Department of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering

Google is sponsoring another AI Challenge Competition run by an independent group of volunteers that grew out of the Computer Science Club of the University of Waterloo. The competition opens today and invites submissions of programs designed to control ants a simulated colony in competition with other colonies.

Ants is a multi-player strategy game set on a plot of dirt with water for obstacles and food that randomly drops. Each player has one or more hills where ants will spawn. The objective is for players to seek and destroy the most enemy ant hills while defending their own hills. Players must also gather food to spawn more ants, however, if all of a player's hills are destroyed they can't spawn any more ants.

The objective is to create a computer program (a bot) that plays the game of Ants as intelligently as possible. It is recommended that you use one of the starter packages as a starting point. If you are looking to get up and running as quickly as possible, check out the Five Minute Quickstart Guide. For more details about Ants beyond this introductory document, see the Game Specification.

The site has documentation, a tutorial and starter packages for windows and Linux in a variety of programming languages. Each package contains a simple working entry to use as a starting point, tools that allow you to run your bot and watch it play graphically, sample opponents that you can test your bot against, and maps you can use for testing. Once you've developed your bot, you can enter it at the website and watch your ant colony fight for domination against colonies created by other people from around the world.

The behavior of ants is a classic example of how the local interactions among individuals in a collection can give rise to interesting emergent behavior. This concept is important in the study of complex systems and was the subject of a recent special topics course taught by Professor Marie desJardins, Computation, Complexity, and Emergence.

Adapt3D: A Framework for Supporting CFD and MHD Modeling

Professor John E. Dorband
Research Associate Professor and MCC Chief Scientist
Computer Science and Electrical Engineering
University of Maryland, Baltimore County

1:00pm Friday 21 October 2011, ITE227

Adapt3D is a software framework that supports 3-D computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and magnetohydrodynamics (MHD) modeling on an unstructured mesh. It facilitates adaptive refinement and execution in a parallel computing environment, either on shared memory or distributed memory computer architectures. The framework was designed primarily to support parallel computing of simulations on a continuum expressed by an adaptively refined unstructured mesh. It was designed to cleanly differentiate the code that manages an unstructured mesh on a parallel computer and the code that performs the numerics on the components of the mesh. The intent is to ease the burden of the engineer or scientist when it come to understanding parallel computing or adaptive refinement, allowing him to spend his time understanding the computational science rather than the computer science.

Dr. John Dorband received a BA in Math and Physics from Northwest Nazarene University in 1972 and a PhD in Computer Science from The Pennsylvania State University in 1985. He work for NASA for 21 years doing research in parallel and high performance hardware architectures and software. He has developed parallel compilers, algorithms and applications. He was a member of the group that developed the concept of developing high performance computing architectures from commodity components (the Beowulf project).

Host: Yelena Yesha

EE Graduate Seminar

Detection and Classification of Chemical, Biological, and Explosive
Materials: A Brief Overview of Several Cutting-Edge Problem Areas

Darren Emge
PI and Deputy Branch Chief
Laser Standoff Detection Branch
US Army Edgewood Chemical Biological Center

11:30am-12:45pm Friday, 21 October 11, ITE 231

The detection and classification of chemical, biological, and explosive (CBE) materials is an area of extremely active research. With the advent of new sensor technologies and sensing methods there is the rapidly growing need for timely robust detection and classification algorithms. Several factors associated with emerging sensors offer novel challenges for the signal processing community. As sensor platforms become more mobile the added complexities of "on the move" standoff detection requires the use of non-stationary and adaptive methods. Ever increasing overall sensitivity introduces variations in signal response and many methods currently lack adequate performance models or ground truth. Reduction in size, weight, and power, along with real time performance, further limit approaches that can be used in addressing these issues. This presentation will provide a brief overview of several of these cutting edge problem areas and offer a glimpse into this challenging problem space.

Mr. Darren Emge earned a BS in Physics from UMBC in 1992. He then went to work for the University of Maryland Medical System, Department of Neurology. During his time at University Medical System, he developed analysis algorithms for evoked response potentials (ERP), functional magnetic resonance (fMRI), or neuronal mapping. He also supported the cognitive psychology group in the development of a pupil motion tracking system in the study of dyslexia. Mr. Emge earned the MSEE from UMBC/CSEE Dept in 2000. In 2001 He joined the US Army ECBC passive detection team investigating advanced mathematical techniques for the detection of chemical vapors based on Fourier transform infrared (FTRI) imaging. In 2003 Mr. Emge was promoted to a Principal Investigator (PI) in the laser standoff detection branch, where he currently serves as PI and Deputy Branch Chief. His current work is in the areas of the detection of small signals, detection of non-stationary signals, and the application of non-linear signal processing methods for the detection of biological and trace chemical/explosive materials.

Seminar Host: Prof. Joel M. Morris

EE Graduate Seminar

Optical Sensors for Biotechnology and Bioengineering

Yordan Kostov, PhD
Research Associate Professor
UMBC Center for Advanced Sensor Technology

11:30am-12:45pm, Friday 14 October 2011, ITE 231

Interaction of the light with the matter is one of the fundamental interactions in the nature. It is used in a variety of fields, stretching from telecommunications to life sciences. In this talk, the use of luminescence for sensing purposes will be highlighted. In particular, fluorescence spectroscopy will be illustrated. Multiple examples that employ different characteristics of the fluorescence (excitation and emission spectrum, decay time, polarization, and combination thereof) will be given. The presented sensing principles are used for measurements of oxygen, pH, CO2, ethanol, etc. As an optical chemical sensor requires successful interweaving of elements from 5 different scientific areas (analytical chemistry, polymer science, optics, electronics and computer science), the problems and the requirements for system integration are discussed.

Dr. Yordan Kostov received his B.Sc. and M.Sc. with honors in 1987 from Department of Electrical Engineering, Odessa Politechnic Institute, Former USSR. He received a Ph.D. Degree in Electrical/Chemical Engineering from Bulgarian Academy of Sciences for his work in the area of optical chemical sensors and biosensors. After that, Dr. Kostov spent an year as a post-doctoral fellow at the Institute for Technical Chemistry, University of Hanover, Germany. In 1994 he accepted a position as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Biotechincs, Sofia Technical University, Bulgaria. In 1999 he became a post-doctoral fellow at University of Maryland Biotechnology Institute, at the Medical Biotechnology Center. He joined the UMBC Department of Chemical and Biochemical Engineering as a Research Assistant Professor in 2000, and is now Research Associate Professor since 2006. Dr. Kostov also holds a position as an Assistant Director of the Center for Advanced Sensor Technology at UMBC. He is involved in the development of chemical and biochemical sensors for biotechnology, bioengineering and biomedical applications.

Seminar Host: Prof. Joel M. Morris

This year, October 7 has been designated as Ada Lovelace Day, a day to honor Augusta Ada King, Countess of Lovelace. She is widely regarded as the first computer programmer for her work with Charles Babbage who developed an early mechanical general-purpose computer, the analytical engine.

ReadWriteWeb commemorated the day with a story on the Women Who Made Google Plus and profiled twenty-two of the  Googlers:

"Launched on June 28th and just opened to the public at large late last month, Google Plus is a feature-rich social network with variable privacy and sharing settings at the core of its experience. Who were the women involved in building such a big, important technology? We asked, on Google Plus, and were told about twenty two of them profiled below. They are an incredibly accomplished group of people and a great source of inspiration for young women interested in science and technology – or for anyone else who could use some powerful role models. You should share this list of women with the girls in your life, though, that's what Ada Lovelace Day is all about."

You can visit their public G+ profiles and see more about who they are and what they do. The article points out that the 22 profiled are just some of the women who helped to build and launch this new and successful application.  

Many former UMBC students work at Google or have done internships there.  If you are interested in either, you can explore the opportunities at Google's pages for internships and jobs.

If you are interested in machne learning you might check out the  American Meteorological Society  Wind Power Prediction Contest.  It is sponsored by the AMS Committee on AI Applications to Environmental Science, Energy, and Probability and Statistics.  The goal is to compare various statistical learning techniques to predict wind power production. This contest considers a wind farm consisting of 53 turbines located in northern Colorado. The objective is to forecast the wind power for the wind farm (sum of the power from the 53 turbines). The inputs are forecast variables from several Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP) models, both from the National Center for Environmental Prediction and NCAR's high resolution WRF forecast. Training data are currently available on the download site, and the test data will be available in November.

The contest consists of two parts: (1) a day-ahead forecasting contest and (2) a short-term (one-, two-, and three-hour) contest. Participants are welcome to enter either or both parts of the contests. The AMS welcome entries from professionals to students, but registration is required by November 15. Entrants names will be kept blind – they must register an abstract to present a poster at AMS, then winners will be notified of an invitation to present a talk at the January AMS Annual Meeting in Atlanta. The AMS expects to solicit prize money, which will be announced on the website at a later time.

Got Linux? If you've ever wanted to try Linux but didn't know where to start, bring your computer to the Linux Installfest this Friday.

The UMBC Linux Users Group will hold a Linux Install Fest from 10:30am to 4:30pm on Friday 7 October on Main Street in the Commons. Experts from the Linux Users Group will help you install a free copy of Linux on your computer as a multi-boot operating system on your computer. They can help you to ensure that your hardware, including wireless, fingerprint reader, and webcam, is working. At the Fall 2011 installfest, they will be installing Ubuntu version 11.04. If you would like assistance installing a different release or distribution, bring install media.

If you are bringing a laptop, bring the AC adapter or charger. If you are bringing a desktop, then bring power cables, a monitor, keyboard, and mouse, too. If you will be dual-booting with Windows, please defragment your C: drive before attending the installfest. This increases the maximum size of your Linux partition. Finally, back up your data. The LUG will make all attempts to keep your data intact, but there's always the slim chance that something will go wrong.  See the LUG site for more information.

The UMBC ACM Student Chapter is co-hosting Interdisciplinary Engineering Panel Night at 7:00pm on Thursday 6 October 201 in the Commons Skylight Lounge. This free event is open to both undergraduate and graduate students in all engineering disciplines. Students have a chance to hear the perspective of professionals from industry, socializing and expanding their network. The event is co-sponsored with mechanical engineering (ASME), chemical engineering (AIChE), Device and the National Society of Black Engineers. Hors d’oeuvres will be served. Business casual dress suggested.

“I think it’s more than a jargon,” says Karuna Joshi of Cloud Computing, a topic she will discuss this Friday during a Computer Science and Electrical Engineering Department Colloquium, “It’s an actual paradigm shift.” Ms. Joshi, a Ph.D. candidate in Computer Science at UMBC, has been pursing research on Cloud Computing for the past three years and was recently awarded a prestigious IBM Ph.D. Fellowship (2011-2012) to help fund her efforts. Ms.Joshi explains that with the widespread implementation of Cloud Computing, Computing has the potential to become a utility—such as power or water—that would be widely available over a wireless network.

Though the cloud has the potential to save money and increase efficiency within organizations that choose to implement the new technology, there are still serious concerns about security, she says. What’s revolutionary about the cloud, for example, is that is removes the need to contain software and information on a particular device. Instead, information and services are wirelessly available to a network of users. The risk is that without proper security enforcement, sensitive information could potentially be accessed by hackers.

Nevertheless, Cloud Computing is steadily gaining credence among popular companies, says Joshi. Amazon, Microsoft and Google, for example, have all developed clouds. “I believe it will be strongly adopted by the industry,” says Ms. Joshi, “It’s the fastest growing field in the computing area.”  Even federal agencies have been mandated to move to a cloud system under the Federal Cloud Computing Initiative, as a way to reduce cost by consolidating necessary information and services into a central, easy to manage location.

Ms. Joshi explains that the novelty of the field makes her work exciting. The research allows her to explore issues that have not been addressed, such as the future of negotiation for acquiring services in the cloud. Through her research, Ms. Joshi has developed an ontology for the life cycle of the cloud that is composed of five phases: requirements, discovery, negotiation, composition and consumption. In addition, she is collaborating with the National Institute of Standards and Technology ( NIST) on a web-based prototype system.

Ms. Joshi envisions a future where powerful portable computing devices, like iPads, tablets and smartphones, will replace traditional computers. This future is only possible, explains Joshi,  if the widespread implementation of Cloud Computing and the transformation of computing into a service becomes a reality.

Ms. Karuna Joshi will speak about her research this Friday, October 7^th at 1 p.m. in ITE 227.