July 19, 2007
Vol. 18, No. 2
In this issue:
Eleven Professors Participate in Microsoft Faculty Summit
Eleven Carnegie Mellon professors, including eight from the School of Computer Science (SCS) and three from the Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) Department, attended Microsoft Research's 8th annual Faculty Summit July 16-17 at the Microsoft campus in Redmond, Wash. The event, which draws about 350 academics from 175 institutions worldwide, is an opportunity for professors to meet with Microsoft researchers and product group engineers for in-depth discussions of computing problems and trends.
Carnegie Mellon attendees included
Jamie Callan, Alexei Efros, Seth Copen Goldstein, Robert Kraut, Peter Lee, Roni Rosenfeld and
Jeannette Wing from SCS, and
Bruce Krogh, Jose Moura and
Dawn Song from ECE.
Luis von Ahn, a Microsoft Research New Faculty Fellow, also participated.
A School of Design project was one of seven student projects displayed on the summit's second day. Students
Max Snyder, Louisa Poythress, Zoe Ouyang, Ben Elgart and
Lee Byron, under the guidance of Associate Design Professor
Shelley Evenson, worked in collaboration with UPMC to design a patient care management system that makes pre-operative care simpler and more patient-focused.
High School Robotics Champions From Qatar Campus Visit Here
Carnegie Mellon hosted three high school students this week from the Al RU'YA Bilingual School in Kuwait who took the top spot at Carnegie Mellon in Qatar's first international Botball(r) competition in May. The students won a trip to Pittsburgh as the grand prize after beating 17 other teams from Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait. The students and their teacher spent five days in Pittsburgh. They toured the university's Robotics Institute and Entertainment Technology Center, took in a Pirates game, toured the city, did some caving and were recognized at a meeting of the Pittsburgh City Council. Councilman
Bill Peduto was their host. For most of these academically talented students, this was their first journey to the United States.
The Botball high school robotics competition is a U.S.-based organization that brings robotics to high schools. Student teams are equipped with a Lego(c) Mindstorm robot, along with instruction on how to program it to move autonomously through a course.
Further information:
http://www.cmu.edu/news/archive/2007/July/july16_botball.shtml/
Governor's School Celebrates 25 Years on Campus
The Pennsylvania Governor's School for the Sciences (PGSS), under the direction of Carnegie Mellon Physics Professor
Barry Luokkala, is celebrating its 25th anniversary on campus. Designed to encourage talented students to pursue careers in the sciences, the PGSS provides high school students with opportunities to experience educational and research-oriented activities not normally available through their high schools.
During the intensive five-week program (through July 28) students participate in core courses covering the latest advances in biology, chemistry, physics, mathematics and computer science. Team projects and laboratory courses emphasize hands-on research using sophisticated technologies and facilities. This year's projects include topics such as genetically modified foods, high-temperature superconductors, bioinformatics, molecular dynamics simulations, quasi-crystals and the wave-particle duality of light. Elective courses cover astrophysics, immunology, materials science, laser technology, science and music, and the history of mathematical ideas.
Further information:
http://www-pgss.mcs.cmu.edu/
News Briefs
- Carnegie Mellon contributed $187,512 to the 2006 United Way Campaign, marking its most successful campaign to date. It surpassed its 2005 contribution by more than $80,000. Ten percent of the campus community participated in the drive, compared to about 4.5 percent a year ago. The university also saw a significant increase in Leadership Gifts of more than $1,000. Overall, the United Way of Allegheny County raised more than $29.8 million from more than 60,000 individual donors and 800 employers.
- The Web communications and publication teams in Marketing Communications recently launched a redesigned Web site for Carnegie Mellon Today magazine. In addition to the new look, the new carnegiemellontoday.com has several new features, including: a send-to-a-friend feature, which allows users to email stories to others; a homepage poll, which will change regularly to reflect hot topics of the day; a "print this page" option, which reformats the page into a clean print out; a search feature, which allows you to search back issues; and a Talk Back feature, which allows readers to share their thoughts in a moderated fashion.
Personal Mention
- Biological Sciences Professor William Brown died Sunday, July 15, following brain surgery. He had been a beloved and revered member and leader of the Carnegie Mellon community since 1973, when he joined the Mellon College of Science faculty as an assistant professor. In 1993, he became a full professor and acting head of the Biological Sciences Department. He was department head from 1995 to 2000. Brown was an honored educator, winning the Julius Ashkin Teaching Award, the Richard Moore Education Award and the Robert Doherty Award. During his tenure, Brown held key roles on numerous committees and was the Faculty Senate Chair from 2004-2005. A campus tribute will be held this fall. In lieu of flowers, remembrances may be made to Carnegie Mellon University for the Dr. William E. Brown Scholarship Fund, c/o Sharon King, 6 PPG Place, 11th Floor, Pittsburgh, Pa. 15222-5488. Further information: http://www.cmu.edu/news/archive/2007/July/july17_brown.shtml/
- Chris T. Hendrickson, the Duquesne Light Professor of Engineering, will be named an honorary member of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) at the 137th Annual Civil Engineering Conference, Nov. 3 in Orlando, Fla. He will be honored for his distinguished service and leadership during more than four decades as an educator, administrator and researcher. A Rhodes scholar in 1973, Hendrickson has penned five books, hundreds of papers and was managing editor of the Journal of Transportation Engineering. Further information: http://www.cmu.edu/news/archive/2007/July/july16_hendrickson.shtml/
- ECE students John Reinke and Nicholas O'Donoughue are recipients of the National Defense Science and Engineering Graduate (NDSEG) Fellowship, which will cover their tuition and stipends over three years. Alumnus Daniel Weller (E' 2006) also qualified for the honor and will use his fellowship at MIT, where he is a graduate student in electrical engineering.
- ECE faculty members Ken Mai and C. Fred Higgs III are winners of the National Science Foundation (NSF) Early CAREER Award. Each grant provides about $400,000 in funding for a period of five years.
- The Carnegie Museum of Natural History is showing Paul Goodman's documentary film "Escola de Samba" from 11 a.m. to noon on Fridays in July and August, with the exception of July 27. Escola de Samba follows the work of a Brazilian group called "Camisa Verde e Branco" (Green and White Shirts) over a 10-month period, in which they prepared to compete against other Brazilian groups in the annual grand festival in San Palo. The film is the second documentary created by Goodman focusing on how developing countries use human and social ingenuity to create complex, efficient and reliable work systems. Goodman is the Richard M. Cyert Professor of Organizational Psychology at the Tepper School.
- Computer Science Professor Lenore Blum will be a panelist at the Pittsburgh STEM Summit on Wednesday, Aug. 15 at the Omni William Penn Hotel. The conference will address the current and future workforce shortage in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) careers. Blum will participate in the higher education panel discussion. For more on the summit, visit http://www.pghtech.org.
- William Cohen, associate research professor in the School of Computer Science's Machine Learning Department, has published a new book, "A Computer Scientist's Guide to Cell Biology."
- Harriet Schwartz, the College of Fine Arts consultant in the Career Center for the past nine years, will join the faculty in Carlow University's Master of Professional Leadership program this August. Schwartz was an assistant to the Dean of Student Affairs from 1991 to 1997 before joining the Career Center. She is editor of "Spirituality 101: The Indispensable Guide to Keeping or Finding Your Spiritual Life on Campus" and is working toward her Ph.D. in leadership and change at Antioch University.
Calendar Highlight
- Saturday, July 21: Residents of several southern Pittsburgh neighborhoods will engage in a "Community Conversation" to discuss strategies for revitalizing their communities. Sponsored by the Southwestern Pennsylvania Program for Deliberative Democracy at Carnegie Mellon and Pittsburgh's Coro Center for Civic Leadership. Further information: http://www.cmu.edu/news/archive/2007/July/july16_conversation.shtml/
