Upcoming Conferences and Workshops
5th Workshop on Resiliency in High Performance Computing (Resilience) in Clusters, Clouds, and Grids in conjunction with the 18th International European Conference on Parallel and Distributed Computing (Euro-Par 2012)
August 27-31, 2012 - Rhodes Island, Greece,
Paper Submission Deadline - June 1, 2011
Authors are invited to submit papers electronically in English in PDF format via EasyChair at<https://www.easychair.org/conferences/?conf=resilience2012">. Submitted manuscripts should be structured as technical papers and may not exceed 10 pages, including figures, tables and references, using Springer's Lecture Notes in Computer Science (LNCS) format at <http://www.springer.com/computer/lncs?SGWID=0-164-6-793341-0>. Submissions should include abstract, key words and the e-mail address of the corresponding author. Papers not conforming to these guidelines may be returned without review. All manuscripts will be reviewed and will be judged on correctness, originality, technical strength, quality of presentation, and interest and relevance to the conference attendees. Submitted papers must represent original unpublished research that is not currently under review for any other conference or journal. Papers not following these guidelines will be rejected without review and further action may be taken, including (but not limited to) notifications sent to the heads of the institutions of the authors and sponsors of the conference. Submissions received after the due date, exceeding length limit, or not appropriately structured may also not be considered. The proceedings will be published in Springer's LNCS as post-conference proceedings. At least one author of an accepted paper must register for and attend the workshop for inclusion in the proceedings. Authors may contact the workshop program chair for more information. For more information, please visit http://xcr.cenit.latech.edu/resilience2012/.
XSEDE Happenings
Announding Appro as First XSEDE12 Sponsor
Appro (http://www.appro.com), a leading provider of supercomputing solutions, has signed on as a Gold sponsor of the XSEDE12 conference and will participate in the high-performance computing conference, July 16-20, 2012, at the InterContinental Magnificent Mile in Chicago. Appro provides supercomputer hardware and software solutions that address capacity, hybrid, data-intensive, and capability computing. Headquartered in Milpitas, Calif., the company recently celebrated 20 years in the HPC business and, in 2011, was recognized by HPCwire as one of the “Top 5 Vendors to Watch.” "XSEDE is particularly happy to have Appro as the very first Gold-level sponsor for the inaugural XSEDE conference," said XSEDE12 General Craig Stewart. "As a relatively new participant in the national NSF-funded cyberinfrastructure, it is very much appreciated that the company is taking a leading role in supporting the XSEDE conference."
Summer Computational Workshops Offered to Educators Through National Computational Science Institute and XSEDE
Several workshops are being held around the country this summer, aimed at educators who want to introduce or expand the use of computational resources in their classrooms. Faculty who are teaching at the college level, especially from Minority-Serving Institutions, are encouraged to apply. Applications from secondary school teachers in appropriate disciplines will be accepted on a space-available basis. A limited number of travel scholarships are available to interested faculty. The scholarships will provide partial or full reimbursement of travel costs to and from the workshops and/or local housing costs. Preference will be given to faculty from institutions that are formally engaged with the education program of XSEDE — Extreme Science and Engineering Discovery Environment — and those institutions that can provide some matching travel funds. Recipients are expected to be present for the full workshop. Those interested in a travel scholarship should register for the desired workshop, and then create an account and complete the scholarship application at
http://www.computationalscience.org/login?came_from=/scholarship.
June 2012 Summer Institutes at Rice University – Register Now!
Time is running out.........register your employees now for the summer institutes organized by the Ken Kennedy Institute at Rice University! Let Rice world class faculty train your staff and summer interns in the latest tools and techniques needed for High Performance Computing and Big-Data. Participants will return to the office armed with fresh insights and the latest information.
HPC Summer Institute - June 4-8, 2012
This year the HPC Summer Institute is a week later than in past years. We hope this later start data will work better for accommodating summer intern schedules.
http://hpcsi.rice.edu
Big-data Summer Institute - June 18-22, 2012
We are very excited to introduce the Big-data Summer Institute. Big data is not only a big-buzz, it is big-business.
http://bigdatasi.rice.edu
2012 Summer NCSI/XSEDE Workshops – Register Today!
The 2012 NCSI/XSEDE workshops for undergraduate faculty, pre-college
teachers, postdocs, grad students, and undergrads accompanying a faculty
member is now open for registration!! Preference for locations has been given to campuses developing computational science programs and committing to substantial local participation.
New in 2012
This year, not all workshops are one-week in length. Additionally, there are a limited number of travel scholarships.
2012 Workshops
A limited number of travel scholarships are available to faculty interested in attending the workshops. The scholarships will provide partial or full reimbursement of travel costs to and from the workshops and/or local housing costs. Preference will be given to faculty from institutions that are formally engaged with the XSEDE education program and to those who can provide some matching travel funds. Recipients are expected to be present for the full workshop. If you are interested in a travel scholarship, please visit http://www.computationalscience.org/scholarship. Scholarship applications can be submitted after you apply for the workshop and is available from the page where you review your application. For a complete list of workshops and workshop locations, please visit http://www.shodor.org/succeed/workshops/current/. For more information about Shodor, please visit http://shodor.org/. For more information about NCSI, please visit http://www.computationalscience.org/.
Research Features from Across XSEDE and Campus Champion Partners
Rice University Brings Open Education to the Mainstream Campus
Large-scale open education initiatives have the potential to transform the environment of higher education by creating a learning landscape that spreads beyond the walls of the university. However, wide-scale adoption of open education resources remains slow. "There are all of these open ed depositories, but you can't easily mix and match across platforms, let alone search across them," says Rice University professor Richard Baraniuk. He notes that faculty bandwidth is another issue. Rice's OpenStax College initiative was created to help streamline access to open education resources. "We're trying to address the highest impact community college courses, as defined by the total number of students enrolled in a particular course multiplied by the average cost of that course's materials for the student," Baraniuk says. The Web versions of the OpenStax textbooks were built on the Connections XML platform, which enables instructors to add new material to the book, or edit the material in the book. To read further, please visit http://campustechnology.com/articles/2012/04/24/bringing-open-education-to-the-mainstream.aspx.
Campus Champion University of Florida Writing New Computer Science Plan, Cites 'Overwhelming' Backlash
The University of Florida's recent plan to cut $1.7 million from the Computer and Information Science and Engineering (CISE) department has been put on hold after students protested against it. The move would have cut all teaching assistant positions, which help finance education costs for Ph.D. students; increased the teaching responsibilities for faculty who now conduct research; and eliminate staff, including technical support. The university now is developing a new plan "in consultation with students, faculty, staff, alumni, and industry partners," says CISE president Bernie Machen. To read further, please visit http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9226677/Fla._university_writing_new_computer_science_plan_cites_overwhelming_backlash.
Descriptive Camera Developed by Campus Champion New York University Graduate Student
A New York University graduate student Matt Richardson has designed a camera that produces written descriptions of scenes. Cameras capture a lot of metadata when a picture is taken, such as the location, date, camera make, and model, but much of it is not useful, Richardson says. "I was picturing a time in which cameras could possibly capture more useful information that can then be searched, cross-referenced, and sorted," he says. His device uploads a picture to the Web, users on Amazon's Mechanical Turk service describe it within minutes, and then the short description is sent back to the camera and printed. Richardson also has added a setting that would send the picture to any available online friends to describe for free. The device uses a BeagleBone, a tiny computer used to power prototypes and other experimental computers. To read further, please visit http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-17853523.
Educator Curriculum, News and Opportunities
TED Blends Animation With Education at New Website
A beta version of the TED-Ed Web site recently went live, inviting teachers to use video clips from its library or YouTube for assignments. "It allows any teacher to take a video of their choice and make it the heart of a 'lesson' that can easily be assigned in class or as homework, complete with context, follow-up questions, and further resources," says TED curator Chris Anderson. The Web site enables teachers to develop real-world lessons around educational videos. "This new platform allows them to take any useful educational video, not just TED's, and easily create a customized lesson plan around it," Anderson says. He says the videos are captivating and short, lasting no longer than 10 minutes, so teachers could easily show them to students in real-world classrooms. To read further, please visit http://news.yahoo.com/ted-blends-animation-education-website-081105246.html
USA Science & Engineering Festival Aims to Breathe New Life Into Science and Math for Kids
The second USA Science & Engineering Festival, which attracted more than 13,000 students, is a three-day event designed to revive students' interest in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM). The event is the only national U.S. science festival with the primary goal of promoting science and math careers to children. “Investment in science and technology is the key to our future,” says Bill Nye, who attended the festival. “It’s the best investment our society can make.” President Obama has hosted two science fairs at the White House since 2010 and launched the "Educate to Innovate" campaign, which encourages students to study math and science. In addition, Obama's 2013 budget includes a $150 million request for the U.S. National Science Foundation to advance undergraduate STEM education procedures. The festival included more than 3,000 hands-on activities and about 150 performances and demonstrations. To read further, please visit http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/national-science-fair-aims-to-breathe-new-life-into-science-and-math-for-kids/2012/04/27/gIQA6RTbmT_story.html.
Harvard and M.I.T. Team Up to Offer Free Online Courses
Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) announced a plan to offer free massively open online courses under their edX partnership. Overseeing edX will be a nonprofit organization that Harvard and MIT will govern equally, and each school has pledged $30 million to the initiative. EdX's inaugural president will be Anant Agarwal, director of MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, while Harvard's contribution will be supervised by provost Alan M. Garber. University officials say the new online platform would be used to research educational technologies and methods as well as to build a global community of online students. Included in the edX project will be engineering courses and humanities courses, in which crowdsourcing or software may be used to grade essays. Harvard Corporation's Lawrence S. Bacow says education technology currently lacks "an online platform that gives faculty the capacity to customize the content of their own highly interactive courses." To read further, please visit http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/03/education/harvard-and-mit-team-up-to-offer-free-online-courses.html?_r=1.
MIT CS4HS Creative Computing Workshop
August 8-11, 2012 – MIT Media Lab
Deadline to enter the participant raffle: Monday, May 21, 2012.
The ScratchEd Team at the MIT Media Lab is hosting its 4th annual Creative Computing summer workshop, held in collaboration with Google's CS4HS initiative. New educational technologies will be explored and instructional strategies to engage students in creative design activities -- and, in the process, help students develop as computational thinkers and computational creators. The workshop will feature technologies developed at the MIT Media Lab, with presentations and demonstrations by Media Lab researchers. Hands-on sessions will focus on Scratch (http://scratch.mit.edu), an easy-to-use programming environment that enables students to create interactive stories, games, animations, and simulations. As students create and share Scratch projects, they learn to think creatively, reason systematically, and work collaboratively -- while also learning important mathematical and computational ideas. The workshop is open to all media specialists, technology coordinators, computer-science teachers, and others who focus on the integration of new technologies into elementary, middle, and high school classrooms. The workshop costs $80 per participant -- this covers parking, meals and workshop materials. Housing and travel are not included in the registration fee. Workshop participants will be selected by a lottery process. For more information, see http://cs4hs.media.mit.edu
Student Engagement Opportunities and Information
NASA's National Community College Aerospace Scholars Program at NASA Johnson Space Center
Application Deadline - June 5, 2012
National Community College Aerospace Scholars (NCAS) is a program funded by NASA's Exploration Systems Mission Directorate (ESMD) and the Minority University Research and Education Program (MUREP) and administered by NASA Johnson Space Center (JSC). Community college students from across the nation who are interested in the areas of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics will apply to travel to NASA for a three-day experience. This opportunity will provide a hands-on project featuring engineering career possibilities. Selected students will begin the semester commitment with Web-based preparation prior to their onsite visit. The only cost to the student is a $30 registration fee; NASA covers travel (up to $700), food, and lodging. For more information and to apply, please visit http://ncas.aerospacescholars.org/apply.
Last But Not Least – Items of Interest
‘Bullet Time' Signals to Stop Cyber Attacks on Grid
University of Tulsa researchers have developed a method to handle cyberattacks on crucial infrastructure, such as electricity grids, water utilities, and banking networks. The method involves an algorithm that sends hyper-speed signals ahead of a malicious attack in order to mobilize defenses. "Slowing the malicious traffic by just a few milliseconds will let the hyper-speed commands activate sophisticated network-defense mechanisms," says Tulsa researcher Sujeet Shenoi. However, hyper-speed signaling is only as effective as its threat sensors. Dartmouth College researcher Jason Reeves has developed a way for infrastructure to effectively monitor itself. The software monitors a program that mediates between the software on one side and the processor and memory on the other. "We detect changes in the sequence of code the program runs, ones often introduced by malicious programs," Reeves says. To read further, please visit http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21428625.900-bullet-time-signals-to-stop-cyber-attacks-on-grid.html.
How Do You Know an Autonomous Vehicle Has Seen You?
The possibility of autonomous vehicles driving themselves has gone from remote to more plausible in just a few years. Google is testing driverless cars, and next year BMW plans to sell a car that can drive itself at speeds under 25 miles per hour. Meanwhile, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Media Lab is developing a system that seems to solve the problem of communicating with pedestrians. A group led by Kent Larsen has demonstrated a prototype electric vehicle that features lights that look like eyes and incorporate the sensors from an Xbox 360 Kinect. The lights swivel to look at a pedestrian when the sensor detects a pedestrian, and blue light-emitting diodes (LEDs) flash to indicate the car has seen the pedestrian. Directional speakers swivel toward the pedestrian, and the car tells you it is safe to cross, while the system also can flash bright white LEDs to get the attention of a pedestrian. To read further, please visit http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/energy/27797/.
