$4.6 Million Award Creates Program to Train Cybersecurity Professionals
A five-year, $4.63 million grant from the National Science Foundation has been awarded
to a team of multi-disciplinary researchers to recruit, educate and train the next
generation of cybersecurity professionals. Prof. Jia Di, PI, will lead a team of researchers from CSCE, as well as ELEG and INEG
over the next 5 years. Read the full story here.
Evan Johnson Commissioned as Lieutenant in the United States Air Force ROTC
One of our recent CSCE Graduates, Evan Johnson, was commissioned as a Lieutenant in
the United States Air Force ROTC. Click here for the full article.
Austin Kreulach Named as 2019 Goldwater Scholar
Austin Kreulach, CSCE honors student, has been named a 2019 Goldwater Scholar, awarded to top students
in mathematics, science, and engineering. His scholarship of up to $7,500 from the
Barry Goldwater Scholarship Foundation. Click here for the full article.
CSCE Faculty Team Awarded $597,000 Grant for "Securing Cognitive Edge Computing for Healthcare"
Led by Jia Di, a team of CSCE and INEG researchers have been awarded an almost $600,000
grant in healthcare cybersecurity. The grant, managed through the Arkansas Security
Research and Education (ASCENT) Institute, will support five PhD. students. In addition
to Di, the project directors are Dale Thompson, Qinghua Li, and Alex Nelson in CSCE
and Chase Rainwater in INEG. Read more here.
Dr. Yarui Peng Wins CRII Grant!
Dr. Yarui Peng, Assistant Professor in Computer Science and Computer Engineering (CSCE),
was recently awarded a CRII grant by the National Science Foundation (NSF) to conduct
research on Design, Extraction, and Optimization of Multi-Chip Fan-Out Wafer-Level-Packaging
for Low-Power Heterogeneous Systems.
The $175,000 grant is to develop a Computer-Aided Design framework to improve the
performance and energy efficiency of next generation computers and mobile phones while
reducing the design time and efforts for chip engineers. This project will develop
the key models and Computer-Aided Design (CAD) tools to enable integrating various
heterogeneous components into advanced 2.5D and 3D integrated circuits. It aims to
address the major challenge of maintaining signal integrity and electro-thermal reliability
in a powerful yet compact system with multiple ICs closely packed together to improve
energy and cost efficiency. Additionally, a graduate course on CAD and physical design
will be offered, where undergraduate and graduate students will have the opportunity
to learn CAD algorithms, circuit design techniques, VLSI design flows, and to practice
their programming skills by developing their own CAD tools through course projects.
Read more.
Dr. Dale R. Thompson teams up with Dr. Steven Ricke from the Division of Agriculture
under the ASCENT Institute to train food science graduates to protect U.S. food systems
from cyberattacks. Read more here.
Dr. Qinghua Li, Assistant professor in CSCE has received one of the National Science
Foundation's most prestigious grants for early career faculty members. The NSF's Faculty
Early Career Development Program Award, known colloquially as a CAREER Award, is considered
the most prestigious awards from NSF. Read more of the story here.
High school students from across Arkansas gathered in March at the University of Arkansas
for the annual High School Programming Competition, hosted by the Computer Science
and Computer Engineering Department. More than 60 teams of students squared off in
a test of programming and problem-solving in the event, which is sponsored by Walmart,
ACM and Acxiom. Read the Newswire story.
The Cyber Hogs, a team of 8 undergraduate and graduate students in computer science
and computer engineering, recently competed in the National Collegiate Cyber Defense
Competition in Tulsa. For more check out the Newswire article.
CSCE Cyberhogs Qualify for the Regional Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition
This past weekend the local cybersecurity club, the Cyberhogs, qualified for the upcoming
Southwest Regional Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition (CCDC), to be held March 23-25,
in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Of the 18 teams competing the Cyberhogs were in the top 8, now
heading to the Regionals. At the February 17 qualifier, teams was given an existing
network configured with various services with vulnerabilities, and teams were responsible
for securing these and ensuring their continued operation. Meanwhile a "red" team
attacked these services. Through the competition services were randomly checked with
points granted if they were still up and running. In addition, there were business
injects throughout the competition. Teams were responsible for answering requests,
memos and correspondence with varying deadlines.
The students that competed were Andrew Beers (team captain), Alicia Gillum, Taylor
Kinsey, Chenglong “Jim” Lin, Yasir Mohammed, Lauren Rainbolt, Clayton Townsend II,
Dylan Walker with alternates Edward Leonard, Andrew Nguyen, Zack Roth, and Trevor
Weihrauch. The coaches were Dale R. Thompson, Associate Professor, Dept. of Computer
Science and Computer Engineering (CSCE), and Alan Greenberg, CISO with ITS.
Four CSCE students, Sarah Colpitts, Victoria Hobbs, Kylie McClanahan and Lauren Rainbolt,
recently attended the Grace Hopper Celebration, thanks to the generosity of Walmart.
The three-day conference is the world's largest gathering of women technologists.
CSCE Programming Teams Take First and Fourth at ACM Regional Site
On November 4th, two CSCE student teams competed in the ACM Collegiate Programming
Contest, Mid-Central Competition, traveling to the Fort Smith site for the all day
contest. Razorback1 (Daniel Hader , Jace McPherson and Joseph Zhang) took first place
at the regional site, solving 6 of the 9 problems within the 5 hour time limit. The
Razorback2 team (Trevor Barlett, Tara Moses and Garrett Vanbuskirk) came fourth at
the site, solving 3 of the 9 problems, missing a tie for 2nd place by a matter of
minutes. Congratulations to the teams and their faculty mentors and coaches.
Two New Faculty Members Join Department
In 2017 the Department gained two new faculty members, Yarui Peng and Alexander Nelson,
both at the rank of Assistant Professor. Dr. Peng joined us in January after earning his
doctorate in electrical and computer engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology.
His research focuses on developing methodologies and algorithms for parasitic extraction,
analysis and optimization for signal integrity, and alleviating reliability issues
in thermal and power delivery in 2.5D and 3D integrated circuits.
In August Dr. Alex Nelson joined the faculty, coming to us from the University of
Maryland, Baltimore County, where he earned a doctorate in Computer Engineering. His
research interests include emergency communications, assistive devices, and home automation.
Nelson is also interested in the interworking and connectivity of all devices, especially
with concern to the cloud and smart objects.
Jia Di, professor and Twenty-First Century Research Leadership Chair, has received
a $349,551 grant from the National Science Foundation to support his research into
security issues in computing hardware. More ...
Joseph Fantinel, a May 2017 CE graduate from Computer Science and Computer Engineering,
who had started the PhD program, died Monday, 7/31. The students, faculty and staff
of the department grieve with his family and friends. More about Joe can be found
in his obituary.
The University of Arkansas Academy of Computer Science and Computer Engineering was
created in April 2017 to recognize the achievements of graduates from the Department
of Computer Science and Computer Engineering and others closely affiliated with the
department. Read more...
