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How to prevent Russian hackers from attacking the 2018 election In this commentary piece in the Chicago Tribune, Prof. J. Alex Halderman and Justin Talbot-Zorn make the case for a straightforward policy agenda to secure America's voting systems against the threat of hackers. [Full Story] CS Alumnae Tara Safavi Chosen for Google Women Techmakers Scholarship Tara Safavi (BS CS 17) has been selected as a recipient of the Google Women Techmakers Scholarship to continue her studies in computer science and engineering. Tara will return to Michigan this Fall to pursue her PhD in CSE. [Full Story] Rick Bergman, CEO of Synaptics - Giving Tech a Sense of Touch ECE alum Rick Bergman (BSE EE 1986), CEO of Synaptics, is working to make tomorrows technology user friendly, safe, and reliable. The company hopes to lead what they call the human interface revolution, and has over 1900 granted and pending patents for common human interface technologies like touch sensors, display drivers, and biometric sensors. Their track record includes the first touchpad to replace a computer mouse, adopted by Apple in 1994. [Full Story] Prof. Becky Peterson Honored with 2018 U-M Henry Russel Award Prof. Becky Peterson has received a University of Michigan Henry Russel Award for her extraordinary record of accomplishment in scholarly research, as well as excellent record of contributions as a teacher. This award, established in 1925, is considered the University's highest honor for faculty at the early to mid-career stages of their career. [Full Story] If Voting Machines Were Hacked, Would Anyone Know? In the article, Prof. J. Alex Halderman points out how electronic voting systems even those not connected to the Internet can be compromised. One path for hackers is to attack the computers that are used to program the ballots, which are later transferred to voting machines via memory cards. [Full Story] Mary Lou Dorf Retires; Her Focus Was On Opening Doors to Computer Science Collegiate Lecturer Dr. Mary Lou Dorf has retired after 15 years at the University of Michigan in the Computer Science and Engineering Division of the EECS Department. During her career at Michigan, Dr. Dorf worked tirelessly to open the doors of computer science to everyone. [Full Story] Necmiye Ozay Receives Nonlinear Analysis: Hybrid Systems Paper Prize Prof. Necmiye Ozay received the Nonlinear Analysis: Hybrid Systems Paper Prize for the paper "Finite abstractions with robustness margins for temporal logic-based control synthesis," co-authored by Prof. Jun Liu (U. of Waterloo). This Prize is awarded for outstanding contributions to the field of hybrid systems documented in a paper published in the journal Nonlinear Analysis: Hybrid Systems. The prize is awarded to the authors of two selected papers published in the journal in the three years preceding the International Federation of Automatic Control (IFAC) World Congress. [Full Story] ECE Alum Kukjin Chun Earns South Korea's Highest Scientific Honor ECE alumnus Kukjin Chun (MSE PhD EE ) was honored by the President of South Korea with the Order of Science and Technology Merit, the highest national honor for a Korean scientist and engineer. This Order of Merit is awarded to those who have rendered outstanding meritorious services in the interest of improving science and technology. [Full Story] Two EE Students Earn Scholarship to Pursue Work in Sustainable Energy Paul Giessner (BSE EE ) and Noah Mitchell-Ward, an EE undergrad, have each been awarded a $2,000 scholarship from the Utility Variable-Generation Integration Group (UVIG) to support their education in wind and solar power. Awardees were chosen by grade point average, commitment to renewable energy and power engineering, recommendations, relevant experience and achievements, and an essay submission. [Full Story] Beyster Collections showcase a lifetime of ideas from U-M alum Three permanent exhibits on U-Ms North Campus pay tribute to the achievements of Michigan Engineer J. Robert Beyster. [Full Story] Valeria Bertacco Appointed Associate Dean for Academic Programs and Initiatives at Rackham Graduate School Prof. Valeria Bertacco has been selected to serve as Associate Dean for Academic Programs and Initiatives at the Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studies. The Associate Dean for Academic Programs and Initiatives serves as the primary liaison between the Rackham School and academic units in the physical sciences and engineering. [Full Story] CSE Staff Outing at the Nichols Arboretum On June 2nd, the CSE staff took a leisurely walk in the Nichols Arboretum to explore the natural environment and to view the blooming Peony Garden. With nearly 800 peonies at peak bloom, the arboretum is home to the largest collection of heirloom herbaceous peonies in North America. [Full Story] Seeing through materials with visible light With yogurt and crushed glass, Prof. Raj Nadakuditi's group have taken a step toward using visible light to image inside the body. Their method for focusing light through these materials is much faster and simpler than today's dominant approach. By understanding exactly how a patch of skin scatters the light, researchers hope to carefully pattern light beams so that they focus inside the bodya first step toward seeing into it. [Full Story] Engineers Bring Education to Disadvantaged Children in Ecuador CE undergrad Sam Tenka traveled to Ecuador with a team of four multidisciplinary engineers to work with youth who have not had the chance to attend school. As part of the Engineering Honors GO program, the team stayed in the city of Quito for two weeks to aid the Street Children Work project. [Full Story] The Power of a lunchbox From electrical engineering to youngest director of operations, Apple, and now founder and CEO of Vaya Life, ECE alum Vashist Vasanthakumar (BSE MSE EE 05 07) has had quite a journey. He came back to Chennai in 2016 with a goal to reinvent traditional and widely used personal products, starting with one of the most versatile products the lunchbox. [Full Story] A VR-Powered Crystal Structures App (Video) EE senior Duncan Abbot and his VR software startup Gwydion want to redefine how humans interact with technology. The companys latest project, an app called Arthea, has been used by Prof. Joanna Millunchick (MSE) in classes to help students visualize crystal structures in 3D. This video by the College of Engineering explores how the team made it work, and how Prof. Millunchick has used it to help her students learn. [Full Story] Eric Vander Weele: Building Bloomberg LP Since graduating from U-M, Eric N. Vander Weele (BSE CS 08, MS CSE 10), has helped grow Bloombergs technology division and increased efficiency and production for employees and clients. He focuses on how to reuse and integrate existing C/C++ libraries within Python, how to improve productivity for other developers, and how to manage and monitor the deployment of Python applications. [Full Story] Lattice Data Makes Gift to Michigan Computer Science and Engineering Fund Lattice Data, Inc. has recently provided a gift to the College of Engineering to benefit the Computer Science and Engineering Division of the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. Lattice was cofounded by Prof. Michael Cafarella. [Full Story] Dmitry Berenson Helps Robots Play Nice with People (with Video) Prof. Dmitry Berenson wants robots to help us out anywhere, any time. In order to do so, he's working with state of the art equipment to design algorithms for robotic manipulation. These algorithms could turn a hunk of metal into a useful household assistant. [Full Story] Breakthrough for Large Scale Computing: Memory Disaggregation Made Practical CSE researchers have introduced Infiniswap, the first system to scalably implement cluster-wide memory disaggregation, whereby the memory of all the servers in a computing cluster is transparently exposed as a single memory pool to all the applications in the cluster. [Full Story] New Computer Chips That See Data Will Enable Energy-Efficient Supercomputers Drawing inspiration from how mammalian brains process sight, Prof. Wei Lu has found a way to mimic the functions of biological neural networks on a next-gen memristor chip. [Full Story] Neuromorphic Chips Offer Neural Networks That Actually Work Like the Brain Engineers at the University of Michigan are onto something rather more brainlike, however, with help from a peculiar electrical component known as a memristor. They've developed a new "sparse coding" algorithm that uses grids of memristors to approximate the pattern recognition abilities of mammalian brains. [Full Story] Alum Dennis Grimard Delivers Commencement Address at Vermont Tech Graduation Dennis Grimard (MSE PhD EE 1984 1990), a Barre, Vt., native, contributed greatly to the construction of U-M's Lurie Nanofabrication Facility, and now works as the associate director of MIT's nanofabrication lab, MIT.nano. During his address, Dennis choked up as he described his background. He came from a line of farmers, quarry workers and small-business owners who were "always willing to give more than they take," he said. [Full Story] Next-gen computing inspired by biology Inspired by how mammals see, a new memristor computer circuit prototype developed by Prof. Wei Lu has the potential to process complex data, such as images and video orders of magnitude faster and with much less power than todays most advanced systems. [Full Story] Lifelong Radiation Lab Researcher Valdis Liepa Retires Dr. Valdis V. Liepa, research scientist in ECE, retired from active faculty status on January 31, 2017. Dr. Liepa has been a member of the U-M family for his entire career, earning his BS , MS, and PhD in EE (1958, 1959, and 1966, respectively), and joining the Radiation Laboratory in 1968. [Full Story] Won Pyo Hong, President of Samsung SDS, Presented with Inaugural ECE Alumni Impact Award Dr. Won Pyo Hong (MSE PhD EE ), President of Samsung SDS, was presented the first annual ECE Alumni Impact Award. This honor, established in 2017, recognizes Dr. Hong for his pioneering work in the personal electronics industry, playing a key role in shaping our world. It is the highest recognition granted by ECE to its alumni. [Full Story] CSE Receives NCWIT Award for Recruiting and Retention Efforts of Women in Computing The Computer Science and Engineering Division has received a NCWIT Extension Services Transformation (NEXT) Award for excellence in promoting women in undergraduate computing. Sponsored by the National Center for Women & Information Technology (NCWIT) and Google, the NEXT Awards honor academic departments that show significant positive outcomes in increasing womens meaningful participation in computing education. [Full Story] Brian Noble Named Chair of Computer Science and Engineering Influential educator and computer scientist Brian Noble has been selected as the new chair of the Computer Science and Engineering division of the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at the University of Michigan. [Full Story] U.S. Hospitals Not Immune to Crippling Cyber Attacks In this article, Prof. Kevin Fu comments on the vulnerabilities that exist in hospital and healthcare systems and devices. The recent strike by the ransomware program called WannaCry demonstrates that these shortcomings. [Full Story] Apple Just Acquired This Little-Known Artificial Intelligence Startup CSE Prof. Michael Cafarella is a co-founder of the startup Lattice Data, which builds on statistical inference and machine learning to solve problems using dark data. Apple has acquired Lattice, which recently emerged from stealth mode, for $200M. [Full Story] Apple acquires AI company Lattice Data, a specialist in unstructured dark data, for $200M CSE Prof. Michael Cafarella is a co-founder of the startup Lattice Data, which builds on statistical inference and machine learning to solve problems using dark data. Apple has acquired Lattice, which recently emerged from stealth mode, for $200M. [Full Story] Smartphone security hole: "Open port" backdoors are common The College of Engineering reports on work by computer science security researchers which has revealed that so-called "open ports" are much more vulnerable to security breaches than previously thought. [Full Story] Picting, not Writing, is the Literacy of Todays Youth This blog post by Thurnau Prof. Elliot Soloway and his collaborator Cathie Norris looks at the disconnect between existing instructional materials (90% text) and how K-12 students communicate and consume (90% image-based), with ramifications for educational practices. [Full Story] Babak Parviz One of 20 Alumni Honored with U-M Bicentennial Award The University of Michigan presented alumnus Babak Parviz (MSE PhD EE 97 01; also MS Physics 97) with a Bicentennial Alumni Award for his pioneering technological innovations that augment human potential and improve peoples lives. Babak is one of 20 alumni to earn this exclusive award, and one of 10 to accept it at the spring commencement ceremony. [Full Story] Sister cell profiling aims to shut down cancer metastasis In work that could improve understanding of how cancer spreads, a team of engineers and medical researchers at the University of Michigan including Prof. Euisik Yoon developed a new kind of microfluidic chip that can capture rare, aggressive cancer cells, grow them on the chip and release single cells on demand. [Full Story] Shai Revzen part of a new five-institution MURI focused on the control of dynamic systems Prof. Shai Revzen is a member of a five-institution team that will take advantage of recent advances in computation to exploit the promise of the Koopman Theory for modeling and control of dynamic systems. 2017 ISCA Influential Paper Award for Groundbreaking Research in Power-efficient Computing For their groundbreaking research in power-efficient computing, faculty and former students of the department received the 2017 ACM SIGARCH and IEEE-CS TCCA ISCA Influential Paper Award. The researchers developed a method to intelligently put parts of a computer's memory into a low power mode to save energy. Since 2002, the technique has been adopted by major chip manufacturers, and has continued to be exploited in subsequent research by the authors themselves. [Full Story] Wellman and Rajan on the Ethics of Automated Trading In this audio interview at Algocracy and the Transhumanist Project, Prof. Michael Wellman and Business Administration Prof. Uday Rajan comment on the ethics of autonomous trading agents on financial markets. The discussion encompasses algorithmic trading, high frequency trading, market manipulation, the AI control problem, and more. [Full Story] U-M Optics Researchers Sponsor Optics and Photonics Industry Snapshot Professionals and researchers from across Michigan's optics industry gathered for the Optics and Photonics Industry Snapshot on March 27, celebrating both the Optical Society of America's 100th anniversary and the Ann Arbor chapter's 50th. The event was sponsored in part by the Optical Society at the University of Michigan (OSUM), advised by research scientist John Nees. Prof. Aghapi Mordovanakis (BME) was also part of the planning of the event. [Full Story] Thomas B. A. Senior Named Fellow of International Union of Radio Science Professor Emeritus Thomas B. Senior, known internationally for his work in scattering and electromagnetics, has been named a fellow of the International Union of Radio Science. The URSI coordinates international exchange and study of all aspects of electromagnetic fields and waves, and fellowship is by invitation only. [Full Story] Hundreds of popular Android apps have open ports, making them prime targets for hacking This article reports on the work done by CSE researchers Yunhan Jack Jia, Qi Alfred Chen, Yikai Lin, Chao Kong, and Prof. Z. Morley Mao in characterizing a widespread vulnerability in popular Android apps. [Full Story] Rackham Student Spotlight: Elizabeth Dreyer Liz is a Rackham Merit Fellow and has always been intentional about her status as a first generation college student, wanting to find whatever ways to increase her chance for success as much as possible. Liz examines magneto-electric scattering, shining high-powered lasers and controlling input light to focus on the scattered light and determine whats happening to the material, particularly exploring what makes one material better than another. [Full Story] Students in EECS 556 Win Prizes for Improving Image Processing Techniques for Camera Motion Blur and Facial Recognition Two teams earned prizes in the graduate level course, EECS 556: Image Processing, thanks to the sponsorship of KLA-Tencor. The course, taught this past term by Prof. Boklye Kim (Radiology, EECS), covers topics in the theory of multidimensional signal analysis and processing with applications in optical, computerized tomography (CT), and magnetic resonance images. [Full Story] Open Ports Create Backdoors in Millions of Smartphones This article reports on work by CSE researchers who have characterized a widespread vulnerability in the software that runs on mobile devices which could allow attackers to steal contact information, security credentials, photos, and other sensitive data by using open ports to create backdoors. [Full Story] Hacking with Sound Waves CSE researchers have demonstrated a new way of using sound to interfere with devices containing accelerometers, such as smartphones and self-driving cars. This presents a new avenue for hackers to use in compromising devices to steal information or disrupt communication. [Full Story] An Obscure Flaw Creates Backdoors in Millions of Smartphones CSE researchers have characterized a widespread vulnerability in the software that runs on mobile devices which could allow attackers to steal contact information, security credentials, photos, and other sensitive data, and also to install malware and to perform malicious code execution which could be used in large-scale attacks. [Full Story] Gopal Nataraj Earns Best Paper Award for Improving MRI Gopal Nataraj, a doctoral student in ECE, earned a Best Student Paper award at the IEEE International Symposium on Biomedical Imaging for his paper "Dictionary-Free MRI Parameter Estimation Via Kernel Ridge Regression." Gopal is working to improve the sensitivity of MRIs to specific disorders as well as improving doctors' ability to distinguish closely-related disorders. [Full Story] Student teams earn prizes for analog-digital converter circuit designs in EECS 511 Students in the graduate level course, Integrated Analog/Digital Interface Circuits (EECS 511), taught by Prof. Michael Flynn, competed for cash prizes while presenting their final design projects thanks to the support of Analog Devices, Inc. Two winning projects and teams were determined by an expert panel at Analog Devices. [Full Story] Prof. Andy Yagle Retires After a 32-Year Career in Signal and Image Processing Prof. Andy Yagle will retire in May after 32 years at the University of Michigan distinguished by his dedication to teaching as well as contributions to research in the area of signal and image processing. A nearly lifelong Ann Arbor resident, Andy is as Maize and Blue as they come. [Full Story] Heath Hofmann Recognized for Excellence in Teaching with the Jon R. and Beverly S. Holt Award from the College of Engineering Prof. Heath Hofmann was honored to receive the Jon R. and Beverly S. Holt Award for Excellence in Teaching. This award, previously limited to faculty in other departments, was opened up to the entire College of Engineering faculty for the first time. Prof. Hofmann specializes in power electronics and electromechanical energy conversion. [Full Story] | ||||
