Graduate Seminar - Spring 2008

All seminars to be held at 3:00 p.m. on Fridays in Kaufman 224. For more information, contact Dr. Sacharia Albin at (757)683-3741 or e-mail salbin@odu.edu. Refreshments will be provided.

Date	Seminar Details
January 25	Title : Graduate Advising Presenter : Dr. Albin
February 1	Dr. M. Zubair Professor, Dept of Computer Science, ODU. Title : "Automated Metadata Extraction for Large, Diverse and Evolving Document Collections" Host : Dr. Albin Abstract : In this talk, we will describe our efforts to develop a toolset and process for automated metadata extraction from large, diverse, and evolving document collections. A number of federal agencies, universities, laboratories, and companies are placing their collections online and making them searchable via meta-data fields such as author, title, and publishing organization. Manually creating metadata for a large collection is an extremely time-consuming task, but is difficult to automate, particularly for collections consisting of documents with diverse layout and structure. Our automated process enables many more documents to be available online than would otherwise have been possible due to time and cost constraints. In the talk, we will describe our architecture and implementation and illustrate the effectiveness of the tool-set by providing experimental results. About the Speaker : Mohammad Zubair has more than twenty years of research experience in the area of experimental computer science and engineering both at the university as well as at the Industry. His current research interests are digital libraries, automatic information extraction, autonomic computing, and Bioinformatics. In his tenure at the university, he has developed several software systems.  Two of his research efforts have lead to source code license agreements with major companies.  His major industrial assignment was at IBM T.J. Watson Research center for three years, where some of his work was integrated into IBM products His research has been supported by NASA, NSF, ARPA, Los Alamos, AFRL, NRL,  JTASC, SANDIA, and IBM Corporation. 2002 -  Professor, Department of Computer Science, Old Dominion University, VA.   1996-2002  Associate Professor, Department of Computer Science, Old Dominion University, VA.   1993-96 Research Staff Member, IBM Thomas.J. Watson Research Center, New York.  1993  Associate Professor, Department of Computer Science, Old Dominion University, VA.   1987-93 Assistant Professor, Department of Computer Science, Old Dominion University, VA. 1991-93: 1996-  Consultant, Institute for Computer Applications in Science and Engineering (ICASE), Langley  Research Center, NASA. 1994  IBM Research Division  Award For Contribution to the  High Performance Ennoblement of  Benchmarks. 1995 IBM Research Division  Award For Contribution to the  MPEG Player, 1995. 1987  Ph.D. Special Purpose Architectures for Matrix Operations, Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi.
February 8	Yiannis E. Papelis, PhD Research Associate Professor ODU - Virginia Modeling Analysis & Simulation Center Host: Dr. Dhali Title : "Autonomous vehicle competitions focused on off-road navigation and obstacle avoidance" Abstract : Prior DARPA-sponsored autonomous vehicle competitions focused on off-road navigation and obstacle avoidance.  For 2007, DARPA sponsored the Urban Challenge, a competition within which autonomous vehicles must navigate roadways and interact with other manned and unmanned vehicles and obey traffic laws, all while pursuing missions that involve reaching a series of specific checkpoints in a finite amount of time.  This talk will outline the efforts of a team that designed a vehicle that entered the competition and was one of the 11 teams that reached the final stage.  Issues covered will include the overall design approach, primary and secondary sensor selection, AI strategy and implementation, control strategies, navigation approach and finally, practical lessons learned both during the preparation phase as well as the final week of the competition. About the speaker: Yiannis Papelis earned a BSEE (with honors) from Southern Illinois University in 1988, a MSEE from Purdue University in 1989 and a Ph.D. degree in Electrical & Computer Engineering from the University of Iowa in 1993.  He has been involved in research on immersive virtual environments used primarily in ground vehicle simulations.  While at the University of Iowa, he conducted research in autonomous agents with applications in microscopic traffic simulation, rapid development of virtual environments used in ground vehicle simulation, design of deterministic scenarios within stochastic simulations and effects of in-vehicle devices in transportation safety.  Dr. Papelis spent one year as a visiting faculty at the University of Central Florida where, among other things, he applied earlier research in driver modeling to an autonomous vehicle that competed in the DARPA Urban Challenge competition.  Dr. Papelis is currently conducting research on autonomous agent modeling issues as applied to a wide range of topics, including simulation of critical infrastructure components, realistic simulation of crowds and control of autonomous ground and aerial vehicles.
February 15	Dr. Sacharia Albin Professor & Graduate Program Director Electrical & Computer Engineering Kauffman Hall 231 Old Dominion University Norfolk, Virginia 23529.   Title: "Diamond is an Engineer's Best Friend too!"   Abstract: It is well known that diamond is the hardest material. Unknown to most of us are some of its unique properties that are technologically important. A large bandgap of 5.4 eV (compared to 1.1eV for Si) makes it suitable for device operation at high temperature as high as 600C. The large bandgap also makes it transparent in UV-visible-IR wavelength regions. The thermal conductivity of diamond is five times that of copper making it one the best materials for thermal management of high power lasers and VLSI devices. However, the large scale application of diamond is limited due to difficulties in producing single crystal diamond large enough for commercial production. In this seminar, important properties of diamond will be reviewed. Results of funded research on synthesis and applications of diamond thin films will be presented.
February 22	Jihong Wang, Ph.D Associate Professor Division of Diagnostic Imaging University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center Houston, Texas 77030 713-563-9185(o), 713-563-8934(fax) Jihong.Wang@di.mdacc.tmc.edu Host: Dr. Li   Title:  "Magnetic Resonance Diffusion Tensor Imaging: Applications and Data Visualization"  Abstract: Diffusion tensor imaging is a non-invasive, functional imaging technique that measures the diffusion characteristics of molecules in tissue. It has found many applications in neuro-imaging, particularly in neural cancer imaging. However, visualizing tensor data in clinical setting can be challenging. In this talk, we will discuss several of the DTI data visualization schemes and some of the DTI's clinical applications.  About the speaker: Dr. Jihong Wang received his B.S. degree and the M. S. degree in Physics from the University of Science and Technology of China, 1984 and 1986, respectively. He received the Ph.D. degree in Medical Physics from the University of Colorado at Boulder in 1994. His research interests are mainly focused on two areas:  1) Functional studies of the brain using fMRI, EEG, MEG and other functional research tools, and 2) Human Perception and Human-Computer Interaction in a Digital Imaging Environment.  Dr. Wang is particularly interested in the effects of external factors on human perception in a softcopy image display environment, and the optimization of image display and data presentation in a digital radiology environment.
February 29	To be Announced
March 7	Dr. Ben Calhoun Electrical & Computer Engineering University Of Virginia http://www.ee.virginia.edu/profiles.php?ID=109 Title : "Techniques for Ultra-Low Power Circuit Design" Host : Dr. Albin Abstract : VLSI circuit design is firmly entrenched in a power limited era. While power imposed limits impact applications across the design space, they are especially critical for severely energy constrained applications such as wireless sensor nodes or implanted medical devices. This talk will present circuit level techniques for achieving ultra-low power and ultra-low energy operation. The focus of the talk will be on sub-threshold digital circuit operation, where the supply voltage, VDD, is lower than the threshold voltage, VT, of the transistors. Operating at extremely low voltages (in both active and standby modes) allows a reduction of energy consumption by over an order of magnitude, which dramatically extends the lifetime of portable systems. About the Speaker : Benton H Calhoun received his B.S. degree in electrical engineering with a concentration in computer science from the University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA, in 2000. He received the M.S. degree and Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, in 2002 and 2006, respectively. In January 2006, he joined the faculty at the University of Virginia as an Assistant Professor in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department. His research interests include low power digital circuit design, sub-threshold digital circuits, SRAM design for end-of-the-roadmap silicon, variation tolerant circuit design methodologies, and low energy electronics for medical applications. Dr. Calhoun is a co-author of Sub-threshold Design for Ultra Low-Power Systems (Springer, 2006). He serves on the Technical Program Committees for the International Symposium on Low Power Electronics and Design (ISLPED) and for the International Conference on Computer Design (ICCD) and is a member of the IEEE.
March 28	Dr. Allen MacKenzie Virginia Tech Host: Dr. Popescu Title: "Building and Analyzing Cognitive Radio Networks" Abstract: For the last several years, researchers at Virginia Tech have been building cognitive radios.  Recently, we have expanded these efforts in an attempt to build the first true cognitive network. This talk will begin by defining these terms, discussing our early success in building cognitive radios, and describing current challenges in extending this work into the higher layers of the protocol stack. After discussing our work on building real systems, I will describe our motivation for and progress in building a generalized cognitive engine to control such systems using an enhanced, distributed, localized genetic algorithm.  I will also present some preliminary results in using this system to solve a channel and power allocation problem in an ad hoc network.  Finally, I will discuss our recent results in applying game theory to analyze the interactions of cognitive radios.  Specifically, I will present some results on game theoretic models of topology control and spectrum allocation in ad hoc networks. About the Speaker: Allen B. MacKenzie received the B.Eng. degree from Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee in 1999 and the Ph.D. degree from Cornell University, Ithaca, New York in 2003.  Since 2003, he has been an Assistant Professor in the Bradley Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia.  Dr. MacKenzie's Ph.D. dissertation was on the game theoretic modeling of power control and medium access control problems, and his current research interests are in the areas of cognitive radio, cognitive networks, and the analysis and design of wireless networks using techniques from game theory.  He received a 2005 National Science Foundation CAREER award to continue the development of game theoretic models of wireless networks.  He has other ongoing research projects in the areas of cognitive radio and ad hoc networks sponsored by the National Science Foundation, DARPA, and the National Institute of Justice. Dr. MacKenzie serves on the technical program committee of several international conferences in the areas of communications and networking, and is a regular reviewer for journals in these areas. He is affiliated with the Wireless @ Virginia Tech research group. Dr. MacKenzie is a member of the IEEE, the ACM, and the ASEE.  He frequently teaches courses on communications theory and networking.
April 4	Laxminarayan L. Raja, Ph.D. Associate Professor (Robert & Francis Stark Centennial Fellow in Engineering) Dept. of Aerospace Engineering & Engineering Mechanics The University of Texas at Austin Austin, Texas Host: Dr. Laroussi   Title: "Studies of direct-current non-equilibrium surface glow discharges for high-speed aerodynamic flow actuation"   Abstract : This talk will discuss computational and experimental studies of direct-current non-equilibrium surface discharge phenomena in the presence of high-speed aerodynamic flows.  Surface discharges are emerging as a promising technology for high-speed flow actuation, especially for hypersonic flows where effective, high-bandwidth, surface actuators are required for flow control.  Experimental studies have revealed that non-equilibrium surface glow discharges operate in multiple modes that have vastly different interactions with the flow.  Based on spatially resolved gas temperature measurements in discharges, we conclude that cathode sheath driven electrostatic forcing, in addition to dilatational effects due to gas heating, are important mechanisms for plasma high-speed flow actuation.  Computational studies of the plasma flow actuator problem are conducted using a compressible Navier-Stokes flow solver and a self-consistent, multi-species, multi-temperature, plasma code.  A new reduced air chemistry model is developed and implemented to study plasma high-speed flow interactions.  The model predicts structure and dynamics of the discharge in these highly-strained bulk flow environments.  New insights provided by the modeling study will be discussed in the talk.   About the Speaker: Dr. Raja is an Associate Professor in the Department of Aerospace Engineering and Engineering Mechanics at The University of Texas at Austin.  He holds the Robert and Francis Stark Centennial Fellowship in Engineering at the Cockrell College of Engineering, The University of Texas at Austin.  He has a Ph.D in Mechanical Engineering, M.S. in Nuclear Engineering, and a B. Tech in Aerospace Engineering.    Dr. Raja's research is in the area of low-temperature, non-equilibrium, plasmas.  His research emphasizes both fundamental studies of plasma phenomena and the study of plasma applications in materials processing and spacecraft electric propulsion.  Current research topics include 1) large-volume high-pressure glow discharges, 2) microdischarges, 3) semiconductor-process plasmas, 4) spacecraft propulsion, and 5) modeling studies of railgun contact gap plasmas.  The above research is conducted primarily through computational modeling involving multidimensional chemically reactive plasma models and particle models currently being developed by Dr. Raja's group.  His research is currently funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF), Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR), the Ad Astra Rocket Company, and the Institute of Advanced Technology, UT-Austin.    Dr. Raja teaches in the area of fluid mechanics and plasma dynamics and has taught undergraduate and graduate classes in these areas at The University of Texas at Austin.   Dr. Raja received the prestigious National Science Foundation CAREER award in 2001.
April 11	Dr. Guoliang Fang Associate professor ECE Department Oklahoma State University   Host: Dr. Shen   Title: "Hybrid Body Representation for Integrated Pose Recognition, Localization and Segmentation"   Abstract :  We consider pose recognition, localization and segmentation of the whole body as well as body parts in a single image. This research is a fundamental step toward video-based human motion analysis that has been intensively studied recently. Pose recognition, localization and segmentation in images are still challenging problems due to the variability of human body shapes and poses. In this talk, we present a new hybrid body representation for integrated pose recognition, localization and segmentation of the whole body as well as body parts in a single image. A typical pose is represented by both template-like view information and part-based structural information. Specifically, each body part as well as the whole body is represented by an off-line learned shape model where both region-based and edge-based priors are combined in a coupled shape representation. Part-based spatial priors are represented by a star graphical model. This hybrid body representation can synergistically integrate pose recognition, localization and segmentation into one computational flow. Moreover, as an important step for feature extraction and model inference, segmentation is involved in the low-level, mid-level and high-level vision stages, where top-down prior knowledge and bottom-up data processing are well balanced via the hybrid body representation. Our future research will focus on extending the proposed body representation to be a dynamic human body representation that supports video-based pose recognition, localization, tracking and segmentation.   About the Speaker: Guoliang Fan received the B.S. degree in Automation Engineering from Xi'an University of Technology, Xi'an, China, in 1993, the M.S. degree in Computer Engineering from Xidian University, Xi'an, China, in 1996, and the Ph.D. degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Delaware, Newark, DE, in 2001. From 1996 to 1998, he was a graduate assistant in the Department of Electronic Engineering at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Since 2001, Dr. Fan has been an Assistant/Associate Professor in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Oklahoma State University (OSU), Stillwater, OK, and the Director of Visual Computing and Image Processing Laboratory (VCIPL). His research interests include image processing, computer vision, biomedical imaging and remote sensing applications. Dr. Fan is a recipient of the 2004 National Science Foundation (NSF) CAREER award. He received Halliburton Excellent Young Teacher Award in 2004 and Outstanding Young Faculty Award in 2006 from the College of Engineering at OSU. Dr. Fan is a senior member of IEEE.
April 18	Ei Ei Brown Center of Laser Sciences and Spectroscopy (CLaSS) Department of Physics Hampton University, Hampton, VA 23668 Title: "Mid-infrared Laser Development for Chemical Sensing" Host: Dr. Albin Abstract : The development of high power, portable, and compact solid-state laser materials for mid-infrared (MIR) laser sources is of great interest for a wide variety of applications such as laser remote sensing of chemicals and biological agents, IR counter measures, and bio-medical procedures. Efficient MIR laser operation is limited by large nonradiative decay rates through multi-phonon emission in traditional oxide and fluoride host materials. Chloride and bromide crystals are currently being considered as promising solid-state laser materials because of their low maximum phonon energies, which help to suppress multi-phonon relaxations and also enable additional laser transitions. Doping of rare-earth (RE) ions in low maximum phonon energy hosts has shown promising results on MIR emission as well as lasing at room temperature. In this talk, the spectroscopic properties of RE doped lead based halides will be explored for 3-5 µm solid state laser development.             A brief discussion of mid-infrared laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) emissions from alkali metal-halides will also be presented. About the Speaker: Ei Ei Brown received the B. Sc. (Hons.) degree in physics from Yangon University, Myanmar, in 1995. She came to America in 1998 and attended graduate school at Hampton University in fall 1999. She then pursued her doctoral work started in summer 2000 under the direction of Dr. Uwe Hömmerich. She received the Ph.D. degree in physics from Hampton University, Hampton, VA, in 2005. Her dissertation research focused on rare earth doped III-V nitride semiconductors for display applications and optical communications. Since fall 2005, she has been working with Center for Laser Science and Spectroscopy, where she is currently a Research Assistant Professor.  Her research interests span the area of fluorescence spectroscopy, crystal growth, and diode-pumped solid-state laser materials development. Current work includes rare earth doped gallium nitride powders for potential application in display and the development of solid-state laser materials for near-IR and mid-IR laser sources. She has authored and coauthored more than 30 publications in refereed journals and conference proceedings. Dr. Brown is a member of the American Physical Society, Optical Society of America, and the Material Research Society.
April 25	Title : Graduate Advising Presenter : Dr. Albin