Department of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering

In 2012-2017, UMBC will support a total of 22 new Cybersecurity students at the BS, MS, MPS, and PhD levels in computer science and related fields. Each scholarship is for the final two years of study (three years for PhD and combined BS/MS). Each scholarship covers full tuition, fees, travel, books, and an academic year stipend of $30,000 for PhD, $25,000 for MS, and $20,000 for BS students.

Interested full-time degree students should submit an application to Dr. Alan T. Sherman, as explained on the CISA website. The same application form is used for the Scholarship For Service (SFS) and Information Assurance Scholarship Program (IASP) scholarships. Clearly state on the cover page to which program you are applying. Be sure to include official transcripts and original signed letters of reference on letterhead (preferably from tenure-track faculty who can comment on your research potential and accomplishments).

The applications must be received by the deadlines: 12noon Monday, November 17, 2014, for scholarships beginning in spring 2015 and 12noon Monday, February 2, 2015, for scholarships beginning fall 2015.

We expect to make up to two new SFS awards for spring 2015, and up to six new SFS awards for fall 2015. We do not yet know if any IASP scholarships will be possible for fall 2015.

Applicants must be US citizens capable of obtaining a secret or top-secret clearance. Each scholar must work for the federal, state, or tribal government (for pay) for one year for each year of award. Each scholar must also carry out an appropriate cybersecurity summer internship (for pay) for each year of support.

Recipients are expected to engage vigorously in cybersecurity education, research, and other cybersecurity activities while at UMBC.

For more information, contact Dr. Alan T, Sherman, Director, UMBC Center for Information Security and Assurance, .

If you are interested in going on to graduate school after graduation, either directly or later, and either full-time and part time, you might attend the following workshop on Monday, October 27.

An Inside Look at Graduate School & Summer Research:
How to Prepare, Get Accepted, and Succeed

Evelyn S. Erenrich, PhD
Asst Dean, Rutgers Graduate School-New Brunswick
Rutgers University

12– 1pm, Monday October 27, 2014
Public Policy Bldg 105

In addition to discussing strategies for research success, I will spotlight exciting programs and interdisciplinary opportunities at Rutgers University, including a summer program, RiSE (Research in Science & Engineering). I will be joined by a UMBC alumnus, now a doctoral Fellow at Rutgers, who will give his personal perspective. Several current UMBC undergraduates who participated in our RiSE program last summer will discuss their experiences.

This session is arranged by the Meyerhoff Program, but all UMBC students are welcome. Students can also sign up for individual appointments before or after the presentation by contacting Ms. Alicia Hall, .

For a flyer and more details, see here. Please contact Dr. Erenrich if you have any questions (, 848.932.9286).

CSEE Professor Chintan Patel and computer engineering student Gurashish Singh recently demonstrated a prototype system that can detect distracted driving behavior at the ATPA expo, the largest gathering of industries involved with transportation. Their novel wearable proximity sensor-based system alerts drivers who show signs of falling asleep, being distracted or driving dangerously.

The project is a collaboration between Professors Ryan Robucci, Chintan Patel and Nilanjan Banerjee. The system was built by graduate students Gurashish Singh and Tsu An Chen. This short video shows some of the dangerous behaviors being detected.

The Conquer site provides resources for undergraduate students interested in research, graduate school, and research careers in computing-related fields. It also provides resources for faculty mentors, looking to engage and advise undergraduates in research and prepare them for graduate school in computing fields. The site is maintained by the Computing Research Association, an organization (of which our department is a member!) with the mission to enhance innovation by joining with industry, government and academia to strengthen research and advanced education in computing.

Specific topics of interest to undergraduate students that are covered are:

• What is computing research
• Finding research opportunities
• Undergraduate research awards
• Why go to graduate school?
• The graduate school application process

Concurrent Technologies Corporation (http://www.ctc.com/) is trying to fill a internship with an undergrad with good software skills to start as soon as possible in their Annapolis Junction, MD facility. If you meet the qualifications and are interested, please follow the directions at the end of this announcement.

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Are you ready to start your career at a corporation with a respected national reputation for solving complex technical challenges? Become a part of our team. Concurrent Technologies Corporation (CTC) has an opportunity for qualified Software Development Intern.

SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT INTERN

Primary Responsibilities: CTC is offering a Participative Internship Program (PIP), which is a twelve week, technically focused group internship experience. The PIP is a mix of direct project work coupled with a relevant research project and end of internship presentation. It is a structured internship program providing student mentorship, leadership, technical subject matter expertise, and competency development opportunities.

The research project will include an evaluation of leading edge cloud, mobile, and virtual application based solutions enabling the integration and/or mobility of CTC’s highly scalable Cross Domain Solutions.

Basic Qualifications:

• Qualifying applicants should have course expertise in software development and best practices.

• Should be capable of handling multiple roles (development of software, writing test plans and test cases, requirements traceability, leading test teams) in a team-based environment.

• Currently pursuing a Bachelor of Science Degree in Computer Science or related discipline.

• Must have course familiarity with object-oriented software design and development using languages such as VBA, Java, C and/or C++ and basic computer networking knowledge and Familiarity with iOS and Android development.

• Hadoop, Groovy, Graph Database, iOS, Android and MongoDB experience are considered a plus.

Clearance: U.S. Citizenship.
Join us! Qualified candidates should submit their resumes online at:
http://careers.ctc.com
Email: or
Reference Code: SR # 2014-0064
EOE, M/F/D/V

NSF REU 2014

Research Experiences for Undergraduates
in Green Building Environments at UMBC

May 28 – August 15, 2014

New emerging “smart plugs” embed a micro-controller and low-power communication device that allows you to monitor the power consumption of individual devices (e.g., microwave, coffee machine, laptop) plugged into power sockets, and communicate such power consumption information over a wireless network to a central monitoring station. Such devices could lead to substantial savings of energy & money by enabling Internet-based monitoring & real-time control of the behavior of individual appliances. This project will use real-life microcontroller kits (ACME Plugs from Moteware) & real-life building measurement data to explore whether such measurement-based monitoring can be used to

• Develop Smart Circuit Breaker — i.e., to lessen the burden of the user of plugging each and every appliance/device in the building with a smart plug; we will investigate connecting multiple devices together with an individual smart plug/smart circuit breaker and design a smart circuit breaker using energy metering chip (ADE7753), AC/DC power supply, Microcontroller with radio (TI MSP430F16 and Cypress Powerline Communications (PLC) modem) and solid state AC relay (Sharp S216SE1) etc.
• Profile individual devices — i.e., use NILM (non-intrusive load monitoring) data analytics algorithm on the time-series of power consumption traces to infer the type of plugged-in device (e.g., distinguish between a laptop & a coffeemaker), thereby building a dynamic catalog of the types & number of devices connected by a consumer.
• Predict the power consumption of individual rooms — i.e., using the past history of the power consumption of individual devices to create predictive inferences of the usage patterns for individual devices (e.g., learn that the individual switches on a dehumidifier for ~3 hrs every Thu).
• Receive $4,500 stipend, free on-campus housing
• Access to university resources, Travel support to UMBC, Unique research experience

Please send your CV (include any relevant experience) and unofficial transcript to Dr. Nirmalya Roy at .

Arduino Workshops from UMBC commonvision on Vimeo

TL;DR: UMBC’s IEEE student branch will hold free weekly workshops on Arduino starting next week. Register at http://bit.ly/OVzA1f.

The Arduino micro-controller is a great device for anyone who wants to learn more about technology. It is used in a variety of fields in research and academia as well as by hobbyists. Arduino can be used for projects ranging from quadcopters to thermal cyclers  and even wearable electronics. Here is more information about the Arduino.

The workshops are intended for ANY student from ANY major and only require a basic understanding of basic programming concepts such as if-statements and loops. The majority of the code will be provided.

The Arduino workshops are offered on a weekly basis at two levels: Level 1 for those new to Arduino and Level 2 for students who have completed Level 1 or have a basic familiarity with Arduino. The Level 1 workshop is offered on Tuesday and Wednesday from 7:00pm to 9:00pm starting the week of April 1st. You may select to participate in either our Tuesday lecture or Wednesday lecture. The Level 2 workshop is only offered on Thursday from 7:00pm to 9:00pm starting the week of April 1st as well. For both workshops, you will need to bring your laptop and you must able to download the Arduino IDE.

Register at http://bit.ly/OVzA1f. Seats are limited. Contact Sekar Kulandaivel () with questions about registration, downloading the IDE, or anything else.

The next Council of Computing Majors (CCM) will be at Noon this Wednesday, March 26th, in Math/Psychology 008. One of our group members, Patrick McElvaney, will give a presentation about a new CCM project: using the Raspberry Pi and photo-receptors to analyze water in the Chesapeake watershed. His talk will provide an overview of the installation of sensing equipment, specific details on how the photo-receptors can differentiate between organic and inorganic compounds, and information on how other students can get involved.

The CCM is a student organization for undergraduate computer science and computer engineering majors as well as other students interested in computing. If you are interested in starting your own project, please come and speak with any of the officers after the meeting.

If you have good software skills and are still looking for a summer internship, check out the 2014 Google Summer of Code program. You can earn $5500 by coding for an open source software project this summer. You will probably work remotely, but in close collaboration with a mentor at one of over 100 participating organizations. To maximize your chances, explore the organizations and find one that needs your skills. Details here; apply by Friday, March 21.