2022 UF CISE, Bytes: A News Magazine

RETHINKING FOUNDATIONAL DESIGN

Kevin R.B. Butler, Ph.D. Professor

MESSAGE FROM THE CHAIR

Dear colleagues, alumni and friends,

A new year brings new celebrations. This year, the department is celebrating 50 incredible years of innovation. The department was officially created in 1972, and since then, we’ve seen thousands of students pass through our halls. As we embark on the new year, we look forward to teaching the computer scientists of the future and creating a new generation of problem solvers.

In this issue, we feature faculty who are doing amazing work to make a positive impact on society. Kevin R.B. Butler, Ph.D. , and a team of researchers are using a $7.5 million grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to examine the needs of marginalized and vulnerable populations among security and privacy technologies ( Page 12 ). Jaime Ruiz, Ph.D. , is using a $2.8 million grant from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency to augment human cognition by providing task guidance through AR headsets ( Page 11 ). A paper by Brendan David-John , a Ph.D. student, was nominated as a Best Journal Paper at an IEEE VR conference and described how the prevalence of eyetracking technology is causing significant possibilities for violating user privacy expectations ( Page 20 ).

We want to celebrate our faculty for their continued efforts and recent awards and recognitions, including Sanjay Ranka, Ph.D. , and Baba Vemuri, Ph.D. , who were named distinguished professors ( Page 6 ), Benjamin Lok, Ph.D. , who was inducted as a member into the inaugural class of the IEEE Virtual Reality Academy ( Page 6 ), and Christina Gardner-McCune, Ph.D. , who received the 2022 AAAI/EAAI Outstanding Educator award for her work with the Artificial Intelligence for K-12 Initiative ( Page 10 ). Our faculty also received some major grants that will have a significant influence on healthcare and education. Baba C. Vemuri, Ph.D. , received a grant to resolve the limitations of MRI for the purpose of differential diagnosis of neurodegenerative disorders ( Page 8 ). My T. Thai, Ph.D. , is working in the field of AI to explore ways to increase the trustworthiness and interpretability of artificial machine learning in healthcare ( Page 10 ). Kristy E. Boyer, Ph.D. , and Mehmet Celepkolu, Ph.D. , are using an NSF grant to explore ways to integrate AI learning into middle school science ( Page 9 ). And Vincent Bindschaedler, Ph.D. , and Dr. Butler will use AI techniques in combination with system security mechanisms to curtail the effects of surveillanceware ( Page 14 ).

Beyond faculty, the department and our students had several reasons to celebrate this year. The UF Online Bachelor’s program ranks No. 1 ( Page 16 ), according to the U.S. News & World Report. Four students received Outstanding Achievement Awards from the UF International Center ( Page 21 ). One student received a Meta Ph.D. Fellowship ( Page 18 ), and another received the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship ( Page 19 ).

Join me in congratulating our faculty and students for their successes this year. As always, we thank you for your continued support.

Sincerely,

Juan E. Gilber t

Juan

E. Gilbert, Ph.D.

The Banks Family Preeminence Endowed Professor & CISE Department Chair

Bonnie Dorr, Ph.D.

NEW HIRE: WELCOMING BONNIE DORR, PH.D.

Bonnie Dorr, Ph.D. , joined the faculty as a professor in Spring 2022. Her research and project management experience includes deep-language understanding and semantics, large-scale multilingual processing, and summarization. She has carried out seminal work in crosslanguage divergence detection, machine translation, paraphrasing and automatic evaluation metrics.

“My research aims to build machines that adapt to humans, rather than forcing humans to adapt to machines. Our time studying intelligent agents has focused on learning user preferences and helping users to understand languages and cultures,” Dr. Dorr said. “When we can intelligently and meaningfully integrate various disciplines such as computer science, computer engineering, linguistics, and social science, we are better able to tackle difficult problems within society.”

Dr. Dorr wants her research at UF to lay a solid foundation for students, broadening how they solve some of the world’s most difficult problems and making them more invaluable for positions in industry, academia and government. She came to CISE because of the access to a range of different disciplines and mentoring opportunities to support the types of cross-cutting research and teaching.

“UF is a large campus, with excellent resources and opportunities for research, teaching, mentoring, and funding, and is well-positioned for the

interdisciplinary study of important problems,” she said. “The opportunities for continuous updates to teaching methodologies are appealing to me, including virtual environments and flipped classrooms, with lectures in the form of ‘video snippets’ and entire class periods dedicated to problem-solving, questions and topical discussions.”

Prior to coming to UF, Dr. Dorr was associate director and senior research scientist at the Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition, where she continues to hold an affiliate senior research scientist position. She was also a faculty member at the University of Maryland. She was an associate dean of the College of Computer, Mathematical and Natural Sciences, and co-founded the Computational Linguistics and Information Processing Laboratory. In 2011, she became a program manager at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), overseeing research in human language technology.

Dr. Dorr is a Sloan Fellow, an NSF Presidential Faculty Fellow (PECASE), and a former president of the Association for Computational Linguistics. She has served on the Executive Council of the Association for Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) and on the Executive Board of the Association for Computational Linguistics. She was elected AAAI Fellow in 2013, ACL Fellow in 2016, and ACM Fellow in 2020.

By Allison Logan

DR. PEIR RETIRES AFTER 25+ YEARS

Jih-Kwon Peir, Ph.D. , recently retired from the department after 27 years. Dr. Peir came to the University of Florida (UF) in 1994. His research focused on high-performance computer system architectures, microarchitectures and their memory hierarchy designs. Dr. Peir, who was an associate professor, was the CISE graduate coordinator from 2001-2015.

“I enjoyed the years at CISE, including both research, teaching, and services as the graduate coordinator,” he said. “I like to work with students, which I will truly miss after retirement.”

Dr. Peir has published over 100 papers in international journals and conferences, book chapters as well as in IBM invention disclosures. He received two best paper awards at the IEEE International Conference on Computer Design (ICCD) in 1990 and 2001. His paper, “Bloom Filtering Cache Misses for Accurate Data Speculation and Prefetching,” was selected to be included in the 25 years of ACM International Conference on Supercomputing (ICS).

Dr. Peir has six patents and nine published inventions. He received a National Science

Foundation Career Award in 1996, and an IBM Research Partnership Award in 1995. He also received an outstanding Alumni Award from the College of Engineering at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee in 2010, where he earned his master’s degree in 1981. Dr. Peir received a Ph.D. degree in computer science from the University of Illinois in 1986.

Prior to coming to UF, he joined IBM T. J. Watson Research Center and served as a Research Staff Member during 1986-1992. At IBM, he participated in the design and development of highperformance mainframe computers. He received an IBM Invention Achievement Award and filed several patents in cache memories. During 1992-94, Dr. Peir joined the Computer and Communication Lab in Taiwan as a deputy director of the Computer System Division, where he oversaw the development of an Intel Pentium-based, symmetric multiprocessor system.

The department is thankful to Dr. Peir for his dedication to the department and UF, and for his years of service, teaching and research.

By Allison Logan

Jih-Kwon Peir, Ph.D.

RANKA NAMED DISTINGUISHED PROFESSOR

After many years devoted to teaching and research at the University of Florida, Sanjay Ranka, Ph.D. , was recently named a Distinguished Professor. Dr. Ranka is the second person in the Department to receive the distinction.

The title of Distinguished Professor at the University of Florida is a rare honor given to those with exceptional records of teaching and research.

“Dr. Ranka’s promotion to Distinguished Professor is well deserved. He has been outstanding in his research,

teaching and service,” said Juan E. Gilbert, Ph.D., the Banks Family Preeminence Endowed Professor and chair of the CISE department. “His research in machine learning has had quite an impact locally.”

Dr. Ranka’s research focuses on developing algorithms and software using Machine Learning, the Internet of Things, GPU Computing and Cloud Computing for solving applications in Transportation and Health Care.

In 2019, Dr. Ranka was awarded a $2 million grant from the National Science Foundation

Sanjay Ranka, Ph.D.

to develop technology that will monitor high-risk intersections in Gainesville, Fla., to make roadways safer.

By Allison Logan

INDUCTED INTO IEEE VIRTUAL REALITY

Benjamin Lok, Ph.D. , a professor, was inducted as a member into the inaugural class of the IEEE Virtual Reality Academy. Dr. Lok was one of 49 scholars and innovators inducted into this year’s class.

“Our work has focused on innovating in the area of virtual humans – the characters one sees in virtual reality experiences. Our work has transformed how healthcare professionals, such as nurses and doctors, train to talk with their patients. Almost all of us are now benefiting from virtual human simulations,” Dr. Lok said.

One of 12 members elected by this year’s IEEE Virtual Reality Academy committee, Dr. Lok was selected for his “virtual human innovations in developing interpersonal skills, empowering team training and promoting healthy behaviors and mental wellness.”

ACADEMY

“Moving forward, we are now using virtual humans to encourage healthy behaviors including helping people get screened (and discovering they test positive) for cancer, improving their mental wellness, and improving medical outcomes for all,” Dr. Lok said. “This award recognizes my and my students’ achievements in advancing the field of virtual reality.”

Established in 2022 by the IEEE Visualization and Graphics Technical Community, the IEEE Virtual Reality Academy recognizes significant contributions and highlights the accomplishments of the leaders in the fast-growing virtual reality field. The inaugural class includes the past and this year’s awardees of VR Lifetime Achievement and Technical Achievement Awards.

By Allison Logan

7 FACULTY MEMBERS RECEIVE UF TERM PROFESSORSHIPS

HONORS & AWARDS

BEST POSTER AWARD AT IMPI 2021 CONFERENCE

The University Term Professorship, awarded to seven faculty members for 2021-2024, was established in 2016 and is presented to 250 eligible faculty members annually. Selection of the professorships is based on an assessment of academic accomplishment.

Each award runs for three years and provides a $5,000/year supplement to the awardee.

Chen, Ph.D. Professor

Baba C. Vemuri, Ph.D. , a distinguished professor, and his team at the department received the best poster award at the International Conference on Information Processing in Medical Imaging (IPMI) for research in processing advanced MRI data. The paper is titled “A Higher Order Manifold-valued Convolutional Neural Network with Applications in Diffusion MRI Processing.”

BEST PAPER AWARD AT ICNP 2021 CONFERENCE

Shigang Chen, Ph.D. , a professor, and his researchers at the department received the best paper award at the 29th IEEE International Conference on Network Protocols (ICNP) for their research on non-duplicate sampling and its applications in network traffic monitoring. The paper is titled “Virtual Filter for Non-duplicate Sampling.”

RESEARCHERS HONORED AT INNOVATION EVENT

UF Innovate | Tech Licensing hosted its annual event to recognize top innovations stemming UF. The Innovator of the Year spoke with the audience while the seven innovations of the year were showcased in prerecorded videos. The awardees from the department were Juan E. Gilbert, Ph.D. , department chair, for his InLine Ticketing App, and Benjamin Lok, Ph.D. , professor, for his work on a virtual health assistant.

Shigang

Kristy Boyer, Ph.D. Professor

Sanjay Ranka, Ph.D. Distinguished Professor

Kevin Butler, Ph.D. Professor

My T. Thai, Ph.D. Professor Baba Vemuri, Ph.D. Distinguished Professor

Christina Boucher, Ph.D. Associate Professor

Baba C. Vemuri, Ph.D.

DEVELOPING AUTOMATED METHODS TO DIAGNOSE BRAIN DISORDERS

A four-year grant by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS), and National Institute on Aging (NIA) has been awarded to Baba C. Vemuri, Ph.D. , the Wilson and Marie Collins Professor in Engineering, to resolve the limitations of MRI for the purpose of differential diagnosis of neurodegenerative disorders, such as Dementia with Lewy body (DLB), Parkinson’s Disease and Alzheimer’s Disease, using sophisticated mathematical models in conjunction with high angular resolution diffusion MRI (HARDI).

“One of my primary research areas is the development of imaging biomarkers for Neuro-degenerative disorders. Within this group of brain diseases, distinguishing between DLB and Parkinson’s, and DLB and Alzheimer’s is a particularly challenging problem even for well-trained neurologists due to possible overlapping symptoms,” Dr. Vemuri said. “Diffusion MRI may mitigate this challenge by providing subtle distinguishing micro-structural changes caused by each of the diseases. However, computational methods to automatically identify and localize these microstructural changes are scarce if any in the literature, thus motivating me and my collaborators to pursue this challenging research goal.”

Dr. Vemuri will work with UF coinvestigators Melissa Armstrong, M.D., at the Department of Neurology; David Vaillancourt, Ph.D., the Department of Applied Physiology and Kinesiology; and

Hani Doss, Ph.D., at the Department of Statistics, on the $1.39 million grant for the project, “Higher Order Convolutional Neural Networks for Classification of Lewy-body Diseases and Alzheimer’s Disease.” The team plans to develop a deep-learning framework that can capture subtle micro-architectural differences in the brain, facilitating automatic classification of Lewy-body diseases and Alzheimer’s disease from diffusion MRI acquired from patient brains.

Recently, convolutional neural nets (CNNs), learning algorithms most commonly applied to analyze visual imagery, have had great success in image classification tasks in computer vision and medical imaging. CNNs, however, cannot cope with HARDI data in its native form.

According to Dr. Vemuri, this motivated the researchers “to propose the development of a novel higher order CNN that is a parameter efficient and an interpretable geometric deep learning network possessing improved model capacity, which we call the VolterraNet.” The VolterraNet will be designed for such data with the goal of facilitating the classification of DLB, Parkinson’s Disease and Alzheimer’s Disease groups.

“This work will help researchers in neurology to identify and localize the microstructural changes caused by DLB, Parkinson’s, and Alzheimer’s and the pairwise differences if any,” he said. “This, in turn, may assist the neurologist in developing an effective treatment plan.”

By Allison Logan

INTEGRATING AI LEARNING INTO MIDDLE SCHOOL SCIENCE USING NATURAL LANGUAGE PROCESSING

Researchers from the University of Florida were recently awarded a grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to explore how to integrate AI learning into middle school science through natural language processing (NLP). Investigators will work with teachers and students at middle schools in Florida and Indiana.

The project team includes the principal investigator Kristy E. Boyer, Ph.D. , a professor, and co-principal investigator Mehmet Celepkolu, Ph.D. , a research assistant scientist.

The team will collaborate with teachers and provide potentially transformative experiences to several teachers and over a thousand students. The twostate effort will focus on diverse schools with approximately 50% African American students with the majority of students eligible for free or reduced lunch.

“This work will break new ground

in AI education for K-12,” Dr. Boyer said. “By working with natural language data (text and conversations) that are available at a large scale on the web, teachers and learners will be able to ask scientific questions and explore data using AI.”

The project will research how to teach NLP with ethics and ethical reasoning applied to relevant local issues and investigate how to integrate AI learning through NLP into middle school science on weather systems and cycles through problem-based learning.

Researchers will investigate a series of questions using qualitative data from teachers and students, which will include narrative accounts, observations of teaching practices, and interviews with teachers about their preparedness and self-efficacy for teaching AIintegrated science, as well as quantitative data, which will

include knowledge and skills assessments for AI-integrated science administered to both teachers and students.

After three years, the team plans to produce empirical findings and innovative NLP tools and strategies that will integrate into Next Generation Science Standards. The tools and strategies will be the outcome of iterative refinement over the duration of the project through participatory co-design with teachers.

This curriculum, accompanying materials, and learning environment will be made publicly and freely available. For students, the project’s hope is that these innovative experiences will foster competencies and attitudes toward careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM).

By Allison Logan

RESEARCHERS SEEK TO BUILD CONFIDENCE INTO AI FOR HEALTHCARE UNDER NSF GRANT

Researchers at the University of Florida will explore ways to increase trustworthiness and interpretability of artificial machine learning in healthcare under a new $1.2 million grant from the National Science Foundation. The team will also investigate ways to use AI to diagnose neurodegenerative diseases earlier.

The project will provide a paradigm shift for explainable AI, explaining how and why a machine learning model makes its prediction. Researchers hope to take a proof-based approach, “which probes all the hidden layers of a given model to identify critical layers and neurons involved in a prediction from a local point of view.”

My T. Thai, Ph.D.

The team is led by principal investigator My T. Thai, Ph.D. , a professor, and co-principal investigators Ruogu Fang, Ph.D., an assistant professor in the J. Crayton Pruitt Family Department of Biomedical Engineering, and Adolfo Ramirez-Zamora, M.D., an associate professor in the Department of Neurology. UF is partnering with Carnegie Mellon University on the project.

“AI has become an essential part of the modern digital era, especially toward enhancing healthcare systems,” said Dr. Thai, the associate director of the Warren B. Nelms Institute for the Connected World. “Now it is time for us to take a deeper look to make AIbased decisions more explainable, transparent and reliable.”

Researchers hope this project will benefit a variety of highimpact AI-based applications such as image-based disease diagnostics or medical treatment recommendations in terms of their explainability, trustworthiness and verifiability.

By Allison Logan

Read the full story on our website

Christina Gardner-McCune, Ph.D. , an associate professor, received the 2022 AAAI/EAAI Outstanding Educator award for her work with the Artificial Intelligence for K-12 Initiative. Dr. Gardner-McCune is the first person from the University of Florida to receive the award.

The award is presented annually at the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) and the Educational Advances in Artificial Intelligence (EAAI) conference to individuals or teams who have made major contributions to AI education. Winners were invited to deliver a talk at the 36th AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence.

Dr. Gardner-McCune, who is the co-founder and co-chair of AI4K12, shares the honor with the other members of the AI4K12 Steering Committee.

The AI4K12 Initiative is jointly sponsored by AAAI and Computer Science Teachers Association and receives funding from the National Science Foundation. It began in 2018, with the goal of developing national guidelines for AI education in grades K-12; an online curated resource directory to facilitate AI instruction; and a community of practitioners, researchers, and resource and tool developers focused on the AI for a K-12 audience.

By Allison Logan

AUGMENTING HUMAN COGNITION TO AID IN EXTREME ENVIRONMENTS

Using a $2.8 million grant from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), researchers will work to augment human cognition by providing task guidance through augmented reality (AR) headset technology in extreme environments, including high hazard and risky operations.

The project titled, “ENKIx: Enabling Knowledgeable Task Guidance In the Extremes,” will use commercial smartwatches, head-mounted equipment and eye-tracking glasses to guide the operator of a specific task. The development of ENKIx will enable the multidisciplinary team, led by principal investigator Jaime Ruiz, Ph.D. , an associate professor, to make advancements to task guidance in multiple domains, including cognitive modeling, AI and human-computer interaction.

“This project highlights that with the advancement of AI, we move toward a future where technology is no longer a tool but a partner able to collaborate with us as we perform tasks,” Dr. Ruiz said.

The system is being designed to help both civilian operators and Department of Defense warfighters take on high-complexity tasks such as airplane repair and field medicine. Both activities tend to occur in adversarial environments. The team is developing open-source software for user-agent interactions and reasoning over complex tasks. The system is being prototyped with commercial VR/AR technology so that it can be readily transitioned to

applied research programs at the end of the project.

“In a world where technology so often makes your life harder because of increasing complexity, our research looks to develop technology that makes your work easier,” said James Fairbanks, Ph.D. , an assistant professor and one of the project’s co-PIs. “It should provide you the right information at the right moment, with the right context to be helpful without distracting. Technology should help, not hurt, people trying to achieve their goals.”

Along with Dr. Ruiz and Dr. Fairbanks, the research team includes co-principal investigators Lisa Anthony, Ph.D. , an associate professor; David Kaber, Ph.D., chair of the UF Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering; Maryam Zahabi, Ph.D., assistant professor in the Texas A&M Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering; and Evan Patterson, Ph.D., a research scientist at the Topos Institute.

“This project will provide many advancements in helping us understand how to develop and design intelligent systems that can understand the user, the state of the world, and a user’s task,” Dr. Ruiz said.

DARPA developed the Perceptually enabled Task Guidance (PTG) program to explore the development of methods, techniques, and technology for AI assistants capable of helping users perform complex physical tasks.

Allison Logan

Jaime Ruiz, Ph.D.

PROTECTING THE SECURITY AND PRIVACY OF THE MOST VULNERABLE POPULATIONS

Computing has never been more important to our daily lives than it is today. Videoconferencing has become ubiquitous for almost the entire population and access to technology and virtual worlds have become a necessity for all rather than a privilege reserved for certain populations.

However, throughout this rapid evolution in computing, it is increasingly apparent that the needs of marginalized and vulnerable populations have been under-addressed, as have the consequences of their exclusion.

Using a $7.5 million grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF), a team of researchers led by the University of Florida will examine the needs of marginalized and vulnerable populations among security and privacy technologies. The project, supported by the NSF’s Secure and Trustworthy Cyberspace Frontiers program, seeks to develop

foundational design principles to mitigate harm and improve benefits to these populations based on foundational computer science, social science theory, and direct collaboration with marginalized and vulnerable populations.

Over the five-year lifetime of the project, investigators will examine the needs of these populations, the intersection of these populations with various technologies, and systematize their findings to inform the future of design and to translate research into action through interaction with industry and government.

“We’ve found that addressing the needs of underserved populations has positive effects on citizens, and by increasing access and inclusion, all citizens will be able to participate in future innovation,” said Kevin R.B. Butler, Ph.D. , lead principal investigator and professor.

Dr. Butler, who is collaborating on the project with researchers from the University of Washington and Indiana University, cited the move to virtual courtrooms during the pandemic as an example.

“This was intended as a means of providing remote and convenient access to justice for all,” he said. “However, it was soon evident that low socioeconomic status defendants, without access to Zoom and only able to call into the courtroom by phone, overwhelmingly lost their cases and never saw the judge throughout the process.”

Informed by real-world issues such as these, the team envisions a more equitable society where technology is created with everyone in mind.

“Within the security and privacy community, there have been recent research efforts to assess the needs of individual marginalized and vulnerable communities,” Dr. Butler said. “However, these efforts can best be described as piecemeal – they don’t provide a means to systematize past and current work. We’re hoping this project will allow us to move toward developing a generalizable and foundational knowledge framework of these communities.”

researchers to assure long-term engagement with these populations and translate research frameworks and outcomes to design, education, and policy.

The researchers plan to use the wide variety of expertise at Florida Institute for Cybersecurity (FICS) Research, including its expansive group of students with diverse backgrounds and knowledge.

“A designer often has assumptions about whom they are designing for — a so-called ‘default persona’ which are essentially stereotypes about who the ’typical’ user is,” said Kurt Hugenberg, Ph.D., a co-PI and professor at Indiana University. “This default persona often includes the majority population or privileged individuals and thus can often overlook the needs and capabilities of marginalized and vulnerable users. Our goal is to fundamentally expand whom designers are designing for, and to explicitly include marginalized and vulnerable users in the design process”

“We’ve found that addressing the needs of under-served populations has positive effects on citizens, and by increasing access and inclusion, all citizens will be able to participate in future innovation,”

- Kevin R.B. Butler, Ph.D.

Dr. Butler, whose expertise spans the security and privacy of computer systems, has done research on low socioeconomic status populations and survivors of intimate partner violence. He will work with a team of interdisciplinary researchers including Patrick Traynor, Ph.D. , professor and the department's associate chair for research, and Eakta Jain, Ph.D. , an associate professor.

Dr. Butler said the ultimate vision for this project is to change the fundamental approach to security and privacy in computing to make considering these communities the norm rather than the exception or worse, an afterthought. Along with creating a foundation of security and privacy design principles, the team hopes to build and sustain a community of

By deeply understanding various technologies and the ways in which they are being used, the researchers hope to find out how these technologies disempower marginalized populations. With that knowledge, they plan to develop design principles that address these problems. It is hoped that the impact of the research will last beyond the five years of the project to eventually become the foundational cornerstones of how computing systems, interfaces and technologies are created in the future. Additionally, researchers hope their work will form a new base of computing professionals.

“Our students will form the basis of this new generation of computing professionals who have these design principles in mind and are able to think about how to design beyond the default persona when they develop systems of their own,” Dr. Butler said.

Allison Logan

Read the full story on our website

RESEARCHERS RECEIVE $1.2M NSF GRANT TO STUDY AND THWART SURVEILLANCEWARE

Cybersecurity is an everchanging field of research, with new forms of security threats appearing often. One increasingly common threat, surveillanceware, involves a malicious individual installing software on a victim’s mobile device enabling secret remote monitoring of the device’s activity. Using a new $1.2 million grant from the National Science Foundation researchers at the University of Florida will study surveillanceware and develop new AI-based defenses for it.

The project titled, “Countering Surveillanceware Using Deception-Based Generative Models and Systems Mechanisms,” will use AI techniques in combination with system security mechanisms to curtail the effects of

surveillanceware. This project will help broaden cybersecurity research to include the concerns of vulnerable individuals and groups, such as survivors of domestic abuse, whose cybersecurity needs have often historically been neglected.

The UF research team is led by principal investigator Vincent Bindschaedler, Ph.D. , an assistant professor, and coprincipal investigator Kevin R. B. Butler, Ph.D. , a professor.

“The system we envision is a deception-based system that uses artificial intelligence techniques, specifically deep generative models, to produce fake but plausible (“synthetic”) data,” Dr. Bindschaedler said. “The synthetic data will be fed to the surveillanceware instead of the victim’s real sensitive data.

This will mitigate the privacy threat of surveillanceware actively monitoring the victim’s device, even when the surveillanceware itself cannot be uninstalled.”

These types of tracking software are often used in intimate relationships where abuse is common. For example, an abuser will install software on a victim’s cellphone that tracks the device’s location and enables remote monitoring of its activity.

“Within FICS Research, we seek to solve security problems that have real-world impact,” Dr. Butler said. “Being able to use the technical expertise of our researchers and students for societal benefit resonates with our core values and goals.”

By Allison Logan

REMEMBERING DOUGLAS D. DANKEL

Douglas D. Dankel II, Ph.D. , retired assistant professor, passed away on March 16, 2022, after a long illness.

After obtaining a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from the North Carolina State University in 1971, he earned a Ph.D. degree in computer science from the University of Illinois, Urbana in 1980. Before beginning his doctoral studies, he worked as an engineer at IBM in Raleigh, N.C., and as a programmer in Lyngby, Denmark.

Dr. Dankel came to the department in 1979. His primary area of teaching and research was AI. Throughout his career at UF, he was the instructor of graduate and undergraduate courses in AI, AI for Computer Games, Expert Systems, Knowledge-Based Systems, and Knowledge Representation. He also taught, many times, the Fundamentals of Computer Science I and II courses.

Throughout the 1980s, he was hired by IBM as an instructor for their internal courses “Fundamentals of Computer Science II and III” and “Artificial Intelligence.” He received a Fulbright Scholar award to teach courses in AI and Expert Systems at the University of Akureyri,

Iceland, from 2003 to 2004 and remained there as a visiting professor from 2004 to 2005. He received uniformly excellent evaluations as a teacher, was cowinner of the UF College of Engineering Teacher of the Year Award in 1985, and the Outstanding Instructor Award from the National Technological University on 12 occasions between 1989 and 2002.

Ph.D.

Dr. Dankel made important contributions in research and service. He was a founding member of the Florida Artificial Intelligence Research Society (FLAIRS) and served as either Program Chair or Conference Chair of the Society’s annual conference for many years. He published a large number of papers in conference proceedings, and a significant number of journal papers, journal abstracts, book chapters, and edited volumes.

Dr. Dankel was a colleague and friend to many faculty and staff in CISE. He will be missed and fondly recalled by CISE Gators everywhere and the CISE community.

By Manuel Bermudez, Ph.D. Former CISE Associate Professor

Christina Boucher, Ph.D. , an associate professor, has accepted an invitation from the Center for Scientific Review at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to serve as a standing member of the Biodata Management and Analysis (BDMA) Study Section.

Her term ends June 30, 2027. Of the approximately 20 members, Dr. Boucher is the only one from a Florida university.

“It is a great honor to serve the NIH in this role,” Dr. Boucher said. “It will increase the visibility of bioinformatics at CISE and the University of Florida. It is a great career achievement that will allow me to have greater networking opportunities and also be able to give feedback about proposed research projects in bioinformatics.”

Standing members are selected based on research accomplishments,

grant history, publication history and review experience.

Dr. Boucher’s research is on developing algorithms and data structures that allow for large-scale biological sequence analysis. She incorporates the latest sequencing technologies and biological analyses into her work.

By Allison Logan

Douglas D. Dankel II,

UF ONLINE BACHLOR'S PROGRAM NAMED NO. 1 IN THE COUNTRY

UF Online, the University of Florida’s online bachelor’s degree program, is No. 1 in the nation, according to the latest rankings released by U.S. News & World Report, recognizing UF’s excellence in delivering worldclass educational opportunities across platforms.

The announcement marks the first time UF has earned the top spot for online bachelor’s degree programs. Several of UF’s online master’s programs also ranked among the top in the country, including Education (No. 2), Master of Business Administration (No. 5), Engineering (No. 12) and UF’s non-MBA Business programs (No. 21). Additionally, U.S. News recognized UF’s online programs as among the top in the country for veterans, with the MBA program earning the No. 1 spot

nationally. UF also ranked No. 2 in the list of best online bachelor’s degree programs for veterans.

Across categories, the rankings symbolize UF’s upward trajectory as well as year-over-year gains in metrics such as studentteacher ratio, graduation and retention rates and the value of each student’s degree after graduation.

“Due to a sustained state investment as well as institutional focus, UF provides a high level of excellence in online education for students that is recognized by our comprehensive national rankings,” said Joe Glover, UF’s provost and senior vice president of academic affairs. “Online education is not simply a matter of transferring in-person classes to an online format. Rather, our nationally recognized faculty

and staff have established an impactful, fulfilling and supportive online educational environment that results in exceptional student outcomes.”

The No. 1 ranking for online bachelor’s degrees is largely a testament to the success of UF Online. Offering 25 degree options from 10 colleges with several academic specializations, the program provides pathways for traditional and non-traditional students. Nearly 4,300 students are enrolled in UF Online and more than 3,900 have graduated since the program was founded in 2013. In terms of total students enrolled fully online, the computer science degree program is the second-largest degree option among UF Online’s programs.

By UF News

2021-2022 ENGINEERING AWARDS

The Herbert Wertheim College Awards recognize faculty, staff, and students receiving UF and/or college awards in the 2020-2021 academic year and celebrate the excellence of Gator Engineering and the fundamental values of the college.

The International Educator of the Year recognizes the outstanding contributions of faculty and staff to the internationalization of the University of Florida. The Doctoral Dissertation Advisor/Mentoring Award recognizes excellence, innovation and effectiveness in doctoral student advising and mentoring.

STAFF INTERNATIONAL EDUCATOR OF THE YEAR

Adrienne

Cook

Graduate Advisor

Cook has been an academic advisor for about 23 years. Previously, she spent 15 years as an undergraduate advisor in the UF Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and has been with CISE for 8 years. Currently, Cook advises more than 115 master’s students and 170 Ph.D. students.

JUNIOR FACULTY INTERNATIONAL EDUCATOR OF THE YEAR

Christina Boucher, Ph.D.

Associate Professor

Dr. Boucher’s research is on developing algorithms and data structures that allow for large-scale biological sequence analysis. She incorporates the latest sequencing technologies and biological analyses into her work. She has over 100 publications in bioinformatics.

SENIOR FACULTY INTERNATIONAL EDUCATOR OF THE YEAR

Ahmed Helmy, Ph.D.

Professor

Dr. Helmy’s research interests include design, measurements, analytics and applied machine learning of the Internet of Things (IoT), smart transportation, sensor and mobile social networks, mobility modeling, multicast protocols and network simulation.

DOCTORAL DISSERTATION MENTORING AWARD

Juan E. Gilbert, Ph.D.

The Banks Family Preeminence Endowed Professor & Department Chair

Dr. Gilbert is a leader in mentoring and graduating Black Ph.D. students in computing. Under his leadership, CISE has the largest number of Black computer science Ph.D. students in the nation, according to ASEE. He is an ACM Fellow, an AAAS Fellow and a Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors.

DOCTORAL STUDENT RECEIVES META PH.D. FELLOWSHIP

Armisha Roberts , a Ph.D. student, was named a recipient of the Meta Ph.D. Fellowship. Roberts is one of the 37 selected for the 2022 fellowship, and she is the only recipient from the state of Florida. “Receiving this fellowship is a blessing,” she said. “I can feel a weight has been lifted off of my shoulders now that I am able to dedicate more time to advancing my research.”

Roberts is a graduate research assistant in the SoundPad (Perception, Application, and Development) lab. Her research interests include 3D audio, artificial intelligence, learning technologies, math education, and Human-Centered Computing (HCC). She is under the advisement of Kyla McMullen, Ph.D. , an associate professor.

Her research focuses on understanding how users detect change within a 3D auditory environment. The application area for this research is auditory guidance for first responders to physical targets. The majority of perceptual 3D audio research focuses on localizing stationary sounds. This research advances knowledge on moving 3D sound perception, especially in ambulatory listening scenarios.

“The next steps for me in my research are to conduct a series of experiments to understand the critical sonic components for change detection within the 3D audio space,” Roberts said. “Through understanding what cues are necessary to

manipulate for the most favorable results, this will allow my work to be used in real-world settings.”

The Fellowship is a global program designed to encourage and support promising doctoral students who are engaged in innovative and relevant research in areas related to computer science and engineering at an accredited university.

Winners of the Fellowship are entitled to receive two years of paid tuition and fees, a $42,000 annual stipend to cover living and conference travel costs, a paid visit to Meta (formerly Facebook) headquarters for the annual Fellowship Summit, and various opportunities to engage with Meta researchers.

“With this assistance, I am now able to dedicate my time to advancing my research and completing my Ph.D. program,” Roberts said. “I am also looking forward to the relationships I will be able to foster during the annual Meta Ph.D. Fellowship Summit with current Meta researchers and other Ph.D. students as well.”

Roberts is a Gates Millennium Scholar, Buick National Achiever recipient, GEM Fellow, and a UF Graduate Student Fellowship recipient. Roberts has interned with Sandia National Laboratories, Booz Allen Hamilton, IBM, and BP broadening her experience and exposure to industry-based research.

By Allison Logan

Armisha Roberts

GRADUATE RESEARCH FELLOWSHIP AWARDED TO CISE PH.D. STUDENT

Congratulations to Tyler Hanks , a Ph.D. student, who has been selected for the 2022 National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP), which recognizes exceptional students who are pursuing full-time research-based master’s and doctoral degrees in science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

The NSF GRFP has announced 2,193 Fellows for 2022. Seventeen students at the University of Florida received fellowships. Of the 11 students selected in the Herbert Wertheim College of Engineering, he is the only one chosen from the department.

“I plan to apply my research across a great breadth of scientific domains, specifically those which contribute to space exploration,” Hanks said. “I believe that human space exploration and colonization can serve as an incredible force for the betterment of humanity if done responsibly and sustainably.”

Hanks is currently a first-year Ph.D. student under the guidance of James Fairbanks, Ph.D. , an assistant professor. Hanks’ current research is at the intersection of applied category theory, machine learning and scientific computing. He is specifically working on generalizing techniques from neural architecture search to a broader class of scientific modeling problems.

“Receiving this fellowship is such an honor. It grants me financial security for the remainder of my Ph.D. years and increases my academic freedom to

pursue research I am passionate about,” he said. “Receipt of this award has also increased my motivation to pursue research that achieves both intellectual merit and positive societal impacts. Overall, I am so happy to have been awarded this fellowship, and I couldn’t have done it without UF’s NSF GRF class or the support of my advisor Dr. James Fairbanks and my mentors Dr. Matthew Klawonn and Dr. Jay Ligatti.”

Hanks joined the computer science Ph.D. program in the fall of 2021, after receiving the Herbert Wertheim College of Engineering Dean’s Research Award. After earning his Ph.D., Hanks plans to work in industry for the likes of SpaceX or NASA, where he can directly apply his research and fulfill his dream of contributing to human space exploration.

As the oldest graduate fellowship of its kind, the GRFP has a long history of selecting recipients who achieve high levels of success in their future academic and professional careers. The reputation of the GRFP follows recipients and often helps them become lifelong leaders that contribute significantly to both scientific innovation and teaching.

Fellowships provide the student with a three-year annual stipend of $34,000 along with a $12,000 cost of education allowance for tuition and fees, as well as access to opportunities for professional development available to NSF-supported graduate students.

By Allison Logan

Tyler Hanks

PAPER NOMINATED AS A BEST JOURNAL PAPER AT IEEE VR

Under natural viewing conditions in virtual reality, there are significant possibilities for violating user privacy, according to a recent paper by doctoral student and lead author Brendan David-John . The paper was written by David-John, Diane Hosfelt, who was a staff research engineer at Mozilla while collaborating on this paper; Kevin R.B. Butler, Ph.D. , a professor; and Eakta Jain, Ph.D. , an associate professor.

Their paper, titled, “A Privacy-Preserving Approach to Streaming Eye-Tracking Data,” was selected as a best paper nominee for accepted journal papers at the 2021 IEEE VR conference, an international event for the presentation of research results in the broad areas of virtual, augmented, and mixed reality.

The paper describes how eyetracking technology is being increasingly integrated into mixed reality devices and that there are significant possibilities for violating user privacy expectations. The team’s research is targeted at identifying and raising awareness of privacy and security concerns of future technologies, and what the implications could be for new forms of data and sensors.

“Future mixed-reality devices could replace mobile phones as always-on devices that sense the environment around the user and track how the user responds and then interacts with both real and virtual realities,” David-John said. “While we are used to mobile phones that track our location, we as a society are not used to devices that can implicitly track personal information like age, gender, medical conditions, sexual orientation, and emotional responses that could then be used for

targeted advertisements, or even more nefarious attacks if data falls into the wrong hands.”

In the paper, the team describes how they are exploring initial solutions for enhancing the privacy of eye-tracking data by reducing the risk of being identified from shared data.

“There is a lot of work to be done in this space before mixed-reality devices and sensors become commonplace in society,” David-John said.

To mitigate such risks, the authors suggest a framework that incorporates gatekeeping via the design of the application programming interface and via software-implemented privacy mechanisms. Their results indicate that these mechanisms can reduce the rate of identification from as much as 85% to as low as 30%.

What does the future hold? For David-John, the answer is twofold. Dr. Jain’s team is working to build collaborations between researchers in mixed reality with those from security and privacy to create better solutions at the intersection of both fields.

“We started this process through a workshop that we conducted at IEEE VR 2021, and we have also presented our insights and perspectives at SOUPS 2021, a top security/privacy conference,” he said.

David-John also plans to “continue establishing privacy for eye-tracking data with my dissertation work by investigating more sophisticated methods for reducing the ability to recognize a user from their eye movements.”

By Allison Logan

Brendan David-John

The department congratulates the following award and scholarship winners. These students were selected by the awards committee because they have outstanding records of academic performance as well as significant contributions to society.

2021-2022 CISE Scholarship & Award Recipients UNDERGRADUATE

GRADUATE

LAC Scholarship

L3Harris Corporation Graduate Fellowship

Jeremy Block • Sarah Brown • Anthony Colas

• Joseph Isaac • Nicholas Kroeger • Kyle Lo • Michael Perez • Simone Smarr • Jacob Stuart • Daniel Volya

Gartner Group Graduate Fellowship

Yang Bai • Jayetri Bardhan • Aysegul Bumin

Gartner Group Information Technology Fund

• Animesh Chhotaray • Pedro Guillermo Feijo Garcia • Amanda Griffith • Pan He • Aruna Jayasena • Yashaswi Karnati • Gloria Katuka • Abhishek Kulkarni • Seth Layton • Chaoyi Ma

• Amogh Mannekote • Truc Nguyen • Mahsan Nourani • Marco Oliva • Daniel Olszewski • Zhixin Pan • Neha Rani • Nanjie Rao • Armisha Roberts

• Ziyu Shu • Yuchen Sun • Fatemeh Tavassoli • Xiaoyi Tian • Haibo Wang • Heting Wang • Kevin Warren • Haniska Weerasena • Hasini Witharana • Aotian Wu

Four students from CISE were the recipients of the Outstanding Achievement Award from the UF International Center. The winners were among 20 students from the Herbert Wertheim College of Engineering to receive the award.

Balaji Balasubramani Balasubramani earned his master’s degree in computer science in

December 2021. He is currently a software engineer at Meta.

Ram Kartikeya Boyini Boyini is pursuing his master’s degree in computer science and is a graduate student researcher at the Florida Institute for Cybersecurity Research.

Pedro Guillermo Feijoo Garcia Feijoo Garcia, is a Ph.D. student in the Virtual Experiences Research

Group. His research focuses on users’ perceptions and their interactions with virtual humans.

Pan He

He is a Ph.D. student in the UF MALT Lab. His current research is focused on understanding the 3-D motion and structure of a dynamic scene by developing deep learning methods in various environments.

MALACHOWSKY ELECTED TO UF’S ACADEMY OF GOLDEN GATORS

An entrepreneur, a former university trustee, a business developer and a family of legal professionals are the latest honorees in the University of Florida’s prestigious Academy of Golden Gators. The academy honors alumni and friends whose support and guidance are driving UF’s ascent as one of the nation’s best institutions of higher learning. UF is ranked No. 5 on U.S. News and World Report’s recent list of public universities.

The 2022 inductees are NVIDIA Corp. co-founder Chris Malachowsky (BSCE ’80) ; Nelson Mullins Riley & Scarborough partner David Brown; Palm Beach County Business Development Board president Kelly Smallridge; and the family of UF College of Law namesake Fred Levin. This year’s awardees were recognized during the academy’s eighth annual induction ceremony.

“The Academy of Golden Gators represents people who have done extraordinary things for the University of Florida, for our students, and for public higher education and its continued positive influence on Florida and our nation,” said UF President Kent Fuchs. “I love that current and future generations of students will benefit from their farsightedness, generosity and commitment to helping others — and have the opportunity to look to them as leaders to emulate in their own lives and careers.”

This year’s Academy of Golden Gators Award categories are Transformational Leadership, Lifetime Philanthropy, Lifetime Volunteer and Annual Volunteer.

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP AWARD

Malachowsky is a leading force behind the university’s ambitious initiative to become “America’s AI University.” His investments in his alma mater and guidance are transforming courses across campus by incorporating artificial intelligence training in curricula to prepare students to use the cuttingedge technology in their chosen fields.

Malachowsky established the Californiabased global technology giant NVIDIA in 1993. Along with his company, he has made significant contributions to building a data science and information technology center (the future home of the Department of Computer & Information Science & Engineering) on campus and to turning the university’s supercomputer into one of the most powerful in all of higher education.

“Each of this year’s Academy of Golden Gators’ inductees is a game-changer in their own right. But taken together, their influence and goodwill is revolutionizing what it means to be a world-class institution of higher learning,” said University of Florida Foundation chairwoman Anita Zucker.

By recognizing philanthropists whose commitment enables UF to address societal and wellness challenges and improve lives throughout the world, the Academy of Golden Gators reflects UF’s goal to be one of the nation’s preeminent public research universities.

By UF News

Chris Malachowsky

ALUMNUS DESIGNS APP TO MAKE PARKING ON UF'S CAMPUS EASIER

If you’ve ever parked on the University of Florida (UF) campus, you’re aware of the various parking restrictions. One recent alumnus has been working to create an app that alleviates some of the stress of navigating those parking restrictions.

Drew Gill (BSCS ’22) began creating EZ Park UF as a group project for his Human-Computer Interaction course. His professor, Jaime Ruiz, Ph.D. , had each group come up with a problem to address that was relevant to UF students.

“We conducted interviews with potential users about what was currently difficult about the current parking system,” Gill said. “We sought to change the way students would find parking on campus so they could save time every day they came on to campus. After releasing it, I’ve realized it could be very helpful for UF Health employees and UF Visitors as well.”

With user-friendly features such as map or list views of campus parking lots and their specific limitations, the app makes campus parking information more accessible. Users can also find out the days and times the decal restrictions are in effect, if electric vehicle charging is available,

and in some cases, information about how guest parking works. There are also built-in search features that allow users to specify which color decal they are looking for or what time/ day they want to park on campus.

Gill

“One of my main goals for the next update, besides ensuring the app has all up-to-date parking info, is to allow users to see the parking changes for holidays, football games, and other important events,” Gill said.

Though UF currently offers a virtual campus map, the EZ Park UF app’s date, time and decal filters, plus the option of getting directions to a preferred lot, provide a more seamless user experience.

The app is free for anyone to download and use. It can be found in the Apple app store and the Google Play store.

By Allison Logan

Drew

The Herbert Wertheim College of Engineering at the University of Florida invites applications for a tenured/tenure-track faculty position at the rank of Associate or Full Professor for an Endowed Professorship in the Department of Computer & Information Science & Engineering (CISE) This endowed professorship will support a faculty leader in research on ethical AI systems, including the development of AI methods and their applications in CISE-related fields.

The recipient will conduct research at the intersection of technology and society with the specific goal of recognizing and understanding potential harms when AI algorithms are embedded in societal applications and the mechanisms are used for unethical monitoring and control. The recipient may also conduct research on how AI changes the nature of humantechnology interaction over time.