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Events for the 1st week of December

  • Differential Verification of Deep Neural Networks

    Tue, Nov 30, 2021 @ 08:30 AM - 09:30 AM

    Thomas Lord Department of Computer Science

    Student Activity


    PhD Candidate: Brandon Paulsen

    Title: Differential Verification of Deep Neural Networks

    Date & Time: Tuesday November 30th at 8:30 AM

    Committee: Chao Wang (Advisor), Jyotirmoy Deshmukh, Nenad Medvidovic, William Halfond, Murali Annavaram

    Zoom link: https://usc.zoom.us/j/97339789019?pwd=blJoYTg3WXJDZzBUcFVRQzZMNUNpQT09

    Abstract:
    Recently, deep neural networks (DNNs) have found success in a wide variety of application domains such as image recognition, natural language processing, and autonomous vehicle control. However, they are often criticized for their large energy-footprint, which limits their use on computationally- and energy-constrained devices. Recently, this limitation was addressed by DNN compression -- a technique that reduces the computational and energy requirements by, e.g., reducing the floating point precision of the neural network -- but this naturally raises the question: is the compressed network equivalent to the original? Answering this question is crucial for safety-critical systems, and desirable in general. Unfortunately, current DNN verification tools are limited in that they are only designed to analyze a single network, rendering them ineffective for this problem.

    For my thesis, I address this limitation by formalizing the problem of differential verification of DNNs, and then developing a novel approach for reasoning about a pair of any two structurally similar feed-forward DNNs with ReLU activations. The key insight in my approach is to reason about the two networks simultaneously, thus greatly improving the precision of the analysis. While the approach is applicable to any pair of structurally similar DNNs, I demonstrate its effectiveness in proving equivalence (within a small error bound) of compressed DNNs with respect to the original DNN, and I further show that my new approach outperforms existing DNN verification tools by orders of magnitude, in terms of scalability. I then show that the first approach can be greatly improved upon by leveraging a novel fine-grained, symbolic technique that captures the relationships between neurons. Finally, I discuss the challenges of extending differential verification to activation functions beyond ReLU and other DNN architectures, and propose a solution.

    Location: Zoom

    WebCast Link: https://usc.zoom.us/j/97339789019?pwd=blJoYTg3WXJDZzBUcFVRQzZMNUNpQT09

    Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

    Contact: USC Computer Science

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  • Astani Civil and Environmental Engineering Seminar

    Tue, Nov 30, 2021 @ 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM

    Sonny Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering

    Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars


    Speaker: Adam Simpson, Ph.D. Candidate, Stanford University

    Talk Title: Predicting Initial Transformation of Food-Based Bio-Polymers and -Molecules During Food Disinfection

    Abstract: Foodborne pathogenic outbreaks still occur 100x more frequently than waterborne pathogenic outbreaks from municipal/community water supplies in the US, despite the passing of the Food Safety Modernization Act of 2011. To kill pathogens, food packaging facilities must treat fruits, vegetables, and meats with high dosages of chemical sanitizers-”most frequently free chlorine-”for ready-to-eat and triple washed foods. Food chemists and engineers have looked to water disinfection byproduct research to predict and measure contaminants (i.e., trihalomethanes, haloacetic acids and chlorates) formed in food disinfection washwaters as potential chemical exposures to consumers. However, my research demonstrates that this is fundamentally incorrect as the boundary conditions of food disinfection and water disinfection processes
    are incongruent. First, I will introduce current food disinfection processing techniques and conditions and compare with water disinfection to encourage a new way to predict initial transformation products formed during food disinfection. Second, I will demonstrate the formation of chlorotyrosines isolated inside of chlorine washed spinach and lettuce in comparison to volatile disinfection byproducts isolated in the washwater to prove where true toxic exposure risks are. Third, I will introduce a new class of food-based disinfection byproducts measured inside of chlorine treated vegetables, namely fatty acid chlorohydrins,and compare the cumulative toxic potencies of these chlorine treated vegetables to a poor-quality water at EPA regulated limits to demonstrate the relative magnitude of these exposures. I will end the seminar with a glance of my future research involving this uncharted field.


    Biography: Adam Simpson is a PhD candidate at Stanford University, in the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department advised by Professor William Mitch. His research involves using organic chemistry and complex analytical chemistry techniques to synthesize and isolate new classes of food-based disinfection
    byproducts that are toxic and affect most consumers. To advance his depth of knowledge and experience with postharvest crop treatment, he is also undergoing a stint at the United States Department of Agriculture-”Agricultural Research Service in Parlier, California, where he is also advised by the
    Environmental Chemist, Dr. Spencer Walse. His work has been supported by multiple fellowships including a Stanford Graduate Fellowship, a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship, and a Diversifying Academia, Recruiting Excellence Fellowship. He will receive his PhD in Civil and Environmental
    Engineering in May-2022 and received his M.S. degree in Civil and Environmental Engineering from Stanford University, and B.S. degree in Chemical Engineering from Carnegie Mellon University. Beingpassionate about diversifying academia, Adam is also a science communicator through his YouTube Channel, where he aims to humanize academia with a focus on Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math Education, while uplifting underrepresented voices. With an ambition of being a tenure-track assistant
    professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering-”he hopes to continue his work to make a more inclusive
    academia.

    Host: Dr. Daniel McCurry

    Webcast: https://usc.zoom.us/j/94682875854 Meeting ID: 946 8287 5854 Passcode: 090068

    Location: Michelson Center for Convergent Bioscience (MCB) - 102

    WebCast Link: https://usc.zoom.us/j/94682875854 Meeting ID: 946 8287 5854 Passcode: 090068

    Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

    Contact: Evangeline Reyes

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  • Photonics Seminar Series

    Photonics Seminar Series

    Tue, Nov 30, 2021 @ 01:30 PM - 02:30 PM

    Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering

    Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars


    Speaker: Dr. Juliet Gopinath, University of Colorado Boulder

    Talk Title: Nonlinear Integrated Optics and Microscopy

    Series: Photonics Seminar

    Host: Electrical and Computer Engineering: Wade Hsu, Mercedeh Khajavikhan, Michelle Povinelli, Constantine Sideris, and Wei Wu

    More Info: https://usc.zoom.us/j/91808071892?pwd=VUwyK3NSNW5rSzVLQzFKSGdPc05yUT09

    Webcast: https://usc.zoom.us/j/91808071892?pwd=VUwyK3NSNW5rSzVLQzFKSGdPc05yUT09

    More Information: Photonics Seminar _Julie Gopinath 11-30-21.pdf

    Location: Hughes Aircraft Electrical Engineering Center (EEB) - 132

    WebCast Link: https://usc.zoom.us/j/91808071892?pwd=VUwyK3NSNW5rSzVLQzFKSGdPc05yUT09

    Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

    Contact: Jennifer Ramos/Electrophysics

    Event Link: https://usc.zoom.us/j/91808071892?pwd=VUwyK3NSNW5rSzVLQzFKSGdPc05yUT09

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  • Repeating EventDrop-In Weekly Office Hours [Virtual] Posted By: Center for Advanced Research Computing

    Tue, Nov 30, 2021 @ 02:30 PM - 05:00 PM

    Technology & Applied Computing Program (TAC)

    Workshops & Infosessions


    Every Tuesday, office hours are an opportunity for CARC users to ask questions about research computing. No appointment/registration is necessary, but you must use your USC credentials to access the Zoom meeting by clicking "Register" below. For in-person support, we are also in Leavey Library room 3M (basement) during this same time period. Register Here!

    Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

    View All Dates

    Contact: Center for Advanced Research Computing

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  • ISE 651 - Epstein Seminar

    ISE 651 - Epstein Seminar

    Tue, Nov 30, 2021 @ 03:30 PM - 04:50 PM

    Daniel J. Epstein Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering

    Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars


    Speaker: Dr. Xunyu Zhou, Professor, Dept. of Industrial Engineering and Operations Research, Columbia

    Talk Title: Policy Evaluation, Policy Gradient, and Actor-Critic Learning in Continuous Time and Space: Theory and Algorithms

    Host: Dr. Renyuan Xu

    More Information: November 30, 2021.pdf

    Location: Zoom/Online

    Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

    Contact: Grace Owh

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  • CS Colloquium: Konstantinos Karydis (University of California, Riverside) - Online mobile robot motion planning under uncertainty in unknown environments

    Tue, Nov 30, 2021 @ 03:30 PM - 04:50 PM

    Thomas Lord Department of Computer Science

    Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars


    Speaker: Konstantinos Karydis, University of California, Riverside

    Talk Title: Online mobile robot motion planning under uncertainty in unknown environments

    Series: Computer Science Colloquium

    Abstract: Mobile robot motion planning under uncertainty is a challenging yet rewarding foundational robotics research problem with extensive applications across domains including intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR), remote sensing, and precision agriculture. One important challenge is operation in unknown environments where planning decisions need to be made at run-time. In this talk we discuss recent results to address online motion planning in unknown environments. We consider two specific cases: 1) How to achieve resolution-complete field coverage considering the non-holonomic mobility constraints in commonly-used vehicles (e.g., wheeled robots) without prior information about the environment? 2) How to develop resilient, risk-aware and collision-inclusive planning algorithms to enable (collision-resilient) mobile robots to deliberately choose when to collide with locally-sensed obstacles to improve some motion planning metrics (e.g., total time to reach a goal).

    To this end, we have proposed a hierarchical, hex-decomposition-based coverage planning algorithm for unknown, obstacle-cluttered environments. The proposed approach ensures resolution-complete coverage, can be tuned to achieve fast exploration, and plans smooth paths for Dubins vehicles to follow at constant velocity in real-time. Our approach can successfully trade-off between coverage and exploration speed, and can outperform existing online coverage algorithms in terms of total covered area or exploration speed according to how it is tuned. Further, we have introduced new sampling- and search-based online collision-inclusive motion planning algorithms for impact-resilient robots, that can explicitly handle the risk of colliding with the environment and can switch between collision avoidance and collision exploitation. Central to the planners' capabilities is a novel joint optimization function that evaluates the effect of possible collisions using a reflection model.
    This way, the planner can make deliberate decisions to collide with the environment if such collision is expected to help the robot make progress toward its goal. To make the algorithm online, we present state expansion pruning techniques that can significantly reduce the search space while ensuring completeness.

    This lecture satisfies requirements for CSCI 591: Research Colloquium.


    Biography: Dr. Karydis is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of California, Riverside (UCR). Before joining UCR, he worked as a Post-Doctoral Researcher in Robotics in GRASP Lab, which is part of the Department of Mechanical Engineering and Applied Mechanics at the University of Pennsylvania (Penn). His work was supported by Dr. Vijay Kumar, Professor and Nemirovsky Family Dean of Penn Engineering. He completed his doctoral studies in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Delaware, under the guidance of Prof. Herbert Tanner and Prof.
    Ioannis Poulakakis.


    Host: Stefanos Nikolaidis

    Location: Seeley Wintersmith Mudd Memorial Hall (of Philosophy) (MHP) - 101

    Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

    Contact: Computer Science Department

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  • Repeating EventVirtual First-Year Admission Information Session

    Tue, Nov 30, 2021 @ 04:00 PM - 05:00 PM

    Viterbi School of Engineering Undergraduate Admission

    Workshops & Infosessions


    Our virtual information session is a live presentation from a USC Viterbi admission counselor designed for high school students and their family members to learn more about the USC Viterbi undergraduate experience. Our session will cover an overview of our undergraduate engineering programs, the application process, and more on student life. Guests will be able to ask questions and engage in further discussion toward the end of the session.

    Register here!

    Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

    View All Dates

    Contact: Viterbi Admission

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  • Repeating EventMS CSCI/DSCI Drop-in Academic Advising

    Wed, Dec 01, 2021 @ 10:00 AM - 11:00 AM

    Thomas Lord Department of Computer Science

    Workshops & Infosessions


    Virtual Academic Advising Drop-in Hours for continuing MS students in CS or Data Science Programs will be available for the month of December. If you have a quick question that doesn't require a 20 minute appointment, please come to our drop in hours. Students may be placed into the waiting room upon arrival.

    Zoom access link for all sessions:

    ZOOM LINK SENT TO STUDENTS DIRECTLY. CHECK EMAIL FOR LINK.

    Wednesday, December 1st --- 10am -- 11am
    Wednesday, December 1st --- 2:30pm -- 3:30pm

    Wednesday, December 8th --- 10am -- 11am
    Wednesday, December 8th --- 2:30pm -- 3:30pm

    Wednesday, December 15th --- 10am -- 11am
    Wednesday, December 15th --- 2:30pm -- 3:30pm

    Location: Online

    Audiences: Graduate

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    Contact: USC Computer Science

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  • Center of Autonomy and AI, Center for Cyber-Physical Systems and the Internet of Things, and Ming Hsieh Institute Seminar Series

    Center of Autonomy and AI, Center for Cyber-Physical Systems and the Internet of Things, and Ming Hsieh Institute Seminar Series

    Wed, Dec 01, 2021 @ 02:00 PM - 03:00 PM

    Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering

    Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars


    Speaker: Mi Zhang , Machine Learning Systems Lab at Michigan State University

    Talk Title: Empowering the Next Billion Devices with Deep Learning

    Series: Center for Cyber-Physical Systems and Internet of Things

    Abstract: The proliferation of edge devices and the gigantic amount of data they generate make it no longer feasible to transmit all the data to the cloud for processing. Such constraints fuel the need to move the intelligence from the cloud to the edge where data reside. In this talk, I will present our works on how we bring the power of deep learning to edge devices to realize the vision of Artificial Intelligence of Things (AIoT).

    First, I will present our work on designing adaptive frameworks that empower AI-embedded edge devices to adapt to the inherently dynamic runtime resources to enable elastic on-device AI. Second, we shift from the single edge device setting to the distributed setting for the task of distributed on-device inference. I will focus on one killer application of edge computing, and present a distributed workload-adaptive framework for low-latency high-throughput large-scale live video analytics. Third, I will present our work on designing a distributed on-device training framework that significantly enhances the on-device training efficiency without compromising the training quality. Lastly, I will talk about our work on developing automated machine learning (AutoML) techniques to address the device deluge challenge which acts as one key barrier of achieving the vision of AIoT.

    Biography: Mi Zhang is an Associate Professor and the Director of the Machine Learning Systems Lab at Michigan State University. He received his Ph.D. from University of Southern California and B.S. from Peking University. Before joining MSU, he was a postdoctoral scholar at Cornell University. His research lies at the intersection of mobile/edge/IoT systems and machine intelligence, spanning areas including On-Device/Edge AI, Automated Machine Learning (AutoML), Federated Learning, Systems for Machine Learning, Machine Learning for Systems, and AI for Health and Social Good. He has received a number of awards for his research. He is the 4th Place Winner of the 2019 Google MicroNet Challenge, the Third Place Winner of the 2017 NSF Hearables Challenge, and the champion of the 2016 NIH Pill Image Recognition Challenge. He is the recipient of seven best paper awards and nominations. He is also the recipient of the National Science Foundation CRII Award, Facebook Faculty Research Award, Amazon Machine Learning Research Award, and MSU Innovation of the Year Award.

    Host: Pierluigi Nuzzo and Bhaskar Krishnamachari

    Webcast: https://usc.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_p5OEJlPxQlakO4hqovuGEQ

    Location: Online

    WebCast Link: https://usc.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_p5OEJlPxQlakO4hqovuGEQ

    Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

    Contact: Talyia White

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  • Repeating EventMS CSCI/DSCI Drop-in Academic Advising

    Wed, Dec 01, 2021 @ 02:30 PM - 03:30 PM

    Thomas Lord Department of Computer Science

    Workshops & Infosessions


    Virtual Academic Advising Drop-in Hours for continuing MS students in CS or Data Science Programs will be available for the month of December. If you have a quick question that doesn't require a 20 minute appointment, please come to our drop in hours. Students may be placed into the waiting room upon arrival.

    Zoom access link for all sessions:

    ZOOM LINK SENT TO STUDENTS DIRECTLY. CHECK EMAIL FOR LINK.

    Wednesday, December 1st --- 10am -- 11am
    Wednesday, December 1st --- 2:30pm -- 3:30pm

    Wednesday, December 8th --- 10am -- 11am
    Wednesday, December 8th --- 2:30pm -- 3:30pm

    Wednesday, December 15th --- 10am -- 11am
    Wednesday, December 15th --- 2:30pm -- 3:30pm

    Location: Online

    Audiences: Graduate

    View All Dates

    Contact: USC Computer Science

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  • AME Seminar

    Wed, Dec 01, 2021 @ 03:30 PM - 04:30 PM

    Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering

    Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars


    Speaker: Emilie Dressaire, UCSB

    Talk Title: Pushing boundaries: flow in low permeability media

    Abstract: Generating and controlling fluid flow in low permeability environments is a challenge in natural and engineered systems. In this talk, I will discuss two studies involving the opening of fractures in a soft substrate and the clogging of microchannels.

    The injection of fluid in brittle elastic materials drive the formation of cracks. Besides, when the pressure is released, the fluid flows out of the crack, in a process called backflow. Using a model experiment, we characterize the growth of a disk-like crack that propagates upon injection of the fluid, and its collapse as the injection pressure is released. The viscous dissipation, elastic deformation, and toughness of the matrix are important physical parameters that control the fluid flow in the crack or blister. This strategy is commonly used in rocks of low permeability and could find applications in bioengineering.

    Yet the increase in permeability is only transient. A solution to avoid the closing of the crack formed by injection is to use suspensions of particles. However, the behavior of particles in confined systems remains mainly qualitative. I will discuss recent results obtained on the clogging of microchannels. When a suspension of particles flows in a microchannel, deposition and assembly can lead to the formation of a clog, followed by a stable aggregate of fixed porosity. I will present a model for the growth of the aggregate at the pore scale, which allows us to rationalize the evolution of the flow rate in networks of microchannels. Bridging the injection of fluid in elastic media with suspension dynamics is a promising route to advance printing in soft materials.

    Biography: Emilie Dressaire received a B.S. in Engineering from ESPCI, France, in 2005, and a Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from Harvard University in 2009. She joined the Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Department at NYU Tandon School of Engineering in 2014 and CNRS in 2017. She is now a faculty member in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at UCSB. She currently serves as a Member-at-Large on the Executive Committee of APS Division of Fluid Dynamics. Her research interests are centered around the areas of small scale fluid mechanics and soft matter physics, specifically focusing on interdisciplinary projects to develop bio-inspired methods to control and monitor fluid flows.

    Host: AME Department

    More Info: https://usc.zoom.us/j/97427241653?pwd=UGd2aXY2b3dsQkxMdzdvcnNBMjRJZz09

    Webcast: https://usc.zoom.us/j/97427241653?pwd=UGd2aXY2b3dsQkxMdzdvcnNBMjRJZz09

    Location: Seaver Science Library (SSL) - 202

    WebCast Link: https://usc.zoom.us/j/97427241653?pwd=UGd2aXY2b3dsQkxMdzdvcnNBMjRJZz09

    Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

    Contact: Tessa Yao

    Event Link: https://usc.zoom.us/j/97427241653?pwd=UGd2aXY2b3dsQkxMdzdvcnNBMjRJZz09

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  • Drop-In Q&A for Prospective Graduate Students

    Thu, Dec 02, 2021 @ 09:00 AM - 09:30 AM

    Viterbi School of Engineering Graduate Admission

    Workshops & Infosessions


    This webinar is designed for those that have specific questions they want answered. Questions will be submitted using the Q&A function and will be answered verbally by a USC Viterbi representative.

    WebCast Link: https://usc.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_a0cbNz_jQieaByFuoP32WQ

    Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

    Contact: William Schwerin

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  • [Theory Seminar] Vaggos Chatziafratis (Northwestern Unviersity) - Hierarchical Clustering: Recent Progress and Open Questions

    Thu, Dec 02, 2021 @ 10:30 AM - 12:00 PM

    Thomas Lord Department of Computer Science

    Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars


    Speaker: Vaggos Chatziafratis, Northwestern University

    Talk Title: Hierarchical Clustering: Recent Progress and Open Questions

    Abstract: Hierarchical Clustering is an important tool for unsupervised learning whose goal is to construct a hierarchical decomposition of a given dataset describing relationships at all levels of granularity simultaneously. Despite its long history, Hierarchical Clustering was underdeveloped from a theoretical perspective, partly because of a lack of suitable objectives and algorithms with guarantees. In this talk, I want to tell you about the recent progress in the area with an emphasis on approximation algorithms and hardness results, and also highlight some interesting open problems.

    Biography: Vaggos Chatziafratis' primary interests are in Algorithms and Machine Learning Theory. He is currently a postdoc at Northwestern and he will be a FODSI fellow at MIT and Northeastern starting January. He will also be joining UC Santa Cruz in Fall 2022 as an Assistant Professor.

    Before that, he was at Google Research in New York, where he was part of the Algorithms and Graph Mining teams. Prior to that, he received his Ph.D. in Computer Science at Stanford, advised by Tim Roughgarden and co-advised by Moses Charikar. He received a Diploma in EECS from the National Technical University of Athens, Greece.


    Host: Curtis Bechtel

    Location: Henry Salvatori Computer Science Center (SAL) - 213

    Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

    Contact: Assistant to CS chair

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  • Astani Civil and Environmental Engineering Seminar

    Thu, Dec 02, 2021 @ 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM

    Sonny Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering

    Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars


    Speaker: Kofi Christie, Postdoctoral Research Associate, Princeton University

    Talk Title: Sustainable membrane-based carbon mineralization

    Abstract: Please see attached abstract and bio.

    Host: Dr. Amy Childress

    Webcast: https://usc.zoom/j/99680049945? Meeting ID: 996 8004 9945 Passcode: 905716

    More Information: K. Christie-Abstract_Bio 12-02-2021.pdf

    Location: Michelson Center for Convergent Bioscience (MCB) - 101

    WebCast Link: https://usc.zoom/j/99680049945? Meeting ID: 996 8004 9945 Passcode: 905716

    Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

    Contact: Evangeline Reyes

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  • NL Seminar-Event Extraction and Reasoning in Multimedia News Data

    Thu, Dec 02, 2021 @ 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM

    Information Sciences Institute

    Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars


    Speaker: Manling Li, Univ of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

    Talk Title: Event Extraction and Reasoning in Multimedia News Data

    Abstract: Reminder: Meeting hosts only admit guests that they know to the Zoom meeting. Hence, you're highly encouraged to use your USC account to sign into Zoom.

    If you are an outside visitor, please inform us at nlg DASH seminar DASH host AT isi DOT edu beforehand so we'll be aware of your attendance and let you in.Event understanding is an essential ability for humans to acquire information. With the rise of multimedia, automated event understanding and narration require machines to not only obtain the local structures of events from multimedia data i.e., who, what, where, and when), but also performs global understanding and inference i.e., what is likely to happen, and why. However, current event understanding is text-only, local, and lacks reasoning. Real events that are multimedia, interconnected, and probabilistic. This talk will present Multimedia Event Extraction to extract events and their arguments from multimedia data, and use event knowledge to enhance multimedia pretraining models. Based on the extracted knowledge, I will introduce how to induce event schemas (knowledge of complex event patterns) by learning a temporal graph model. After that, I will talk about how to use event knowledge to support real applications, such as timeline summarization.

    Biography: Manling Li is a fourth year Ph.D. student at the Computer Science Department of University of Illinois Urbana Champaign. Manling has won the Best Demo Paper Award at ACL 20, the Best Demo Paper Award at NAACL 21, C.L. Dave and Jane W.S. Liu Award, and has been selected as Mavis Future Faculty Fellow. She is a recipient of the Microsoft Research PhD Fellowship. She has more than 30 publications on knowledge extraction and reasoning from multimedia data.

    Host: Jon May and Thamme Gowda

    More Info: https://nlg.isi.edu/nl-seminar/

    Webcast: https://youtu.be/MLITKOKIHY0

    Location: Information Science Institute (ISI) - Virtual Only

    WebCast Link: https://youtu.be/MLITKOKIHY0

    Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

    Contact: Pete Zamar

    Event Link: https://nlg.isi.edu/nl-seminar/

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  • Create a Neo-Bank Over Lunch With Finch! (Viterbi, Virtual)

    Thu, Dec 02, 2021 @ 01:00 PM - 02:00 PM

    Viterbi School of Engineering Career Connections

    Workshops & Infosessions


    Learn more about creating neo-bank from Finch's business leaders. We've created a hands-on experience to look over the app's customer journey so we can identify key points of traction, feedback. We're also going to chat about working for a start-up and current opportunities, both remote and based in NYC.

    RSVP for this virtual session on Viterbi Gateway.

    Finch democratizes investment access and empowers customers to make their money work for them! Finch is an all-in-one checking and investment account that lets customers earn investment returns by automatically investing their checking balance into a portfolio designed to match their unique risk profile. Finch further pushes the envelope by enabling customers instant access to their money when they need it (even the invested part!). Finch is a productive checking account that puts your money to work for you! Finch empowers you to achieve your full financial potential. Finch was selected as a 2019 TechCrunch Top Pick, and we were part of the 2019 Barclays Accelerator, powered by Techstars in New York. We are currently growing our team in New York.




    Q & A
    Are you interested in undergraduates, masters, or PhD?
    Everyone.
    What majors are you recruiting for?
    Computer Science, IT, Graphic Design and similar
    Can you offer Visa sponsorship?
    Yes.
    Are you willing to hire a student on CTP or OPT?
    Yes.
    What types of internships and full-time opportunities will be presented?
    Spring internship and full-time jobs.

    Location: Virtual Platform

    Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

    Contact: RTH 218 Viterbi Career Connections

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  • Repeating EventVirtual First-Year Admission Information Session

    Thu, Dec 02, 2021 @ 04:00 PM - 05:00 PM

    Viterbi School of Engineering Undergraduate Admission

    Workshops & Infosessions


    Our virtual information session is a live presentation from a USC Viterbi admission counselor designed for high school students and their family members to learn more about the USC Viterbi undergraduate experience. Our session will cover an overview of our undergraduate engineering programs, the application process, and more on student life. Guests will be able to ask questions and engage in further discussion toward the end of the session.

    Register here!

    Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

    View All Dates

    Contact: Viterbi Admission

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  • Drop-In Q&A for Prospective Graduate Students

    Thu, Dec 02, 2021 @ 04:00 PM - 04:30 PM

    Viterbi School of Engineering Graduate Admission

    Workshops & Infosessions


    This webinar is designed for those that have specific questions they want answered. Questions will be submitted using the Q&A function and will be answered verbally by a USC Viterbi representative.

    WebCast Link: https://usc.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_MYe4mGEpQGWUDZnivSKgNw

    Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

    Contact: William Schwerin

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  • CAIS++ A Showcase of Undergrad AI Projects

    Thu, Dec 02, 2021 @ 06:00 PM - 08:00 PM

    Thomas Lord Department of Computer Science

    Student Activity


    Hi,

    We are CAIS++, the undergraduate branch of USC's Center for Artificial Intelligence in Society (CAIS). Our mission is to advance AI for Social Good, and our group of 150+ students has worked with professors, startups, and community organizations to develop cutting-edge AI solutions for societal problems.

    We're inviting you to our Fall 2021 Projects Showcase on Thursday, December 2nd from 6:00-8:00 pm both in person and on Zoom (specifics below). Our student teams will be presenting the AI research projects that they have worked on this semester, along with some paper and method reviews.
    We will be recruiting new undergraduate members directly into our projects in Spring 2022, so coming to our showcase is a great way to learn about CAIS++ and see the type of work we do!
    Hope to see you there!

    Room: MCB 101
    Zoom link: tinyurl.com/F21SHOWCAIS

    Location: Michelson Center for Convergent Bioscience (MCB) - 101

    WebCast Link: tinyurl.com/F21SHOWCAIS

    Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

    Contact: USC Computer Science

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  • Prospective Graduate Student Webinar: Chat with a USC Rep

    Fri, Dec 03, 2021 @ 09:00 AM - 10:00 AM

    Viterbi School of Engineering Graduate Admission

    Workshops & Infosessions


    Online webinars are held throughout the year via Zoom and hosted by Viterbi School representatives. All that is needed to participate is a computer with internet access. Webinars are designed for prospective students to learn more about:

    Master's & Ph.D. Programs
    Application Requirements
    Tuition & Funding
    There will also be ample time for questions.

    Register

    WebCast Link: https://usc.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_VpuBLtevRYazKcD3C7P2Ow

    Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

    Contact: USC Viterbi Graduate Admission

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  • D.R.E.A.M. Pitch Industry Mentorship Panel

    Fri, Dec 03, 2021 @ 10:00 AM - 11:20 AM

    USC Viterbi School of Engineering

    University Calendar


    This panel features dream pitches from students with additive feedback from industry mentors from a variety of tech and destination companies. Please contact Elisabeth Arnold Weiss at arnolde@usc.edu if you would like to attend this event.

    D.R.E.A.M. (Direct Response to Engineers Aspirations from Mentors) is an initiative that leverages insights from industry mentors who directly respond to students dream pitches, an original leadership communication assignment in WRIT 340 where students create a vision for their future selves, align their efforts around purpose, and build a consistent character and identity in the context of growth, reinvention, and constant change. To achieve that vision, they design a detailed career roadmap which encourages adaptability and determination, frees up cognitive resources to embrace new opportunities, and instills mental flexibility, long-range thinking, and a sense of agency about the future.

    Location: Virtual (Zoom)

    Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

    Contact: Elisabeth Arnold Weiss

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  • PhD Thesis Proposal - Arka Sadhu

    Fri, Dec 03, 2021 @ 12:00 PM - 02:00 PM

    Thomas Lord Department of Computer Science

    University Calendar


    Ph.D. Thesis Proposal - Arka Sadhu

    Friday, Dec 3rd, 2021: 12pm-2pm

    Title: Grounding Language in Images and Videos

    Thesis Committee members: Prof. Ram Nevatia, Prof. Xiang Ren, Prof. Yan Liu, Prof. Stefanos Nikolaidis, Prof. Toby Mintz.

    Abstract: Language grounding in images and videos -- the task of associating linguistic symbols to perceptual experiences and actions -- is fundamental to developing multi-modal models which can understand and jointly reason over images, videos and text.
    It has garnered wide interest from multiple disciplines such as computer vision, natural language processing, and robotics. An essential element in this space involves formulating tasks that investigate a particular phenomenon inherent in image or video understanding in isolation, thereby encouraging the community to develop more robust models. In this thesis proposal, I will articulate four vision-language tasks developed during the course of my Ph.D., namely, grounding unseen words, spatio-temporal localization of entities in a video, video question-answering, and visual semantic role labeling in videos. For each of these tasks, I will further discuss the development of corresponding datasets, evaluation protocols, and model frameworks.

    Zoom Link: https://usc.zoom.us/j/92383912262?pwd=N25ETlRMVFRiWTlKdGxtN09UVHhlQT09

    WebCast Link: https://usc.zoom.us/j/92383912262?pwd=N25ETlRMVFRiWTlKdGxtN09UVHhlQT09

    Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

    Contact: Lizsl De Leon

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  • PhD Thesis Proposal - Chen-Yu Wei

    Fri, Dec 03, 2021 @ 01:00 PM - 02:30 PM

    Thomas Lord Department of Computer Science

    University Calendar


    Time: 1:00-2:30pm, December 3rd

    Committee: Haipeng Luo (host), Rahul Jain, David Kempe, Vatsal Sharan, Jiapeng Zhang

    Title: Robust and Adaptive Online Reinforcement Learning

    Abstract: Online reinforcement learning (RL) studies how an agent learns to behave in an unknown environment from scratch. In this thesis, I focus on the theoretical foundations of this learning paradigm, with emphasis on designing algorithms that are robust to the non-stationarity of the environment, where the non-stationarity may come from natural drift, adversarial manipulation, or the existence of other agents. While being robust, most of our algorithms are also "adaptive" at the same time in the sense that they do not sacrifice nice performance guarantees if the environment happens to be stationary. More broadly speaking, the performance of our algorithms automatically scale with some intrinsic properties that reflect the difficulty of the problem.

    For future work, I plan to characterize the fundamental limit of RL in large state space, a central topic in theoretical RL. We hope to answer the following questions: "what are the minimal assumptions to be made so that RL algorithms can find near-optimal policies with polynomial number of samples", and the similar question under the restriction of "polynomial computational time".

    WebCast Link: https://usc.zoom.us/j/96695544670?pwd=VnZJUzRLam9scVpHbFRTYUVmQlk4Zz09

    Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

    Contact: Lizsl De Leon

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  • Ming Hsieh Institute Seminar Series on Integrated Systems

    Fri, Dec 03, 2021 @ 02:00 PM - 03:30 PM

    Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering

    Conferences, Lectures, & Seminars


    Speaker: Jie Gu, Associate Professor, Northwestern University

    Talk Title: Exploring New Dimensions of CMOS Deep Learning Accelerators with Neural CPU Architecture and Compute-in-Memory Circuits

    Host: Mike Chen, Hossein Hashemi, Manuel Monge, Constantine Sideris

    More Information: MHI IS Seminar - Jie Gu_Flyer.pdf

    Location: Hughes Aircraft Electrical Engineering Center (EEB) - 132

    Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

    Contact: Jenny Lin

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