NewsNews&NotesNotes 1 The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Department of Computer Science from Sitterson Hall SPRING 2005 • ISSUE THIRTY-FIVE In this issue Chairman’s corner CHAIRMAN’S CORNER 1 Greetings from step in the Science Complex expansion is an Sitterson Hall! As addition to Sitterson Hall. While the funding WELCOMES AND FAREWELLS 1 I write this, we details are far from settled, we have been are at the close meeting regularly with architects with a target CONGRATULATIONS TO... 1 of the spring start date for construction in summer 2006. semester, with FAMILY MATTERS 2 a faculty retreat In this edition of News & Notes you will and graduation find the latest computer services news, as GRANTS AND CONTRACTS 3 remaining this well as news from our Networking Research week. Group, among other updates. We are finding RECENT PUBLICATIONS 4 that we have many short announcements One of the major of awards and activities that could be more DEPARTMENT NEWS 5 events this spring has been Maze Day, an rapidly disseminated by the “recent news” entertaining and educational fun-fair for section of our web site. We invite you to visit RESEARCH HIGHLIGHTS 6 blind and low-visual acuity children featuring our departmental web site for the latest news. computer-based games and educational Our newsletter will continue to come to you ALUMNI NEWS 7 programs specifically designed for sightless with focus on research projects and alumni operation in Professor Gary Bishop’s and faculty news. www.cs.unc.edu Assistive Technologies course. Fifty-one children and fifty-six adults from around Congratulations to the spring semester the state were in attendance for this exciting 2005 Computer Science alumni fellowship event. Eighteen different demonstrations recipient, Olufisayo Omojokun. For more were set up throughout the department and about his research, see page 3. I thank you for manned by student volunteers. The event your support of this important fellowship! was organized by our new demo coordinator While the normal term for the fellowship is Missy Wood and was a huge success. You one academic year, the fall recipient, Miguel can read more about Maze Day and Gary’s Otaduy, was so productive that he completed work in the Fall 2005 edition of News & and defended his dissertation in the first Notes. semester. The Science Complex expansion has also As always, I welcome your comments been in full swing this spring. A 128,000- and questions about any aspect of the square-foot addition to Phillips Hall that department. If you are in Chapel Hill, be sure will house Physics and Marine Sciences has to stop by the department for a visit. sprung up beside Sitterson with an estimated completion date of July 2006. The next Jan F. Prins Welcomes and Farewells years of office experience at Lucent Technologies in Greensboro. Most NEW FACULTY recently, she worked with the Director Naga Govindaraju (Ph.D. 2004) was of Secondary and Career-Technical named Research Assistant Professor, Education in the Alamance-Burlington School System. effective November 2004. NEW STAFF Congratulations to... Faye Lewis, administrative assistant, FACULTY AND STAFF joined the department in February 2005. Faye comes to us with many Delphine Bull, administrative assistant, who graduated from UNC in Family matters Congratulations to... Kevin Arthur (Ph.D. 2000) married December 2004 with a B.A. in student in the department, and his Maureen McClarnon on October Management and Society, completing advisor is Marc Pollefeys. You can 13, 2004, in Lake Tahoe, California. the degree she began at Florida read his winning entry at http://www. ([email protected]) International University. Delphi started canesta.com/contest/. with one course at UNC in fall 1999 and increased up to five courses a year. Graduate student Gokul Varadhan Fred and Nancy Brooks welcomed their She joined the department in January ninth grandchild, and Professor Dinesh Manocha were Roger Greenwood 2001 as administrative support to the recipients of the Best Paper Award , born to and Brooks, Jr. Roger Ann Steve Pizer and Guido Gerig. at Pacific Graphics 2004. The title of Brooks on February 23, 2005, in N.Y. the paper was “Accurate Minkowski , associate chair for ([email protected]) Tim Quigg Sum of Polyhedral Models,” and the administration and finance, who received conference was held in Seoul, South the 2004 Excellence in Research Dennis G. Brown (M.S. 1998) and his Korea, on October 6 - 8, 2004. wife, Lisa, welcomed their daughter, Administration: Research Administrator on September 16, 2004, in of the Year Award from the Office of Jessica, the Vice Chancellor of Research and December 2004 Ph.D. Recipients: Waldorf, Md. ([email protected]) Economic Development. This annual William Valentine Baxter, III, award recognizes a University employee “Physically-Based Modeling Techniques Kelly Corbet (B.S.M.Sci. 1987) married for meritorious and distinguished for Interactive Digital Painting.” (Ming Stephanie Price on March 20, 2004, in accomplishments in research Lin) Raleigh, N.C. ([email protected]) administration at UNC-Chapel Hill. Tom Fletcher, “Statistical Variability Tim Culver (Ph.D. 2000) and his wife, Jenni Styron and Marie Tarjan, who in Nonlinear Spaces: Application to Kathleen, welcomed their daughter, were both promoted to Program Shape Analysis and DT-MRI.” Grace Ann, on October 2, 2004, in Assistant V’s in September 2004. They (Stephen Pizer) Waltham, Mass. Grace joins big brother provide administrative support for the faculty and department. Jenni joined Matthew. ([email protected]) Yoni Fridman, “Extracting Branching the department in January 2001 and Object Geometry via Cores.” (Stephen Marie joined the department in April Pizer) Scott Larsen, graduate student, and his 1996. wife, , welcomed their son, , on Amy Seth Shelby Funk, “Implementing Real- November 2, 2004, in Chapel Hill. Seth Missy Wood, who was promoted to time Systems on Heterogeneous joins siblings Jacob, David, and Lorin. Administrative Assistant II in Multiprocessors.” (Sanjoy Baruah) ([email protected]) September 2004, and will now provide support for proposal development , “Profile Scale Spaces for and resurrect the demo/outreach Sean Ho Gopi Meenakshisundaram (Ph.D. Statistical Image Match in Bayesian 2001) and (Ph.D. 2003) program for the department. Missy Aditi Majumder also received a “Big Buddy” award Segmentation.” (Guido Gerig) welcomed their daughter, Sucheta M. in October 2004 from the Employee Sundaram, on December 15, 2004. Forum Recognition Program. She was Martin Isenburg, “Compression and ([email protected], [email protected]) nominated by Jenni Styron and Streaming of Polygon Meshes.” (Jack selected by a committee to receive a Snoeyink) Derek Merck, graduate student, married gift basket to Southern Seasons along Dr. Lisa Fagan on the beach in Santa with a UNC One Card Gift Certificate. Miguel A. Otaduy, “6-DoF Haptic Barbara on August 8, 2004. (derek@cs. Rendering Using Contact Levels of unc.edu) GRADUATE STUDENTS Detail and Haptic Textures.” (Ming Sudipta Sinha, who was one of Lin) Mark Moir (Ph.D. 1996) and Vikki Genys the winners of Phase One of the , “Analyzing the Behavior welcomed their son, Maxwell John, on CanestaVision™ Contest, sponsored Erin Parker of Loop Nests in the Memory December 12, 2004, in Wellington, NZ. by Canesta, Inc. Phase One of the contest asked participants to explore Hierarchy: Methods, Tools, and ([email protected]) innovative applications of Canesta’s Applications.” (Siddhartha Chatterjee) new depth cameras (active infrared Jai Glasgow Pausch, former outreach time-of-flight cameras). In the context Adam Seeger, “Surface Reconstruction coordinator, and her husband, Randy, of this contest, Sudipta proposed to from Combination AFM/SEM Images.” welcomed their son, Logan Maxwell, extend his work on camera network (Russell Taylor) on October 2, 2004, in Pittsburgh, calibration to depth cameras and Penn. Logan joins big brother Dylan. hybrid camera networks. As one of the December 2004 M.S. Recipients: ([email protected]) ten selected winners, Sudipta received John Chek, Timothy Cogger, Justin a $7,500 electronic perception Hensely, David O’Brien, Chris Oates, development kit. Sudipta is a Ph.D. Max Smolens, Ben Wiseman. Grants Congratulations to... 33 UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS Grants and Contracts Austin Hogue, a junior business ALUMNI FELLOWSHIP major who was enrolled in Jeannie Ming C. Lin, professor (PI). “Conference RECIPIENT Walsh’s COMP 90 A.P.P.L.E.S. Service Support for ACM Workshop on Learning course (a companion course General Purpose Computation using Olufisayo Omojokun (M.S. 2001) to COMP 4) during the fall 2004 semester, Graphics Processors,” ARO. is the recipient of the spring who was presented with the President’s Dinesh Manocha, professor (PI), semester 2005 Computer Science Choice Award for Outstanding and Ming C. Lin, professor (Co-PI). Alumni Fellowship. The fellowship Community Service from the Orange “Computer Generated Force Scalabil- is awarded annually to a Ph.D. County Disability Awareness Council ity,” U.S. Army RDECOM. candidate in his or her final year in November 2004, at a banquet held of study, allowing the student at the Sheraton Inn in Chapel Hill. Leonard McMillan, associate professor to work full time on dissertation A.P.P.L.E.S. is a service learning program (PI), and Wei Wang, assistant professor research. Generous contributions that gives students the opportunity to (Co-PI). “Enhanced Night Vision Via by alumni and friends help to implement skills they have learned a Combination of Poisson Interpolation make this fellowship possible. in class in a real life setting. Austin and Machine Learning,” DARPA. worked as a technical advisor intern for Andrew Noble, adjunct associate pro- Olufisayo’s research falls in the the OCDAC, utilizing his understanding fessor (PI), and Wei Wang, assistant areas of mobile and ubiquitous of office software to organize the professor (Co-PI). “Analysis of High computing.