Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Events for October
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Center for Cyber-Physical Systems and Internet of Things and Ming Hsieh Institute Seminar
Wed, Oct 02, 2019 @ 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM
Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Sanjay Shakkottai, The University of Texas at Austin
Talk Title: Hyper-parameter Tuning for ML Models: A Monte-Carlo Tree Search (MCTS) Approach
Series: Center for Cyber-Physical Systems and Internet of Things
Abstract: We study the application of online learning techniques in the context of hyper-parameter tuning, which is of growing importance in general machine learning. Modern neural networks have several tunable parameters, where training for even one such parameter configuration can take several hours to days. We first cast hyper-parameter tuning as optimizing a multi-fidelity black-box function (which is noise-less) and propose a multi-fidelity tree search algorithm for the same. We then present extensions of our model and algorithm, so that they can function even in the presence of noise. We show that our tree-search based algorithms can outperform state of the art hyper-parameter tuning algorithms on several benchmark data-sets.
Biography: Sanjay Shakkottai received his Ph.D. from the ECE Department at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2002. He is with The University of Texas at Austin, where he is currently the Temple Foundation Endowed Professor No. 3, and a Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. He received the NSF CAREER award in 2004, and was elected as an IEEE Fellow in 2014. His research interests lie at the intersection of algorithms for resource allocation, statistical learning and networks, with applications to wireless communication networks and online platforms.
Host: Paul Bogdan
Location: Hughes Aircraft Electrical Engineering Center (EEB) - 132
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Talyia White
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
Ming Hsieh Institute Seminar Series on Integrated Systems
Fri, Oct 04, 2019 @ 10:00 AM - 11:30 AM
Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Dr. Gabriele Manganaro, Director of Technology at Analog Devices
Talk Title: Mixed-Signal Technologies for Ultra-Wide Band Signal Processing Systems
Host: Profs. Hossein Hashemi, Mike Chen, Dina El-Damak, and Mahta Moghaddam
More Information: MHI Seminar Series IS - Gabriele Manganaro.pdf
Location: Hughes Aircraft Electrical Engineering Center (EEB) - 248
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Jenny Lin
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
Franco Nori - Munushian Seminar Series, Friday, October 4th at 2pm in EEB 132
Fri, Oct 04, 2019 @ 02:00 PM - 03:30 PM
Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Franco Nori, Riken, Saitama, Japan, University of Michigan
Talk Title: Parity-Time-symmetric optics, extraordinary momentum and spin in evanescent waves, optical analog of topological insulators, and the quantum spin Hall effect of light
Abstract: This talk provides a brief overview to some aspects of parity-time-symmetric optics, extraordinary momentum and spin in evanescent waves, optical analog of topological insulators, and the quantum spin Hall effect of light.
1. Parity-Time-Symmetric Optics
Optical systems combining balanced loss and gain provide a unique platform to implement classical analogues of quantum systems described by non-Hermitian parity-time (PT)-symmetric Hamiltonians. Such systems can be used to create synthetic materials with properties that cannot be attained in materials having only loss or only gain. We report PT-symmetry breaking in coupled optical resonators. We observed non-reciprocity in the PT-symmetry-breaking phase due to strong field localization, which significantly enhances nonlinearity. In the linear regime, light transmission is reciprocal regardless of whether the symmetry is broken or unbroken. We show that in one direction there is a complete absence of resonance peaks whereas in the other direction the transmission is resonantly enhanced, which is associated with the use of resonant structures. Our results could lead to a new generation of synthetic optical systems enabling onchip manipulation and control of light propagation.
2. The quantum spin Hall effect of light: photonic analog of 3D topological insulators Maxwell's equations, formulated 150 years ago, ultimately describe properties of light, from classical electromagnetism to quantum and relativistic aspects. The latter ones result in remarkable geometric and topological phenomena related to the spin-1 massless nature of photons. By analyzing fundamental spin properties of Maxwell waves, we show that freespace light exhibits an intrinsic quantum spin Hall effect -”surface modes with strong spin-momentum locking. These modes are evanescent waves that form, for example, surface plasmon-polaritons at vacuum-metal interfaces. Our findings illuminate the unusual transverse spin in evanescent waves and explain recent experiments that have demonstrated the transverse spin-direction locking in the excitation of surface optical modes. This deepens our understanding of Maxwell's theory, reveals analogies with topological insulators for electrons, and offers applications for robust spin-directional optical interfaces.
Biography: Dr. Nori received a PhD in Physics from the University of Illinois, and then did postdoctoral research work at the Institute for Theoretical Physics, now KITP, at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Afterwards, he became Assistant, Associate, full Professor and Research Scientist at the Physics Department of the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.
He is a RIKEN Chief Scientist, leading the "Theoretical Quantum Physics Laboratory" at RIKEN (the Japanese National Laboratory).
His research group has done pioneering interdisciplinary studies at the interface between nanoscience, quantum
information, superconducting quantum circuitry for quantum computing, photonics, quantum optics, atomic physics, nano-mechanics, mesoscopics, computational physics, and condensed matter physics.
During the past decade, his research group has produced 40 highly-cited papers (i.e., top 1% most cited publications
among all papers in all areas of Physics) according to the Web of Science. He has more than 100 publications in Physical Review Letters, over 50 in Science and Nature journals, and also numerous in other top journals. According to the Web of Science: > 34K citations and h-index 89 (Google Scholar: > 48K citations and h-index 102).
Host: ECE-Electrophysics
More Info: https://minghsiehee.usc.edu/about/lectures/munushian/
Location: Hughes Aircraft Electrical Engineering Center (EEB) - 132
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Marilyn Poplawski
Event Link: https://minghsiehee.usc.edu/about/lectures/munushian/
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
Fall 2019 Joint CSC@USC/CommNetS-MHI Seminar Series
Mon, Oct 07, 2019 @ 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM
Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Jin Wang, Auburn University
Talk Title: Process Monitoring for Smart Manufacturing: Challenges and Opportunities
Abstract: Process monitoring is an important component in the long-term reliable operation of any system or process and its importance can only become greater in the era of smart manufacturing. Currently, driving by market demand and global competition, process operations in manufacturing are being pushed closer to the process limits; at the same time, with recent advances in sensor technology (such as Internet-of-Things devices), data storage and computing power, there are more data than ever before being collected and stored. These on-going changes in manufacturing industries present a broad spectrum of challenges and opportunities to process monitoring. In this talk, we present a roadmap that summarizes the development of process monitoring over the last century, with the focus on how process monitoring has been evolving in response to various challenges presented by manufacturing industries. Specifically, we believe feature space monitoring (FSM) is emerging as the next generation process monitoring tool, and is poised to provide general solutions that could address many unsolved long-standing challenges (such as process nonlinearity) and emerging challenges (such as 4V challenges associated with IoT generated big data). Finally, we introduce Statistics Pattern Analysis (SPA) as a specific example of FSM, with several case studies (including an IoT-enabled testbed) to demonstrate its performance in addressing various challenges exhibited in smart manufacturing
Biography: Dr. Jin Wang is Walt and Virginia Woltosz Endowed Professor in the Department of Chemical Engineering at Auburn University. She obtained her BS and PhD degrees in chemical engineering (specialized in biochemical engineering) from Tsinghua University in 1994, and 1999 respectively. She then obtained a PhD degree (specialized in control engineering) from the University of Texas at Austin in 2004. While pursuing her second PhD, she joined AMD in 2002 as a senior development engineer. In 2006, Dr. Wang joined Auburn University as B. Redd Assistant Professor, and was promoted to Associate Professor in 2011, then full professor in 2016. The central theme of her research is to apply systems engineering principles and techniques to understand, predict and control complex dynamic systems, including both engineered systems and microbial organisms. Her current research interest includes genome-scale metabolic network modeling and analysis with experimental validations, and big data analytics for smart manicuring. Her research is funded by various US federal and state funding agencies including DOE, NSF, USDA, DOEd and DOT, as well as private foundations.
Host: Joe Qin, sqin@usc.edu
More Info: http://csc.usc.edu/seminars/2019Fall/wang.html
More Information: 191006_Jin Wang.pdf
Location: Hughes Aircraft Electrical Engineering Center (EEB) - 132
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Brienne Moore
Event Link: http://csc.usc.edu/seminars/2019Fall/wang.html
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
CILQ Faculty Seminar
Mon, Oct 07, 2019 @ 04:00 PM - 05:00 PM
Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Andreas Molisch, Professor/USC
Talk Title: MM-wave propagation channels and their impact on 5G system design
Abstract: Communication in the mm-wave band is an essential part of 5G, allowing us to reach the ambitious data rate and throughput goals of IMT-2020. In order to design systems that will work in practice, a thorough understanding of mm-wave propagation channels is required. This must be based on measurements in real-world channels. This talk provides an overview of such research. After a brief introduction of suitable channel sounders, the talk will concentrate on (i) requirements for street-by-street pathloss models, (ii) dynamics of angular statistics, (iii) outdoor-to-indoor propagation in mm-wave bands, and (iv) spatial consistency and the change of second-order channel statistics. The impact of these channel effects on system design and deployment planning will be elaborated.
Host: CSI
Location: Hughes Aircraft Electrical Engineering Center (EEB) - 248
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Corine Wong
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
Center for Cyber-Physical Systems and Internet of Things and Ming Hsieh Institute Seminar
Wed, Oct 09, 2019 @ 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM
Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Calin Belta , Department of Mechanical Engineering at Boston University
Talk Title: Optimization-based Formal Synthesis
Series: Center for Cyber-Physical Systems and Internet of Things
Abstract: In control theory, complicated dynamics such as systems of (nonlinear) differential equations are mostly controlled to achieve stability. This fundamental property is often linked with optimality, which requires minimization of a certain cost along the trajectories of a stable system. In formal synthesis, simple systems such as finite state transition graphs modeling computer programs or digital circuits are controlled from specifications such as safety, liveness, or richer requirements expressed as formulas of temporal logics. With the development and integration of cyber physical and safety critical systems, there is an increasing need for computational tools for controlling complex systems from rich, temporal logic specifications. In this talk, I will introduce some recents results on the connection between optimal control and formal synthesis. Specifically, I will focus on the following problem: given a cost and a correctness temporal logic specification for a dynamical system, generate an optimal control strategy that satisfies the specification. I will first briefly review automata-based methods, in which the dynamics of the system are mapped to a finite abstraction that is then controlled using an automaton corresponding to the specification. I will then focus on optimization-based methods, which rely on mapping the specification and the dynamics to constraints of an optimization problem. I will illustrate the usefulness of these approaches with examples from robotics and traffic control.
Biography: Calin Belta is a Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Boston University, where he holds the Tegan Family Distinguished Faculty Fellowship. He is the Director of the BU Robotics Lab and of the Center for Autonomous and Robotic Systems (CARS), and is also affiliated with the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and the Division of Systems Engineering at Boston University. His research focuses on dynamics and control theory, with particular emphasis on hybrid and cyber-physical systems, formal synthesis and verification, and robotics. He received the Air Force Office of Scientific Research Young Investigator Award and the National Science Foundation CAREER Award. He is a distinguished lecturer of the IEEE Control System Society and an IEEE Fellow.
Host: Jyotirmoy Vinay Deshmukh
Location: Hughes Aircraft Electrical Engineering Center (EEB) - 132
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Talyia White
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
Ming Hsieh Institute Seminar Series on Integrated Systems
Fri, Oct 11, 2019 @ 02:00 PM - 03:30 PM
Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Dr. Dennis Sylvester, Professor, University of Michigan
Talk Title: Ultra-low Power Microsystems
Host: Profs. Hossein Hashemi, Mike Chen, Dina El-Damak, Manuel Monge, Constantine Sideris, and Mahta Moghaddam
More Information: MHI Seminar Series IS - Dennis Sylvester.pdf
Location: Hughes Aircraft Electrical Engineering Center (EEB) - 248
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Jenny Lin
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
Engineering Nano-electronics for Enabling Ubiquitous Intelligence
Mon, Oct 14, 2019 @ 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM
Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Dr. Akhilesh Jaiswal, Senior Research Engineer, GLOBALFOUNDRIES Worldwide Research Division
Talk Title: Engineering Nano-electronics for Enabling Ubiquitous Intelligence
Abstract: The science of Artificial Intelligence (AI) is built upon multi-disciplinary areas of research such as Nano-, Bio-electronics, and computational engineering. Despite its meticulous design, the underlying hardware fabrics fueling AI systems are based on decades-old computing principles using Boolean transistor switches. Although transistors have scaled from planar to 3D, the basic synchronous digital computing paradigm based on von-Neumann architecture has remained unaltered. Moreover, transistor scaling, which has been the driving force behind the ever-improving performance of traditional digital systems is approaching its imminent demise. These factors have led to multiple bottlenecks in terms of memory-wall, energy-efficiency, throughput, and security concerns. As such, the vision of enabling 'Ubiquitous Intelligence' cannot be achieved without mitigating the challenges mentioned above and embedding intelligent computations across high-end servers down to resource-constrained edge devices. In this talk, I will present two solutions to mitigate energy- and throughput- bottleneck based on emerging non-volatile technologies and also CMOS SRAM. In particular, I will discuss 1) voltage-controlled spin dynamics to achieve massively parallel in-memory Boolean computing, 3) embedding three terminal spin Hall device into standard SRAM cell to enable in-situ checkpointing and restore operations for intermittently powered devices 3) digital 8 transistor-SRAM bit-cells as multi-bit-analog dot product engine for AI acceleration. I will conclude the talk by presenting future research directions for beyond Moore-era AI computing.
Biography: Akhilesh Jaiswal is currently a Senior Research Engineer for GLOBALFOUNDRIES Worldwide Research Division. As a Senior Engineer he is responsible for 1) developing compact device model for MRAM based AI in-memory circuits 2) enabling AI acceleration through hybrid photonic-electronic neuro-mimetic devices.
Akhilesh received his Ph.D. degree in Nano-electronics from Purdue University in May 2019 under supervision of Prof. Kaushik Roy and Master's degree from University of Minnesota in May 2014. As a part of doctoral program his research focused on 1) Exploration of bio-mimetic devices and circuits using emerging non-volatile technologies for Neuromorphic computing. 2) CMOS based analog and digital in-memory and near-memory computing using standard memory bit-cells for beyond von-Neumann AI/ML acceleration. Akhilesh was an intern with GF Differentiating Technology Lab, Malta, in summer of 2017 and with ARM Devices-Circuits-System Research Group, Austin, in summer 2018. He has authored over 25+ articles in journals and conferences and has 2 issued patents and 13 pending patents under USPTO.
Host: Professor Richard Leahy, leahy@sipi.usc.edu
Location: Hughes Aircraft Electrical Engineering Center (EEB) - 132
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Mayumi Thrasher
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
Fall 2019 Joint CSC@USC/CommNetS-MHI Seminar Series
Mon, Oct 14, 2019 @ 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM
Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Vasileios Christopoulos, University of California, Riverside
Talk Title: The acting and adapting brain: Making decisions and learning to adapt in a dynamic world
Abstract: The ability to select between competing options while acting, and learning to adapt to new situations, underlies our impressive capabilities of playing soccer, flying aircrafts and skiing on the Olympics. Although significant progress has been made on understanding the mechanisms underpinning decision-making and learning, there is no strong consensus on how the brain chooses between actions and adapts to new environmental conditions. I will discuss recent findings from our lab providing evidence that decision-making is not a centralized cognitive process that resides solely within the frontal lobe. Instead, it also includes brain areas that have been traditionally associated with planning and generating actions. By modeling the decision-making process within a neurodynamical framework, I will present an alternative hypothesis according to which decisions emerge via a continuous competition between multiple potential actions. To select between actions, the brain needs an accurate representation of the state of the body and the environment it is in. Despite the sophistication of our sensory system, it is unlikely to extract a complete and accurate representation of the state due to noise and long sensory delays. To avoid instabilities due to these factors, previous work has suggested that the brain builds internal models that predict sensory outcome of motor actions. These predictions are integrated with the incoming sensory feedback to update the estimate of the current state. By recording neural activity from the posterior parietal cortex (PPC) in both humans and non-human primates, I will show that PPC contains an adaptive internal forward model that learns to compensate for delayed visual feedback. I will also discuss clinical brain-machine interface (BMI) studies in human with tetraplegia that have taken steps to elucidate the mechanisms behind the acquisition of new skills and why learning new skills is easier when they are related to already learned abilities. By training a participant to control a computer cursor by modulating the neural activity of PPC neurons, we found that some patterns of activity were generated more easily than others. The easier-to-learn patterns of activity were combinations of pre-existing neuronal patterns, whereas the difficult-to-learn activity patterns were different from the neuronal patterns that the participant had experienced in the past. Importantly, there were neuronal patterns that PPC could not generate indicating that neuroplasticity in learning is constrained by the pre-existing structure of the brain. This fundamental constraint may explain why learning novel tasks can be challenging.
Biography: Dr. Christopoulos is an Assistant Professor at the Bioengineering Department at the University of California Riverside. He received his Ph.D. in Computer Science and Engineering (with minor in Cognitive Sciences) from the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis in 2010. He then moved to California Institute of Technology (Caltech) to work as a post-doctoral fellow at the Andersens lab. In 2017, he was appointed as Research Faculty at the Division of Biology and Biological Engineering at Caltech and Director of Neurotechnology at the T&C Chen Brain-Machine Interface Center. Dr. Christopoulos research group uses neurophysiological, functional brain-imaging and computational methods to elucidate the mechanisms underlying decision-making, motor learning and spatial awareness, and explore circuit dysfunctions in neurological and psychiatric disorders. In recent years, Dr. Christopoulos extended his research to clinical trials including neural prosthetic applications in individuals with tetraplegia (intracortical Brain-Machine Interface), and deep brain stimulation (DBS) in Parkinson's disease (PD) patients.
Host: Mihailo Jovanovic, mihailo@usc.edu
More Info: http://csc.usc.edu/seminars/2019Fall/christopoulos.html
More Information: 191014_Vasileios Christopoulos_CSC.pdf
Location: Hughes Aircraft Electrical Engineering Center (EEB) - 132
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Brienne Moore
Event Link: http://csc.usc.edu/seminars/2019Fall/christopoulos.html
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
CILQ Faculty Seminar
Mon, Oct 14, 2019 @ 04:00 PM - 05:00 PM
Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Salman Avestimehr, Professor/USC
Talk Title: Coded Computing: A Transformative Framework for Resilient, Secure, and Private Distributed Learning
Abstract: This talk introduces Coded Computing, a new framework that brings concepts and tools from information theory and coding into distributed computing to mitigate several performance bottlenecks that arise in large-scale distributed computing and machine learning, such as resiliency to stragglers and bandwidth bottleneck. Furthermore, coded computing can enable (information-theoretically) secure and private learning over untrusted workers that is gaining increasing importance in various application domains. In particular, we present CodedPrivateML for distributed learning, which keeps both the data and the model private while allowing efficient parallelization of training across untrusted distributed workers. We demonstrate that CodedPrivateML can provide an order of magnitude speedup (up to ~30x) over the cryptographic approaches that rely on secure multiparty computing.
Host: CSI
Location: Hughes Aircraft Electrical Engineering Center (EEB) - 248
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Corine Wong
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
Ming Hsieh Institute Seminar Series on Integrated Systems
Tue, Oct 15, 2019 @ 02:00 PM - 03:30 PM
Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Dr. Nagendra Krishnapura, Professor, IIT Madras
Talk Title: Widely Tunable Active True-Time-Delay Line and Millimeter-Wave VCO
Host: Profs. Hossein Hashemi, Mike Chen, Dina El-Damak, Manuel Monge, Constantine Sideris, and Mahta Moghaddam
More Information: MHI Seminar Series IS - Nagendra Krishnapura.pdf
Location: Hughes Aircraft Electrical Engineering Center (EEB) - 132
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Jenny Lin
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
Medical Imaging Seminar
Wed, Oct 16, 2019 @ 12:00 PM - 01:00 PM
Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Vanessa Landes, University of Southern California
Talk Title: Radiofrequency Pulse Performance for Myocardial ASL
Series: Medical Imaging Seminar Series
Abstract: Coronary artery disease (CAD) is one of the leading causes of death and disability in the United States, accounting for approximately one third of all deaths in individuals over the age of 35. Myocardial perfusion imaging (MPI) is an important tool to diagnose or monitor patients with CAD. Current techniques use ionizing radiation or contrast agents, and are not suitable for routine monitoring or in patients with chronic kidney disease. Myocardial Arterial Spin Labeling is under development as a contrast and radiation free MPI technique. Spatial coverage must be increased and sensitivity to transit delay must be eliminated for clinical adaptation.
This talk will discuss technical improvements in RF pulse performance for myocardial ASL. First, a hardware-free, efficient RF predistortion technique is developed to improve SMS bSSFP imaging for increased spatial coverage of myocardial ASL. Second, a VS pulse is designed using Fourier Velocity encoding techniques and tailored specifically for labeling of coronary blood at 3T to remove transit delay sensitivities of myocardial ASL. With the proposed methods, the development of myocardial ASL approaches clinical reality.
Biography: Vanessa Landes is a Ph.D. candidate working under the supervision of Prof. Krishna Nayak at the Magnetic Resonance Engineering Laboratory. Her research focuses on MR pulse sequence development and RF pulse design for cardiac applications at 3T.
Host: Professor Krishna Nayak
Location: Hughes Aircraft Electrical Engineering Center (EEB) - 132
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Talyia White
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
Center for Cyber-Physical Systems and Internet of Things and Ming Hsieh Institute Seminar
Wed, Oct 16, 2019 @ 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM
Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Sayan Mitra , University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Talk Title: Optimal Data Rate Estimation and Model Detection for Safe Autonomy
Series: Center for Cyber-Physical Systems and Internet of Things
Abstract: Building a safe autonomous system will involve connecting a number of perception, monitoring, and decision components over a bandwidth-constrained network. Secondly, many of these components rely heavily on models. Based on these two observations, we motivate a new line of theoretical investigation on data-rate optimal state estimation and model detection. We introduce the notion of estimation entropy that captures the minimal data rate needed for state estimation of dynamical and switched systems. While there are parallels with the information-theoretic counterparts, this notion of estimation bounds the worst-case errors which is often necessary for reasoning about safety. As we believe that computing the estimation entropy of a system exactly will be difficult, we provide upper bounds. We present an algorithm for state estimation over finite bandwidth channels that matches this upper bound. Building on this estimator, we then present an algorithm that can detect the correct model of a system from a set of candidate models. We will conclude with a discussion of switched systems and connections with formal verification.
Biography: Sayan Mitra is a Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and an affiliate professor of Computer Science. He is the Associate director of research at the recently formed Center for Autonomy. His research interests lie around formal verification, autonomous systems, safety and privacy in control systems, and distributed computing. He has authored a textbook on verification of cyber-physical systems (to be published by MIT press). His research group has developed several leading tools for verification and synthesis of hybrid systems. He holds a PhD in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from MIT, MSc from the Indian Institute of Science, and a Bachelor's Degree in Electrical Engineering from Jadavpur University. He was a postdoctoral fellow at Caltech (2008), and has held visiting faculty positions at Oxford University, TU Vienna, and Kirtland Air Force Research Laboratory. Sayan received the National Science Foundation's CAREER Award, AFOSR Young Investigator Research Program Award, IEEE-HKN C. Holmes MacDonald Outstanding Teaching Award, a RiSE Fellowship, a Seibel Research Grant, and several best paper awards.
Host: Jyotirmoy Vinay Deshmukh
Location: Hughes Aircraft Electrical Engineering Center (EEB) - EEB 132
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Talyia White
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
Fall 2019 Joint CSC@USC/CommNetS-MHI Seminar Series
Mon, Oct 21, 2019 @ 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM
Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Behcet Acikmese, University of Washington
Talk Title: Real-time optimization based control for agile autonomy
Abstract: Many future aerospace engineering applications will require dramatic increases in our existing autonomous control capabilities. These include robotic sample return missions to planets, comets, and asteroids, formation flying spacecraft applications, applications utilizing swarms of autonomous agents, unmanned aerial, ground, and underwater vehicles, and autonomous commercial robotic applications. A key control challenge for many autonomous systems is to achieve the performance goals safely with minimal resource use in the presence of mission constraints and uncertainties. In principle these problems can be formulated and solved as optimization problems. The challenge is solving them reliably onboard the autonomous system in real time. Our research has provided new analytical results that enabled the formulation of many autonomous control problems in a convex optimization framework, i.e., convexification of the control problem. The main mathematical theory used in achieving convexification is the duality theory of optimization. Duality theory manifests itself as Pontryagin's Maximum Principle in infinite dimensional optimization problems and as KKT conditions in finite dimensional parameter optimization problems. Both theories were instrumental in our developments. Our analytical framework also allowed the computation of the precise bounds of performance for a control system in term of constrained controllability/reachability sets, which enables rigorous V&V of the resulting control algorithms. This seminar introduces several real-world aerospace applications, where this approach provided dramatic performance improvements over the heritage technologies. An important application is the fuel optimal control for planetary soft landing, whose complete solution has been an open problem since the Apollo Moon landings of 1960s. We developed a novel lossless convexification method, which enables the next generation planetary missions, such as Mars robotic sample return and manned missions. We will also present a method called successive convexification to handle a general class of trajectory planning problems, such as, drone and planetary landing motion rocket planning. Another application is in Markov chain synthesis with safety constraints, which enabled the development of new decentralized coordination and control methods for spacecraft swarms.
Biography: Behcet Acikmese is a professor in the William E. Boeing Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics and an adjunct faculty member in Department of Electrical Engineering at University of Washington, Seattle. He received his Ph.D. in Aerospace Engineering from Purdue University. He was a senior technologist at JPL and a lecturer at Caltech. At JPL, He developed control algorithms for planetary landing, spacecraft formation flying, and asteroid and comet sample return missions. He developed the flyaway control algorithms in Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) mission, and the RCS algorithms for NASA SMAP mission. Dr. Acikmese invented a novel real-time convex optimization based planetary landing guidance algorithm (G-FOLD) that was ight tested by JPL, which is a first demonstration of a real-time optimization algorithm for rocket guidance. He is a recipient of NSF CAREER Award, several NASA Achievement awards for his contributions to NASA missions and new technology development. He is an Associate Fellow of AIAA, a Senior Member of IEEE, and an associate editor of IEEE Control System Magazine and AIAA JGCD.
Host: Mihailo Jovanovic, mihailo@usc.edu
More Info: http://csc.usc.edu/seminars/2019Fall/acikmese.html
More Information: 191021_Behcet Acikmese_CSC Seminar.pdf
Location: Hughes Aircraft Electrical Engineering Center (EEB) - 132
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Brienne Moore
Event Link: http://csc.usc.edu/seminars/2019Fall/acikmese.html
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
Center for Cyber-Physical Systems and Internet of Things and Ming Hsieh Institute Seminar
Wed, Oct 23, 2019 @ 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM
Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Mahnoosh Alizadeh, University of California Santa Barbara
Talk Title: Safety-constrained Learning Algorithms for Demand Management
Series: Center for Cyber-Physical Systems and Internet of Things
Abstract: The first part of this talk is motivated by the fact that learning algorithms are growing in popularity for sequential decision making in many cyber-physical systems. However, when dealing with safety-critical systems, it is paramount that the learner's actions do not violate the safety/reliability constraints of the system at any round, in spite of uncertainty about system parameters. An example we will highlight is that of optimal real-time price design for demand management in power distribution systems given unknown customer price response functions. We will showcase the performance of a ``safety-aware" bandit heuristic for designing prices that controls the probability of violation of power grid constraints during the learning process. We then study the effect of such safety constraints on the growth of regret for certain classes of stochastic bandit optimization problems.
In the second part of the talk, we consider the problem of joint routing, battery charging, and pricing problem faced by a profit-maximizing transportation service provider that operates a fleet of autonomous electric vehicles. To accommodate for the time-varying nature of trip demands, renewable energy availability, and electricity prices and to further optimally manage the autonomous fleet, a dynamic pricing and control policy is required. We highlight several such policies, including one trained through deep reinforcement learning to develop a near-optimal control policy. We also determine the optimal static policy to serve as a baseline for comparison with our dynamic policy and for determining the capacity region of the system. While the static policy provides important insights on optimal pricing and fleet management, we show that in a real dynamic setting, it is inefficient to utilize a static policy.
Biography: Mahnoosh Alizadeh is an assistant professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of California Santa Barbara. She received the B.Sc. degree in Electrical Engineering from Sharif University of Technology in 2009 and the M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees from the University of California Davis in 2013 and 2014 respectively, both in Electrical and Computer Engineering. From 2014 to 2016, she was a postdoctoral scholar at Stanford University. Her research is focused on the design of network control and optimization algorithms for societal-scale cyber-physical systems, with a particular focus on renewable energy integration in the power grid and electric transportation systems. She is a recipient of the NSF CAREER award.
Host: Ashutosh Nayyar
Location: Hughes Aircraft Electrical Engineering Center (EEB) - 132
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Talyia White
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
Medical Imaging Seminar
Wed, Oct 23, 2019 @ 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM
Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Ahsan Javed, Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Southern California
Talk Title: Improving the Sensitivity and Spatial Coverage of Arterial Spin Labeled Cardiac Magnetic Resonance Imaging
Series: Medical Imaging Seminar Series
Abstract: Cardiac magnetic resonance imaging (CMR) is the method of choice to address the growing need for a safe and repeatable technique to assess coronary artery disease. Existing techniques are unsuitable for frequent use, as they are either invasive or involve ionizing radiation. Recently, CMR first pass perfusion was used to guide treatment of CAD and was shown to have comparable outcomes to fraction flow reserve, the leading invasive assessment. However, first pass perfusion uses gadolinium based contrast agents which are contraindicated in patients with kidney disease. There are approximately 600 thousand Americans with end-stage renal disease and 26 million with chronic kidney disease. This patient population has over 10 times higher risk of developing cardiovascular disease and requires more frequent monitoring. In this population arterial spin labeling cardiac magnetic resonance imaging (ASL-CMR) presents a promising alternative. Currently, clinical use of existing ASL-CMR techniques is limited by poor spatial coverage and sensitivity.
This talk will introduce developments to improve both spatial coverage and sensitivity of ASL-CMR. We will discuss the development and optimization of saturation steady pulsed arterial spin labeling, a new labeling scheme inspired from a recent work by Capron et al. that improves the sensitivity and signal efficiency of ASL-CMR. I will also present the implementation and validation of reduced FOV sequential multi-slice single shot EPI for ASL-CMR to improve spatial coverage. With these proposed methods we aim to move a few steps closer to making ASL-CMR clinically feasible to enable safe, contrast free assessment of CAD.
Biography: Ahsan Javed is a PhD student in the Magnetic Resonance Engineering Laboratory at University of Southern California under the supervision of Dr. Krishna Nayak. His research expertise lies in RF pulse design, pulse sequence development, and cardiac magnetic resonance imaging. His works have focused on development of novel pulse sequences to improve sensitivity and spatial coverage of ASL-CMR and validation of ASL-CMR techniques in large animal models.
Host: Krishna Nayak
Location: Hughes Aircraft Electrical Engineering Center (EEB) - 248
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Talyia White
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
Ming Hsieh Institute Seminar Series on Integrated Systems
Fri, Oct 25, 2019 @ 02:00 PM - 03:30 PM
Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Dr. David R. Smith, Professor, Duke University
Talk Title: Engineering Systems with Metamaterials
Host: Profs. Hossein Hashemi, Mike Chen, Dina El-Damak, Manuel Monge, Constantine Sideris, and Mahta Moghaddam
More Information: MHI Seminar Series IS - David Smith.pdf
Location: Hughes Aircraft Electrical Engineering Center (EEB) - 132
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Jenny Lin
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
Fall 2019 Joint CSC@USC/CommNetS-MHI Seminar Series
Mon, Oct 28, 2019 @ 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM
Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: James Rawlings, University of California, Santa Barbara
Talk Title: Nonlinear Optimization-Based State Estimation: Robustness Analysis by Q Functions
Abstract: State estimation can be posed as an optimal control/tracking problem. From this perspective, the stability and robustness properties of the estimator should be derivable from the properties of the optimization problem, as is commonly done in the analysis of Model Predictive Control. To achieve this goal in state estimation, we introduce a Lyapunov-like function, termed a Q function, and show that for general nonlinear systems satisfying a nonlinear detectability assumption and a nonlinear, incremental stabilizability assumption, the optimal full information state estimate is robustly asymptotically stable in the presence of bounded process and measurement disturbances. We also show that the state estimate converges to zero for asymptotically convergent disturbances. These general theoretical results are illustrated by application to some numerical examples using the freely available software CasADi/MPCTools for solving the optimal control problems. Implications of these full information results for moving horizon estimation are also discussed.
Biography: James B. Rawlings received the B.S. from the University of Texas and the Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin, both in Chemical Engineering. He spent one year at the University of Stuttgart as a NATO postdoctoral fellow and then joined the faculty at the University of Texas. He moved to the University of Wisconsin in 1995, and then to the University of California, Santa Barbara in 2018, and is currently the Mellichamp Process Control Chair in the Department of Chemical Engineering, and the co-director of the Texas-Wisconsin-California Control Consortium (TWCCC). Professor Rawlings's research interests are in the areas of chemical process modeling, monitoring and control, nonlinear model predictive control, moving horizon state estimation, and molecular-scale chemical reaction engineering. He has written numerous research articles and coauthored three textbooks: Model Predictive Control: Theory Computation, and Design, 2nd ed. (2017), with David Mayne and Moritz Diehl, Modeling and Analysis Principles for Chemical and Biological Engineers (2013), with Mike Graham, and Chemical Reactor Analysis and Design Fundamentals, 2nd ed. (2012), with John Ekerdt. In recognition of his research and teaching, Professor Rawlings has received several awards including: election to the National Academy of Engineering; William H. Walker Award for Excellence in Contributions to Chemical Engineering Literature from the AIChE; Doctor technices honoris causa from the Danish Technical University; The inaugural High Impact Paper Award from the International Federation of Automatic Control; The Ragazzini Education Award from the American Automatic Control Council; and The Computing in Chemical Engineering Award.
Host: Si-Zhao Qin, sqin@usc.edu
More Info: http://csc.usc.edu/seminars/2019Fall/rawlings.html
More Information: 191028_James Rawlings_CSC Seminar.pdf
Location: Hughes Aircraft Electrical Engineering Center (EEB) - 132
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Brienne Moore
Event Link: http://csc.usc.edu/seminars/2019Fall/rawlings.html
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
Human-Building Integration as a Function of Human Physical Signal
Wed, Oct 30, 2019 @ 10:30 AM - 11:30 AM
Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Professor Joon-Ho Choi, USC School of Architecture
Talk Title: Human-Building Integration as a Function of Human Physical Signal
Abstract: The Human-Building Integration develops an integrated human-centered framework for intelligent environmental control in a building. The physiological signals of the occupants, as well as their ambient environmental data, are integrated by using sensing agents (such as wearable as well as remote sensors) and embedded environmental sensors in the building. This enables bio-sensing-driven multi-criteria decisions for determining building thermal and lighting system controls that will potentially lower energy usage awhile improving occupant comfort.
This human-centered approach provides a framework that will 1) address sensor data processing and analysis challenges that are inherent in large and dynamic datasets generated from sensing agents; 2) develop methods for optimizing decisions and solutions to multiple-criteria problems pertaining to occupants' preferences; and 3) establish a human-centered control approach that is integrated with a conventional control system for building retrofits to enable real-time decision making and system optimization that enhances energy efficient operations and occupants' comfort. Such a three-fold approach can lead to tailored building environmental control systems with the potential for dramatically improving the efficiency of a building's performance, increasing sustainability, and leveraging informatics technology that can improve the occupants' quality of life.
Biography: Dr. Choi, Joon-Ho is an Associate Professor of Building Science and Associate Dean for Research in the USC Architecture. He is also the Director of Human-Building Integration Research Group. His primary research interests are in the area of human-centered indoor environmental quality control, comprehensive post-occupancy evaluation, and cyber-physical system in a built environment. As an interdisciplinary scholar and principal investigator, he has developed/participated in multiple research projects sponsored by the U.S. federal and research foundation grant programs, as well as industry partners, which include National Science Foundation, Environmental Protection Agency, General Services Administration (GSA), American Institute of America(AIA), International Institute of Building Enclosure, Buro Happold Engineering, Glumac, and AECOM.
Host: Professor Richard Leahy, leahy@sipi.usc.edu
Location: Hughes Aircraft Electrical Engineering Center (EEB) - 132
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Mayumi Thrasher
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor. -
Center for Cyber-Physical Systems and Internet of Things and Ming Hsieh Institute Seminar
Wed, Oct 30, 2019 @ 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM
Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars
Speaker: Janos Sztipanovits, Institute for Software Integrated Systems, Vanderbilt University
Talk Title: Model- and Component-Based Design of Cyber-Physical Systems
Series: Center for Cyber-Physical Systems and Internet of Things
Abstract: Model- and component-based design have yielded dramatic increase in design productivity in several narrowly focused homogeneous domains, such as signal processing, control and aspects of electronic design. However, significant impact on the design and manufacturing of complex cyber-physical systems (CPS) such as vehicles has not yet been achieved. This talk describes challenges of and solution approaches to building a comprehensive design automation tool suite for complex CPS and new directions to extend model- and component-based design flows with a range of data-driven methods recently emerging in AI/ML research. The first part of the talk will discuss the OpenMETA tool suite that was developed for pushing the boundaries of "correct-by-construction" methods to decrease the costly design-build-test-redesign cycles in CPS design flows. The discussion will focus on the impact of heterogeneity in modeling, analyzing and optimizing CPS designs. Based on experience with the development of OpenMETA and with the evaluation of its performance in a complex CPS designs, the talk will argue that the current vertically integrated, discipline-specific tool chains need to be complemented with horizontal integration layers that support model integration, tool integration and design process integration. The second part of the talk will analyze the impact of Learning Enabled Components (LEC) on systems as well as engineering design processes.
Biography: Dr. Janos Sztipanovits is currently the E. Bronson Ingram Distinguished Professor of Engineering at Vanderbilt University and founding director of the Institute for Software Integrated Systems. Between 1999 and 2002, he worked as program manager and deputy director of DARPA Information Technology Office. He was member of the US Air Force Science Advisory Board between 2006 and 2010. His current research interest includes the foundation and applications of model and component-based design of Cyber Physical Systems, design space exploration and systems-security co-design technology. He leads the CPS Virtual Organization and he is co-chair the CPS Reference Architecture and Definition public working group established by NIST in 2014. In 2014/2015 he was elected to be member of the Steering Committee of the Industrial Internet Consortium. He was founding chair of the ACM Special Interest Group on Embedded Software (SIGBED). Dr. Sztipanovits was elected Fellow of the IEEE in 2000 and external member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences in 2010.
Host: Pierluigi Nuzzo
Location: Hughes Aircraft Electrical Engineering Center (EEB) - 132
Audiences: Everyone Is Invited
Contact: Talyia White
This event is open to all eligible individuals. USC Viterbi operates all of its activities consistent with the University's Notice of Non-Discrimination. Eligibility is not determined based on race, sex, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or any other prohibited factor.
