CSE Undergrad News

We are looking for an undergraduate interested in doing a CSE499 project at the intersection of computer science and biology. The project involves connecting a biology muscle simulator with a cloud database in order to provide efficient support for data analytics. To apply, you must have completed CSE344. If you are interested, please send your transcript to Prof. Magda Balazinska (magda@cs.washington.edu).

Study and research engineering abroad this summer! The College of Engineering is sponsoring 6 engineering programs abroad to help students make the most of their summer. There are programs for undergraduate and graduate students from every engineering discipline. Check out the information below for more information.

• Attend the information session to learn more about all of these opportunities at 3:30-4:30pm on Wednesday, December 7 in Electrical Engineering Building (EEB) 303

• Explore program information online at http://www.engr.uw.edu/current/stuordy-abroad

• Apply online by February 1, 2017

• Questions? Contact Mike Engh in the College of Engineering

ACM | University of Washington

UW | Association of Computing Machinery Registered Student Organization.

When: Thursday 12/1/2016 @ 7pm

Where: ACM Lounge & CSE Labs

The weather is getting colder, so come warm up with some free hot chocolate. Take a break from studying before we enter the final stretch of Fall quarter and socialize with your fellow CSE students. ACM is providing an evening of hot chocolate, cookies, and board games for your enjoyment!

Please join us today, December 1st at 7pm. We will be serving hot chocolate and cookies in the ACM lounge and setting out board games in the CSE labs.

Your homies,
The ACM Executive Team

(Sorry for the lack of CSS magic)

MathAcrossCampus Talk

Friday, December 2, 2016, 3:30 PM

Kane Hall 110

reception to follow at 4:30

David Shmoys

Cornell University

Smarter Tools for (Citi)Bike Sharing

The sharing economy has helped to transform many aspects of our day-to-day lives, leveraging the IT revolution in increasingly novel ways. At the same time, the sharing economy presents new computational challenges to provide tools to support the operations of these emerging industries. Although perhaps not quite as visible in impact as Uber and Airbnb (and their competitors), bike-sharing systems have fundamentally changed the urban landscape as well. Even in a city as notoriously inhospitable to cycling as New York, Citibike has emerged as a significant player in the city’s transportation network, supporting more than 1.5 million rides per month for a subscriber base of roughly 100,000 individuals. We have been working with Citibike to develop analytics and optimization models and algorithms to help manage this system. The key challenge is to cope with huge rush-hour usage that simultaneously creates stark shortages of bikes in some neighborhoods, and surpluses of bikes (and consequently, shortages of parking docks) elsewhere. We will explain how mathematical models can be used to answer questions such as, how should we position the fleet of bikes at the start of a rush hour, and how should we mitigate the imbalances that develop? Since a fundamental aspect of the behavior of these systems is the fluctuation in traffic patterns that vary over time, the resulting mathematical questions fall in the domain of stochastic optimization, where we develop a probabilistic model of the demand, and then optimize the expected performance of the system over a planning horizon. We will also describe some of the algorithmic challenges that these models pose, and highlight the computational tools developed to address them.

Speaker Bio:
David Shmoys is the Laibe/Acheson Professor at Cornell University in the School of Operations Research and Information Engineering, and also the Department of Computer Science at Cornell University, and is currently the Director of the School of Operations Research and Information Engineering. Shmoys’s research has focused on the design and analysis of efficient algorithms for discrete optimization problems, with applications including scheduling, inventory theory, computational biology, and most recently, on stochastic optimization models and algorithms in computational sustainability. His graduate-level text, The Design of Approximation Algorithms, co-authored with David Williamson, was awarded the 2013 INFORMS Lanchester Prize. He is an INFORMS Fellow, a Fellow of the ACM, a SIAM Fellow, and was an NSF Presidential Young Investigator; he has served on numerous editorial boards, and is currently Editor-in-Chief of Research in the Mathematical Sciences (for theoretical computer science) and an Associate Editor of Mathematics of Operations Research.
http://www.math.washington.edu/mac/

CSE study abroad info session
Today! Wednesday 11/29, 4-5pm
CSE 691

Speakers include CSE faculty coordinators, past exchange participants, and current visiting students from abroad
Who should attend: Anyone considering study abroad generally, or a CSE direct exchange specifically

This info session will present basic info on CSE exchanges, and allow lots of time for questions. Topics will include info on our exchange partner schools, the benefits and challenges of going on an exchange, cultural differences, rough expenses, and how to prepare for an exchange

You can read this page with LOTS of details on CSE exchanges. Here are some details on CSE exchanges:

• Courses are taught in English. No foreign language skill is required, though it may be useful.
• Exchanges are designed to last a full year, or one semester (two quarters).
• CSE majors pay regular UW tuition while abroad, plus expenses like airfare and insurance. Financial aid and scholarships apply normally. Some exchange schools offer a stipend, offseting your extra expenses.
• Students are selected based on their academic and personal preparation for an exchange.
• CSE students typically go abroad after completing 300-level CSE courses, and take CSE senior electives abroad.
• All/most of your exchange courses can fulfill CSE requirements, assuming you select courses carefully.

CSE study abroad info session
This Wednesday, 4-5pm
CSE 691
Speakers include CSE faculty coordinators, past exchange participants, and current visiting students from abroad
Who should attend: Anyone considering study abroad generally, or a CSE direct exchange specifically

This info session will present basic info on CSE exchanges, and allow lots of time for questions. Topics will include info on our exchange partner schools, the benefits and challenges of going on an exchange, cultural differences, rough expenses, and how to prepare for an exchange

You can read this page with LOTS of details on CSE exchanges. Here are some details on CSE exchanges:

• Courses are taught in English. No foreign language skill is required, though it may be useful.
• Exchanges are designed to last a full year, or one semester (two quarters).
• CSE majors pay regular UW tuition while abroad, plus expenses like airfare and insurance. Financial aid and scholarships apply normally. Some exchange schools offer a stipend, offseting your extra expenses.
• Students are selected based on their academic and personal preparation for an exchange.
• CSE students typically go abroad after completing 300-level CSE courses, and take CSE senior electives abroad.
• All/most of your exchange courses can fulfill CSE requirements, assuming you select courses carefully.

Hello, CSE students! CSE is getting ready for our K-12 Open House, on Saturday 12/3 from 1-5pm. Hundreds of middle and high school students will visit the CSE building to learn about CS and related fields.  We need your help as volunteers to host all of these young students.

If you can volunteer for part of Saturday afternoon, sign up here. You do not need to attend the full event. After signing up, we’ll email you to get your availability.

More details on CS Education Week:

12/9 is Grace Hopper’s birthday and 12/5 is the beginning of the nationally-recognized Computer Science Education Week.  In celebration of these events, we’ll host our fourth Computing Open House on Saturday, December 3rd from 1-5pm.  Middle and high school students from around the Puget Sound will visit us to see computer science in action.  Last year’s event drew over 500 participants!

Center for Sensorimotor Neural Engineering (CSNE)
Hackathon 2016-2017 application is now open!

The hackathon will take place February 10 – 13, 2017 in Seattle, WA (airfare, hotel, food provided). More information attached.

What is the CSNE Hackathon?

The CSNE Hackathon is a weekend-long event where teams of students work together to apply principles of sensorimotor neural engineering to create novel technology on an accelerated time scale.

Each team will be provided with an array of technologies and their own PC to work on the project. At the conclusion of the Hackathon, teams will present their project prototypes to a panel of judges and members of the CSNE community.

Apply here!

Click here for the application:

Applications are due Friday, December 23rd.

Questions?

Check out the website: http://www.csnehackathon.org/

Contact: Nile Wilson at nilew(at)uw(dot)edu