Retires After 32 Years Alumni News
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Summer 2 0 0 2 Alumni News The end of an era: Prof. Saburo Muroga retires Saburo Muroga grew up in the company, which employed about 442,000, was Namazu, Japan, the son of a gathered there,” he laughingly recalled. “People who career military officer. As a had difficulty with others were sent there.” When he teenager who played the joined the laboratory, it was converted into a research violin, he aspired to be a laboratory devoted to bullet train technology, and many diplomat, a fiction writer, or a of the researchers had come from the country’s top naval musician. What he became and army research labs, which were being dissolved. “At was a giant in the field of that time,” he said, “people at Bell Labs had published a logic design. book on visible speech, analyzed by electrical signals. Saburo Muroga He earned his under- The book was a compilation of research, and I thought graduate degree in electrical this could be used to develop a speech typewriter.” He engineering from University of Tokyo during the applied for a patent and began basic research on voice turbulent days right after World War II. He graduated in recognition. Due to lack of support, he was forced to give 1947 with the desire to do research. up work on the project. Jobs were extremely scarce, and Muroga was lucky to Muroga’s manager left the company to join a land a job in a small laboratory owned by an enormous government agency similar to the American F.C.C., and government-supported national railroad, which used to Muroga followed him there. “But it was a miserable test electrical instruments. “Every strange character in place,” he said. “We had to make laws and prepare data continued on p. 14 Retires after 32 years Thank you, Judy! Zigrida Arbatsky has seen a lot of changes since her After nine years of dedicated service to the department, arrival in CS in 1970 as Professor Muroga’s secretary. alumni, and students, Judy Tolliver has taken a new This was before the arrival of the personal computer; she position as Program Manager with the National Center typed manuscripts and student’s theses, including that for Supercomputing Applications. She became the of Professor David Padua. A terminal hooked to the conduit between the three groups, connecting people, mainframe computer was soon to appear on her desk creating the highly successful Mentor Program, and and with it’s arrival she learned Troff, LaTeX, ED, EX, being a valuable resource. And there was Cyberfest! and Unix. Later when the department switched to PCs, While Tolliver was here, the department has received she switched to the latest software a 56 percent increase in annual fund gifts—a tremendous evolving as it did. She still sign of your support. The maintains her pre-PC skills as department’s endowment has various professors still use the grown from $351,000 to more “classics.” than $8 M, and its first endowed She also helped Prof. Muroga positions were established with with the department’s library. For gifts by private individuals: three students the library was a great scholarships, four fellowships, place to study and had the best two professorships, and two source of CS books, journals, and chairs. And in 2001, we received technical reports not available a $32 M gift for a new building. Zigrida Arbatsky continued on p. 2 see letter on p.2 Judy Tolliver Dear Alumni and Friends, Zigrida, continued from page 1 Working to raise money for the anywhere else Alps, and one of her favorite places Department of Computer Science on campus. is Jackson Hole, Wyoming. has been the best job I’ve ever had. Zigrida said “Exercise makes me feel good,” she Over the nine years that I’ve been that on a commented. coordinator of alumni relations and number of She is moving to New York in development, I’ve met many occasions she July to be near her son. She will not wonderful people who share a found signs of stray too far from computers common interest—to provide the after hours because she will bring a recently best educational experience for the partying. acquired laptop computer with her. next generation of students. Alumni Zigrida Arbatsky During the But first, she said, she must learn and friends across the country have mid-1980s, the how to use it. expressed their loyalty, commitment, depart-ment library became part of and generosity to the department by the university openly sharing their personal library system. She experiences at the university and had to renumber offering their opinions about our and reorder the programs, as well as their thoughts entire collection. In on how we can improve. 1990 when the I sincerely thank all of you who latest addition to have made contributions to the DCL was opened, department, financially and in other she helped move ways. Your support is vital to the the collection to its faculty and students who currently new home. Her walk the halls of DCL and who will happiest memories occupy our new building, Siebel are of working Center. I especially thank those of with students and you who have started new traditions helping them locate material. by endowing funds to ensure that we DCS Library (1990) thrive for generations to come. They in turn It has been a privilege to work for brought her many books, including the best computer science science fiction, books by Stephen University of Illinois department in the world, and King and the Lord of the Rings series, CS Alumni News although I’m moving on as a to “lighten” her reading. She Editors: Judy Tolliver and Kathleen program director for NCSA, I am recollects that her saddest day was in Zanotti happy knowing that many of our 1996 when the collection was moved to the Grainger Library. “Everyone, CS Alumni News is published twice a year. paths will cross again. Deadlines for submissions: March 1 for Again, thank you. especially faculty, enjoyed having the spring issue, October 1 for the winter materials close at hand,” said issue. Sincerely, Zigrida. “Zigrida was easy to work with. All ideas expressed in the CS Alumni News Judy Tolliver are those of the authors or editors and do I learned a lot from her and she not necessarily reflect the official position was a good source of information of the alumni or the Department of for the department. She had a great Computer Science. historical memory and of course Correspondence concerning the she knew exactly what was going CS Alumni News should be sent to on in the department,” according to [email protected] or: Rick Henderson, DCL building supervisor. Editor, Department of Computer Science, 1304 West Springfield Avenue, She plans to continue skiing, Urbana, IL 61801 which she began when she moved Judy Tolliver with Doug Hilmes, here in 1965. Last year she went www.cs.uiuc.edu BS 85, and Prof. Roy Campbell with the Ski Club to the French The University of Illinois is an equal opportunity and affirmative action during Illini Reception (1995). institution. 2 CS ALUMNI NEWS From the corner office . A year has quickly passed since be essential in maintaining our excellence (see p.7). I started as department head. The The recent rankings from US News and World Report have summer is here; time to slow down brought us good news: we were ranked (again) fifth in the a little and to reflect on what was country along with the College of Engineering. Our peers achieved this year and where we continue to recognize the high quality of our programs. I go from here. always take such rankings with a grain of salt because of the We have had an exceptional many biases that are built into them. However, there are recruiting season this spring, with some useful lessons to be learned. a large number of top candidates The first lesson is that size matters: there is a clear interested in our department. Eight correlation between size and rank. The department plans to Marc Snir outstanding new faculty members continue growing to more than sixty faculty members. This will join us this fall (see p. 11). growth will improve our education with smaller student/ They will strengthen our department in established research faculty ratios and improve our research with critical mass in area and push us into new areas such as information all key research areas. retrieval and human computer interfaces. Many of the Another lesson is that leveraging computer science candidates that turned us down did so because of the lack of research and education activities across the campus is a suitable position for the candidate’s spouse. This is a essential. Computer Science at the UI is excellent not only serious problem for a small place, as two career couples because we have an excellent department, but we also have become the norm. The university has programs in place to great CS-related research and education in other units: first help with spousal hiring, but we must do more and learn and foremost is ECE, but also in Library and Information from the private sector how to handle this issue using job Sciences or Commerce and Business Administration. placement services or other mechanisms. Similarly the relationship between academic departments Hiring is likely to be more modest next year because of and research centers must also be nurtured. The research reduced budgets. The University faces a $40 million centers, such as the CSL, Beckman, or NCSA, fulfill an reduction in the state budget, which will be partly offset by a important role at the university in supporting 10% tuition increase.