NEWS HEADLINES Spring 2005
Just The Headlines
The News (headlines with text)
Graduation Awards 2005 Date: June 2, 2005 Senior awards were presented as part of the Computer Science class of 2005 commencement ceremony on Hoy Field on Sunday, May 29, 2005. Eric Tsu '05 and Radha Narayan '05 were the recipients of the Jonathan E. Marx Senior Prize, awarded annually for demonstrated leadership, service, and extra-curricular activity. The Alan S. Marx Memorial Prize for Excellence Supporting Undergraduate Education was awarded to Radha Narayan '05, recognizing her efforts as a consultant and TA for CS 100. The Computer Science Prize for Academic Excellence, given by the CS faculty, was awarded to Paul Shafer '05 .
Caruana Acknowledged by Merrill Scholar Date: May 26, 2005 Professor Rich Caruana, CS, was recognized by Yewen Ying '05 as the Cornell Faculty member most influential to his education and experience as a Cornell undergraduate. Ying, one of 36 Merrill Presidential Scholars, named James Kett of the Singapore American School as his most inspiring high school teacher. The Merrill Scholars, selected by the Deans of the seven undergraduate college's, are graduating seniors who demonstrate "outstanding scholastic achievement, strong leadership ability, and potential for contributing to society."
Senior CS Consultants Recognized Date: May 16, 2005 Several graduating seniors were acknowledged for their service as undergraduate consultants in an atrium event that was held on May 10. COM S Chair Charlie Van Loan presented awards to the following students: Yim Cheng and Jhony Fung were each commended for five semesters of service to COM S 100; Arthur Zhang consulted for COM S 100 for three semesters. Tim Yip and Alvin Law were recognized for their four semesters as COM S 211 consultants. Sophia Cui consulted for both COM S 100 and COM S 314, for a total of four semesters and Frans Effendi served as a consultant for COM S 100 and COM S 381 for three semesters. Alex Fierro was recognized for his four semesters as a COM S 312 consultant, and Rahda Narayan for her five semesters as a COM S 100 consultant. Rahda's contribution was especially acknowledged; she was a supervisor for three of those semesters, ran prelim review sessions for CS 100J, and was a CS 100 AEW facilitator. David Schwartz nominated both David Levitan and Ivan Gyurdiev for their efforts, calling them the "lifeblood" of COM S 212. Also recognized was Matt Brochstein for his exceptional effort as a consultant for COM S/INFO 130. Matt worked closely with Professor Phoebe Sengers to redesign the content and structure of the course last year. In addition, Matt developed a new and very advanced server to support the course, taught a section of the course and supported TAs in developing teaching materials. Colin Campbell was acknowledged by David Schwartz for "showing tremendous initiative" in his role as CIS 300 consultant, and providing "valuable service to CS and IS students by running outreach events for prospective female students."
Game Design Showcase on May 11 Date: April 28, 2005 The Game Design Initiative at Cornell University (GDIAC) will showcase spring semester student work on Wednesday, May 11, 3:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m., in 315-319 Upson. About 80 students from several departments are collaborating this semester on games for CIS 300 and independent studies. This event is free and open to the campus and community. Visit the project website:
http://www.cs.cornell.edu/projects/game/
Where Computing and Social Systems Meet Date: April 7, 2005. Ismail Degani '05, working with Sociology professor Douglas Heckathorn, has developed respondent driven sampling (RDS) software that will be used to study the spread of HIV. The RDS Coupon Manager developed by Degani is a cross platform multilingual implementation of a sampling methodology designed for use with “hidden populations”, groups that are reluctant to participate in research or are otherwise underrepresented in random samples. This approach has significant implications for public health research, particularly AIDS and HIV studies. More information on RDS can be found at: http://www.respondentdrivensampling.org/.
"Computing in the Arts" Concentration Date: April 6, 2005. Thanks largely to the efforts of Graeme Bailey, CS and a coalition of arts college faculty including Carol Krumhansl, psychology, and Steve Stucky, music, 2005 Pulitzer Prize winner, undergraduates in the College of Arts and Sciences will now be able to select an official academic concentration called Computing in the Arts. In announcing the the news, CS Chair Charles Van Loan remarked: "The computer plays a role in almost every aspect of human life, and its influence and potential now extend routinely not only to technical and commercial pursuits but also into the realms of the imaginative and the aesthetic. The Computing in the Arts concentration offers students opportunities to use computers to realize works of art, to study the perception of artistic phenomena, and to think about new, computer-influenced paradigms and metaphors for the experiences of making and appreciating art. Faculty from several departments in the college offer courses toward the concentration, drawing on disciplines in the arts, the social sciences, the humanities, and the physical sciences.”
BOOM 2005 Bigger than Ever Date: March 17, 2005. The hustle and bustle of weeks of preparation gave way to the curious glances and thoughtful questions of students and staff alike as BOOM (Bits on our Mind) 2005, Cornell's digital technology fair, filled Duffield Hall's atrium. More than 130 students from four colleges presented diverse projects from all aspects of engineering as well as computing and information science. A project list, with links to research pages can be viewed at: http://www.cis.cornell.edu/boom/2005/ projectlist.htm. Eugene Medynskiy '06 was this year's student spotlight winner. For his project, Medynskiy investigated how users of the online community “LiveJournal” interacted with users in other online groups, research that could aid web page design in the future. Autonomous robotic all-terrain and underwater vehicles DARPA and CUAV were represented as was the 2005 Robocup prototype. BOOM 2005 was co-sponsored by Bloomberg and Credit Suisse/First Boston. Reporters from several media were present; read the Cornell Daily Sun article at: www.cornellsun.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2005/03/10/422ffa7468917 and the Cornell Chronicle story: www.news.cornell.edu/Chronicle/05/3.17.05/BOOM_cover.html.
AMD Donates Computers Date: February 28, 2005. Duffield Hall's computer lab boasts new high-end computing power thanks to a donation of 15 high performance Opteron workstations and a quad Opteron server by microprocessor manufacturer AMD and its subsidiary Spansion. Running 64-bit processors, the new computers can complete complex tasks almost instantaneously. In addition, AMD has provided new servers and financial contributions to Cornell's DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) and AUV (Autonomous Underwater Vehicle) unmanned vehicle teams. The new servers will be used to process information from stereoscopic cameras to help guide the DARPA unmanned vehicle along its route. For details about AMD's donation see : http://www.cornellsun.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2005/02/24/421d88d386293?in_archive=1.
Software Helps Blind Grad "See" Date: Wednesday, February 23, 2005. Software written by Ankur Moitra '07 enables grad Victor Wong ECE, blind since the age of seven, to "see" the images of atmospheric phenomena that he studies. Moitra's software translates the detailed, color-scaled images by converting pixels into sound, an approach that was used because color and pitch can be related directly, each note on the piano representing one of 88 gradations of color. Read more about this pioneering work: http://sys-con.com/story/?storyid=47933&de=1.
Gomes Presents Paper at AAAS Date: Tuesday, February 22, 2005. Professor Carla Gomes, CS, presented a paper describing new approaches to tackling combinatorial problems at the 2005 annual meeting of the AAAS on Monday. Professor Bart Selman, CS moderated the session in which Gomes spoke. More about the computational difficulties of heavy-tailed phenomenon can be found at: http://www.news.cornell.edu/releases/Feb05/AAAS.Gomes.heavytails.ws.html.
BOOM '05 Deadline Extended Date: Thursday, February 17, 2005. BOOM 2005 will take place in the Duffield Atrium on March 9, 2005. The project submission deadline has been extended to Friday, February 25, 2005. To participate in this exciting event read the submission guidelines at:www.cis.cornell.edu/boom/submission.
BioChallenge Begins Today Date Tuesday February 15, 2005. The Cornell Theory Center is sponsoring a BioChallenge for Cornell undergraduates. In this contest, students will compute the structural comparison for all possible pairs of proteins in the Protein Data Bank using a cycle-scavenging application. Cash prizes will be awarded and all Cornell undergraduates are eligible. The contest ends on April 11 or when all the comparisons have been completed. For more information visit the CTC website: http://www.tc.cornell.edu/CTC-Main/News/2005/050218.htm.
Hopcroft Wins IEEE Award Date: Professor has been named the recipient of the IEEE Computer Society's Harry H. Goode Memorial Award for 2005. The award recognizes Professor Hopcroft's outstanding contribution to the study of algorithms and their applications. The IEEE Computer Society is the world's leading organization of computer professionals.