I will always remember

2009-10 as the year in

which we applied to ABET

for accreditation of our B.S.

in computer science

(systems option). ABET

accredits programs in

engineering, computer

science and technology and

defines accreditation as

“assurance that a college or

university program meets

the quality standards

established by the

profession for which it

prepares its students.” In

support of its accreditation

application, the department

completed a comprehensive

(450+ page) self-study that

describes its curriculum,

faculty, facilities and

assessment plan. The self-

study was submitted to

ABET in June, and we are

now preparing for a visit by

an ABET accreditation

team in November 2010. It

is our hope that by this time

next year our program will

be fully accredited by

ABET.

While maintaining its focus

on its commitment to

undergraduate education,

the department made

significant headway in

other areas as well. The

graduate program in computer science and

information systems

continues to grow and

currently has more than 40

students. There were

significant

accomplishments in faculty

research and scholarship as

well. The Face Aging

Group continued its

impressive track record of

securing external funding

for its research. The recent

approval by UNCW of The

Institute for

Interdisciplinary Studies in

Identity Sciences represents

a crowning achievement for

this group. The USeIT

(Using Squeak to Infuse

Information Technology)

group continued its NSF-

funded activities for a third

year, and hosted Squeakfest

2010, an annual meeting of

the Squeak community, at

UNCW that attracted

participants from places as

far away as Germany and

Uruguay. Computer science

faculty continued to publish

their scholarship at

international conferences,

in many cases co-authoring

papers with their students.

This year was also

distinguished in other ways.

We formed a computer

science advisory board,

whose membership

includes Carla Hunt

(manager, knowledge and

information systems,

MCNC), Ed Addison (CEO

of Teradisc and Lexxle,

Inc.), Ryan Wilkins

(Pharmaceutical Product

Development, Inc.), Larry

McAdams (president,

Construction Imaging

Systems), James Fredley

(president, Triumph

Interactive, Inc) and Shin

Kurokawa (lead software

developer, Digieffects Inc.)

The board met for the first

time in March, and we look

forward to working with the

members and reaping the

benefits of their valuable

feedback.

As we continue to make our

mark in teaching, research

and service, we invite you

to join us in any way you

can. Look for us on

Facebook, and if you

happen to visit Wilmington,

we would love for you to

drop by and say hello.

Sridhar Narayan, Ph.D.

professor and chair

Teaching Research Service

News Bytes

U N I V E R S I T Y O F N O R T H C A R O L I N A W I L M I N G T O N Fall 2010

Volume 12, Number 1

Faculty Focus 2

Special

Congratulations 2

2010 Award

Recipients 3

Student Showcase 4

Awesome Alumni

4

UPE Initiation 6

2009-10 Graduates 7

Other Faculty Ventures

7

In this issue:

Look for the

UNCW computer

science group on

Facebook!

News Bytes Volume 12, Number 1

Page 2

Gur Adhar published

“Parallel Algorithms for

Maximum Independent

Set in Trapezoid Graphs

and their Applications” in

the Proceedings of ninth

International Conference

on Parallel and Distributed

Computing and Networks,

(PDCN 2010) in

Innsbruck, Austria. He

was also a session chair at

the same conference.

David Berman presented

“Splittable Triplewhist

Tournament Designs” at

the 41st Southeastern

Conference on

Combinatorics, Graph

Theory and Computing in

Boca Raton, Fla., March

2010.

Curry Guinn presented

“Remote Monitoring of

Activity, Location and

Exertion Levels” at the

Virtual Healthcare

Interaction for the

Association for the

Advancement of Artificial

Intelligence (AAAI), in

Arlington, Va. He also

presented “A Hybrid AI

Approach to the

Classification of Emotive

Text” at the International

Conference on Artificial

Intelligence (ICAI 09),

World Congress in

Computer Science,

Computer Engineering,

and Applied Computing in

Las Vegas, Nev., July

2009.

Clayton Ferner and Barry

Wilkinson led a workshop

called “Teaching a Hands

-on Undergraduate Grid

Computing Course” at

SIGCSE 2010 in

Milwaukee, Wis. Ferner

also conducted a

colloquium at Wake

Forest University’s

Department of Computer

Science in Winston-

Salem, titled “Automatic

Parallelizing Compilers:

Why Bother?”

Devon Simmonds

presented “A Comparison

of Aspect-Oriented

Approaches to Model

Driven Engineering” at

the International

Conference on Software

Engineering Research

and Practice (SERP)

WORLDCOMP, in Las

Vegas, Nev., July 2009;

“A Comparison of

Software Architectural

Styles Using Aspects” at

the International

Conference on SERP

(Maziar Boddoohi co-

authored); “The Viability

of UML Models in Small

Web Applications” at the

International Conference

on SERP (Jason Dudley

co-authored); “A Case

Study in Software

Reengineering” at the

seventh International

Conference on

Information Technology:

New Generations 2010

(D. C. Tucker co-

authored); “XMI2USE: A

Tool for Transforming

XMI to USE

Specifications” at the

fifth International

Workshop on

Foundations and

Practices of UML (FP-

(Wuliang Sun, Eunjee

Faculty Focus

Special congratulations to the following department members for

their recent accomplishments:

Curry Guinn, Laurie Patterson and Devon

Simmonds whose applications for promotion

and tenure and reappointment, respectively,

were approved by the UNCW Board of

Trustees.

Gur Adhar, David Berman, Curry Guinn, Srid-

har Narayan, Fletcher Norris, Eric Patterson,

Laurie Patterson, Karl Ricanek, Devon Sim-

monds and Gene Tagliarini who were all rec-

ognized by one or more graduating seniors.

Emma Kay Thornton who was recognized by

one or more graduating seniors for her willing-

ness to help our students.

Karl Ricanek and Eric Patterson whose con-

tract and grant activity at UNCW surpassed the

$1,000,000 mark earning them membership in

the James F. Merritt Million Dollar Club

(http://www.uncw.edu/research/milliondollarclub.html).

Song and Paul Grabow

co-authored); and “A

Comparison of Aspect-

Oriented Approaches to

Model Driven

Engineering, at the

International Conference

on SERP.

Sridhar Narayan, Gene

Tagliarini and Shelby

Morge presented “Squeak

EToys” at the North

Carolina Science House,

Raleigh, December 2009.

Sridhar Narayan, Gene

Tagliarini, Shelby Morge,

Mahnaz Moallem and

Karen Hill, published

“Using Squeak Etoys with

the VernierLabPro” at

Squeakfest 2009,

Viewpoints Research

Institute, UCLA, Los

Angeles, Calif., August

2009.

Continued on p. 3

News Bytes Volume 12, Number 1

Page 3

Faculty Focus (continued from p. 2)

Sridhar Narayan, Jack

Tompkins and Gene

Tagliarini published

“Algoritharium:

Facilitating an Early

Focus on Algorithms in an

Objects-Early CS1

Course” at the 2010

International Conference

on Frontiers in Education:

Computer Science and

Computer Engineering

July 2010.

Eric Patterson, Amrutha

Sethuram, Karl Ricanek

and Frederick Bingham

published “Improvements

in Active Appearance

Model Based Synthetic

Age Progression for Adult

Aging” in the Proceedings

of the IEEE Conference

on Biometrics: Theory,

Applications, and Systems

2009.

Amrutha Sethuram, Eric

Patterson, Karl Ricanek

and Allen Rawls ’08

published “Improvements

and Performance

Evaluation Concerning

Synthetic Age Progression

and Face Recognition

Affected by Adult Aging”

in the Proceedings of the

Third IAPR International

Conference on Biometrics,

2009.

Karl Ricanek presented

“Craniofacial

Morphology” to the Facial

Identification Scientific

Working Group, FBI,

Tampa Bay, Fla., April

2010; “Diachronic

Biometrics: Morphology

of the Face” at the

University of Notre Dame,

South Bend, Ind., March

2010; “Methods for Face

Analysis” at Vietnam

National University,

University of Sciences,

Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam,

March 2010; and “Robust

3D Biometrics” co-

authored with Marios

Savvides, for Biometric

Exploitation Scientific

Technology, Intelligence

Advanced Research

Project Activity, Dulles,

Va., December 2009.

Eric Patterson presented

the poster “Improvements

in Active Appearance

Model Based Synthetic

Progression for Adult

Aging” at the IEEE

International Conference

on Biometrics: Theory,

Applications, and Systems

2009, Crystal City, Va.

Eric Patterson, Karl

Ricanek and Amrutha

Sethuram published “A

Hierarchical Approach to

Facial Aging” in the

Proceedings of IEEE

Workshop on AMFG in

association with the 23rd

IEEE Conference on

Computer Vision and

Pattern Recognition

(2010).

Laurie Patterson, Gabriel

Lugo, Dargan Frierson,

Carol Midgett and Eleanor

Pusey presented

“PIMUST: The Teal K16

Road” at the Department

of Education’s Math and

Science Partnership MSP

Program, New Orleans,

La., March 2010.

Laurie Patterson presented “Majoring in a

Virtual Environment:

Merging CS and IS into

IT” at Frontiers in

Education: Computer

Science and Computer

Engineering, 2009 World

Congress in Computer

Science, Computer

Engineering, and Applied

Computing, Las Vegas,

Nev., July 2009.

Karl Ricanek, Fang Fang,

Qijun Fang and Susan

Simmons published

“Markov Chain Monte

Carlo Model Composition

Search Strategy for

Quantitative Trait Loci in

a Bayesian Hierarchical

Model” for World

Academy of Science,

Engineering and

Technology, presented in

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil,

March 2010.

Karl Ricanek and Khoa

Luu published “Age

Estimation Using Active

Appearance Models with

Support Vector

Regression” in the

proceedings of IEEE

Biometrics: Theory and

Applications Systems,

Crystal City, Va.,

September 2009.

Karl Ricanek presented

“MORPH: Development

and Optimization of a

Longitudinal Age

Progression Face

Database” for

International Biometric ID

Management and

Multimodal

Communication, Crystal

City, Va., September

2009. Allen Rawls ’08

co-authored.

Karl Ricanek, Cuixian

Chen, Yaw Chang and

Yishi Wang published

“Face Age Estimation

Using Model Selection”

in the Proceedings of

IEEE Computer Society

Workshop on AMFG, in

association with the 23th

IEEE Conference on

Computer Vision and

Pattern Recognition

(CVPR), 2010.

Khoa Luu, Ching Suen,

Karl Ricanek and Tien

Bui published “Spectral

Regression-based Age

Determination” for the

IEEE Computer Society

Workshop on Biometrics,

Continued on p. 5

Benjamin Eldon

Barbour

Computer Science

Chairs Scholarship

Justin Matthew Cowen

Fletcher R. Norris

Scholarship

Jeffrey Stephen Bruce

Construction Imaging

Systems Scholarship

2010 Award

Recipients

News Bytes Volume 12, Number 1

Page 4

Student Showcase Current Students’ Accomplishments

Ricardo Valea, Phillip

Whisenhunt (pictured

above) and Camilio Al-

varez were featured in the

Greater Wilmington Busi-

ness Journal on Nov. 13,

2009 for their work with

iPhone applications. The

three have since formed a

software development

company called BoomCo

which is focused on

iPhone application devel-

opment. The full article is

at http://tinyurl/2uhlgh5.

Congratulations to MS

CSIS student Maz Bod-

doohi and Maurice Ben-

son for winning the

2010 Southeast (SE) Deci-

sion Sciences Institute

(DSI) Outstanding Student

Paper Competition. Their

paper “Variable Rectangle

Strip Cutting Heuristic

Analysis – a Real World

Implementation” was rec-

ognized at the meeting’s

luncheon on Feb. 22. The

2010 SE DSI Student Paper

Competition was open to

Ph.D., masters and under-

graduate students. All student

papers were subject to the

same review process as regu-

lar papers.

Benjamin J. Jamieson graduated with university

honors in computer science.

His honors project was titled

“TuneToTab: From Tune to

Tablature in Real Time.”

Congratulations to Will

Wharton for being among

the first 60 contestants to

complete, 100 percent cor-

rectly, all of the challenges in

Part 2 of the IBM’s “Master

the Mainframe” Contest and

to Lyle Scott for being one of

the winners in Part 1.

Wesley Williams, Elizabeth

Snead, Shelby Morge, Srid-

har Narayan, Gene

Tagliarini, Mahnaz Moallem

and Karen Hill presented

“Using Squeak Etoys to Inte-

grate Science, Technology,

Christopher Watford ’07 has been working for GE

Hitachi Nuclear Energy

since Feb. 2007 as lead

software engineer. He also

completed emergency

medical technician training

and graduated from Cape

Fear Community College’s

paramedic school. He

writes, “Currently I’m

straddling computer science

(lead software engineer for

methods and software

development) and medicine

(emergency response

organization) at work,

which is pretty fun! I hope

to work part time as a

paramedic soon.”

Heath Newton ’06 recently

opened Cape Fear Games

(http://

www.capefeargames.com/)

at 3608 Oleander Dr. It

carries board games, card

games, rpg’s and much

more. Stop in, and say hi.

Awesome Alumni Lindsey Kelley ’09 accepted a job offer from

Credit Suisse for a position

in their technical analyst

program at their Research

Triangle Park location. Her

team provides effective

structured technical support

for multiple front/middle/

back office applications.

They are responsible for

problem solving and root

cause analysis for problems

raised to them. She

writes,“I cannot wait to

take all of the skills and

fundamentals that I've

acquired here at UNCW

with me into the real

world.”

Congratulations to Kevin

Matthews ’08 and ISOM

faculty member Tom

Janicki who received

the “Best Paper in the

Innovative Education and

Experiential Learning

Track” award at the 40th

annual meeting of the

Southeast Decision

Sciences Institute. Their

paper was titled

“Development and

Preliminary Results of an

Adaptive Grading /

Learning System (AGLS).”

Engineering and Mathe-

matics” at the Society for

Information Technology

and Teacher Education

2010 21st International

Conference, SITE/AACE,

San Diego, Calif., April

2010.

Wesley Williams and

Devon Simmonds pub-

lished “A Case Study in

the Design of a Restaurant

Management System” in

the proceedings of FECS

2010 the sixth Interna-

tional Conference on

Frontiers in Education:

Computer Science and

Computer Engineering.

(continued on p. 6)

in association with the

23th IEEE Conference on

Computer Vision and

Pattern Recognition,

2010.

Karl Ricanek, Marios

Savvides, Damon

Woodard and Gerry

Dozier published

“Unconstrained Biometric

Identification: Emerging

Technologies” in

Computer, Vol. 43, No. 3,

February 2010.

Yishi Wang, Cuixian

Chen, Karl Ricanek and

Susan Simmons

published, “Generalized

Multi-Ethnic Face Age-

Estimation” in the

Proceedings of IEEE

Third International

Conference on

Biometrics: Theory,

Applications and Systems,

2009.

Gene Tagliarini, Sridhar

Narayan, Mahnaz

Moallem, Shelby Morge

and Chandra Roughton,

published “Integrating

Computational and

Modeling Technology

Using Squeak e-Toys and

Problem-Based Learning

Pedagogy to Infuse

Information Technology

Skills into the Core STEM

Curriculum” for the

American Educational

Research Association

Annual Meeting, Denver,

Colo., May 2010.

Gene Tagliarini

presented and authored,

with Sridhar Narayan,

Mahnaz Moallem, Shelby

Morge and Katharine

Daniels, “Integrating

Computational and

Modeling Technology

with Problem-based

Learning to Improve

Teaching and Learning in

the Core STEM

Curriculum” at the Society

for Information

Technology and Teacher

Education 21st

International Conference,

SITE/AACE, San Diego,

Calif., April 2010.

Gene Tagliarini and

Shelby Morge presented

“Using an Open-Source

Modeling and Simulation

Tool to Transform

Learning and Instruction”

at the Society for

Information Technology

and Teacher Education’s

21st International

Conference, SITE/AACE,

San Diego, Calif., April

2010. Co-authors are

Mahnaz Moallem and

Sridhar Narayan.

Ron Vetter published

three guest editor

introductions:

“Authentication by

Biometric Verification”

Computer, Vol. 43, No. 2,

pp 28-29; “Professional

Ethics” Computing Now,

2009; and with Karl

Ricanek “Biometrics”

Computing Now, 2010.

Ron Vetter and Jeff

Brown published

“Flexibility Is Key for

SMS Coupons” in the

Mobile Marketer's Classic

Guide to Mobile

Advertising, pp 49.

Ron Vetter, Laurie

Patterson, Tom Janicki

and Bryan Reinicke

published “Majoring in a

Virtual Environment:

Merging CS and IS into

IT” in the Proceedings of

the 2009 World Congress

in Computer Science,

Computer Engineering,

Don’t miss the UNCW-ACM website: http://student.uncw.edu/org/acm/

Faculty Focus (continued from p. 3)

News Bytes Volume 12, Number 1

Page 5

and Applied Computing:

The 2006 International

Conference on Frontiers in

Education: Computer

Science and Computer

Engineering, No. 2009, pp

360-366.

“Computer science is cool again," said Eric Grimson, chair of the Computing Research Associa-

tion. The organiza-tion found that

computer science major counts are increasing for the second year in a row. See the full

article at: http://tinyurl.com/2walf5n

THE VOTE IS IN:

BARBIE® DOLL’S

126TH CAREER:

COMPUTER ENGINEER.

See more at: http://tinyurl.com/ydzxa96

Upsilon Pi Epsilon’s three officers for 2009-10, Maziar Boddoohi,

Adam M. Gaweda and Wesley Allen Williams, inducted 24 students

into the local chapter of the international computer science honor

society. Congratulations to Richard Stephen Alford, Benjamin Eldon

Barbour, Alexander Justin Beaty, Frederick Bingham, Gregory Andrew

Braden, Jeffrey Stephen Bruce, Justin Matthew Cowen, Phillip R.

Garriss, Zachary Kyle Glaser, Linwood Carlton Gordon, Patrick

Michael Green, Joseph Brandon Hilton, Lyndon Kyle Holt, Joshua

Stephen Hubbard, Dominique Christin Jackson, Micah Daniel Justad,

David Daniel Macurak, Pamela Lyn Rosoff, Lyle Scott, Michael Stokes

Shaw, James Richard Smith, Tammy Nguyen Tran, Jason Michael

Vandeventer and Phillip Jordan Whisenhunt (all pictured below.)

News Bytes Volume 12, Number 1

Page 6

Student Showcase (continued from p. 4)

A summer 2009 survey, conducted by the National Association of Colleges and Employers reported that, of the

majors offered at UNCW, computer sci-ence is the one with the highest average

starting salary: $61,407. Second is

geological sciences at $52,770.

Camelio Alvarez, Ri-

cardo Valea, Phillip

Whisenhunt, Ron Vetter

and Jeff Brown presented

“UNCW Mobile Applica-

tions: Interactive Text

Message and iPhone De-

velopment” at the UNCW

Board of Trustees meet-

ing, October 2009.

Ron Vetter, Camelio Al-

varez, Douglas Kline and

Bryan Reinicke published

“iTour: A System for Self-

Guided Virtual Campus

Tours in the proceedings

of the International Con-

ference on Wireless Net-

works, 2010.

Ron Vetter, Jeff Brown

and Christopher Velado

presented “XML Interac-

tive: A Software Frame-

work for Developing In-

teractive SMS Applica-

tions” at the International

Conference on Internet

Computing.

Other Faculty Ventures: Did you know that…?

News Bytes Volume 12, Number 1

Page 7

Congratulations to Our Recent Graduates! Fall 2009 Graduates

Master’s Degrees: Camilo Andres Alvarez, Matthew

Royce Boykin, Brian Alton Bullard, Robert Monroe

Harrison, Matthew Jonathan Mascherin, Michael

Parker Moran, Matthew Stephen Ratliff and Doug-

las Casey Tucker.

Bachelor’s Degrees: Jacob A Boniface, Hogan

Gordon Hagy, Jacob Michael Kane, Lindsey Jo

Kelly, Elizabeth Nicole Snead, Matthew Ryan

Traynham and Ricardo Arturo Valea.

Spring and Summer 2010 Graduates

Master’s Degrees: Maz Boddoohi, Seiken Hi-

gashionna, Matt Ratliff, Maurice Benson, Chris

Cotton, Jerry Martin and Michael Parker Moran.

Bachelor’s Degrees: Amil Nabeel Abdallah, An-

drew Mitchell Barfield, Herbert Carroll Bland,

Devin Sheldon Dixon, Cory David Douglas,

Ryan Morgan Gates, Linwood Carlton Gordon,

Christopher Michael Gore, Haeden H. Howland,

Benjamin John Jamieson, Erik Lee Langston, Jan

Gabriel Lucas, Philip Michael Perry, Jason Mi-

chael Vandeventer, Phillip Jordan Whisenhunt

and Wesley Allen Williams.

Laurie Patterson

and her husband,

Phil Furia from

UNCW’s creative

writing department

(both pictured at

right), recently pub-

lished a book to-

gether. “The Songs

of Hollywood,” was

released in April,

2010 by Oxford University Press. See more at

http://tinyurl.com/23lkdqv.

Karl Ricanek and Ron Vetter were guest editors of the

February 2010 issue of Computing Now, the IEEE Com-

puter Society's online source for scientific content from

its peer-reviewed magazines, journals and conference pro-

ceedings. That issue highlighted Biometrics and is avail-

able online at http://tinyurl/3y2ufvq. They were also in-

vited to speak with UNC’s Vice President for Federal

Programs and US Army Special Operations Command

last week.

Jack Tompkins was selected to serve as a reader at the

College Board's 2010 AP Computer Science Reading.

Ron Vetter was asked to be a keynote speaker at the

Consortium for Computing Sciences in Colleges annual

conference held November, 2009 at Roanoke College in

Salem, VA.

Ralph Bradley maintains the

membership database for the

Cape Fear Jazz Society.

The MORPH longitudinal data-

base created by UNCW’s Face

Ageing Group is being actively

used by students and faculty in

Canada, Mexico, France, Swit-

zerland, Germany, Spain, Italy,

Russia, Israel, Taiwan, The

Netherlands, India, Finland,

Singapore, Korea, Croatia, Wales, England, Chile, Hong

Kong, Iran, Slovenia, Cyprus, Malaysia, China, Australia,

Portugal, Turkey, Egypt and Japan.

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E-mail: cscdept@uncw.edu

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