquitous Atari VCS classic Pac-Man makes the list, along with standbys like Tomb Raider, Fable, and Myst. Games were chosen by a public vote from a list of 240 titles compiled by exhibit curator Chris Melissinos, and come from twenty gaming systems ranging from the SNES to Playstation 3. In an NPR interview, Melissinos, founder of Past Pixels and an avid video game collector, demystifies why Mario resembles an Italian plumber, and offers a theory about how Pac-Man was conceived.

A select five games can be played during the exhibit: Pac-Man, Super Mario Brothers, The Secret of Monkey Island, Myst, and Flower. The exhibition also features video interviews with video game developers and artists, historic game consoles, and photos of in-game screen shots.

Catch the exhibit at the Smithsonian American Art Museum until September 30, before it heads out on an across-country tour. On May 4, the museum is hosting Beyond Play: Video Games at Work, a series of free exhibition-inspired talks. At 1 p.m. "Video Games at Work" looks at the influence of video games on areas like health care, education, civics, journalism, and national defense. At 3 p.m. "Game Change: Society and Culture" looks at the impact of video games on our society and culture.

For more information about The Art of Video Games, visit www.americanart.si.edu

Interested in breaking into the burgeoning field of Cybersecurity? Come to a Graduate Information Session on Wednesday, May 2 in ITE 104 at Noon to learn about UMBC's Master's programs in Cybersecurity.

Headed by program director Richard Forno, UMBC offers both a Master's in Professional Studies: Cybersecurity, a ten-course master’s degree that incorporates courses in cybersecurity strategy, policy, and management with more technical, hands-on cybersecurity courses, and a Graduate Certificate in Professional Studies: Cybersecurity Strategy & Policy, a four-course program that can be completed in a year.

To RSVP for next Wednesday's session, click here. In the meantime, take a look at the program brochure, fact-sheet, and website for more information.