Logo: University of Southern California

2009

2009 In the News Archive


Geoffrey Spedding to Lead AME
December 24, 2009
The professor, who has been at the Viterbi School more than 25 years, will become chair of the Department of Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering January 10.
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<b>KABC-TV</b> Zooms In on USC Student Game Builders
December 16, 2009
Viterbi grad students like Erin Reynolds, game industry reps, and CS faculty are featured in a report on GamePipe Demo Day
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GamePipe Laboratory Holds Ninth Demo Day
December 15, 2009
Lab Director Mike Zyda introduced representatives of 16 game companies to 21 student game creations.
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First DNS Address Was ISI, <B>NPR</B> Interviewer Learns
December 15, 2009
Paul Mockapetris discusses his USC Information Sciences Institute work on the domain name system (DNS) of Internet addresses.
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Strength and Sustainability:
December 09, 2009
The transportation technology magazine Go! highlights the pioneering work of Astani Department Professor Yan Xiao, who created a new bamboo-based material for use in high-load bridges and other structures.
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Viterbi Students Help Build
December 08, 2009
The Federation of American Scientists hopes the 'serious game' will help high schoolers understand the immune system, VentureBeat reports.
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ISI SuperBots Star in <I>Servo Magazine</i> Feature
November 10, 2009
David Geer's GeerHead column offers a detailed look at Wei-Min Shen's "Polymorphic Robotics Lab, which is conducting research into self-reconfigurable, autonomous robots with capabilities derived in part from the study of insect and animal life."
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Viterbi School Associate Dean Profiled in <i>The New Yorker</i>
October 29, 2009
"Born in Belgrade, in what was then Yugoslavia, Maja Matarić originally wanted to study languages and art," begins a 5000-word feature entitled "Robots That Care." The ending: "But robotic interaction should not replace human interaction," she said. "It should only improve it."
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Innovator W. Daniel Hillis to Lead USC-based National Cancer Institute Research Center
October 26, 2009
Hillis, a research professor of engineering at the USC Viterbi School of Engineering and co-chair of Applied Minds Inc, is the principal investigator for a $16 million effort to bring non-medical scientific expertise to bear on oncology.
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Lessons of the Samoan Tsunami
October 05, 2009
Sophisticated warning systems are crucial, says Astani Department specialist Costas Synolakis in a WSJ opinion piece, but educating people in risk areas is equally important, and "the lesson that education saves lives has apparently been lost to emergency managers world-wide."
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October 02, 2009
Introduced by Daniel J. Epstein Department Chair James E. Moore, the President of Olin College of Engineering delivers the 2009 installment of the annual series of talks honoring the memory of system architecting pioneer Eberhardt Rechtin
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Viterbi School Robot Meets the Star of a Robot Movie
September 30, 2009
KTLA's Kurt the CyberGuy visits the USC Robotics Laboratory with Radha Mitchell, co-star of Surrogates, to talk about "the real life of robots."
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Astani Department Undergrad a Role Model in ASEE Magazine
September 17, 2009
Kristen Scudder is profiled and video-interviewed in the American Society For Engineering Education online and print publication eGFI, aimed at encouraging K-12 students to consider engineering as a career.
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Astani Department Chair Addresses Rash of Burst Water Mains in Los Angeles
September 17, 2009
Los Angeles Daily News: "'We have created surges of water on Mondays and Thursdays, (and) that has created new demands on our system and increased stresses on our pipes,' said Jean-Pierre Bardet, chairman of the University of Southern California department of civil and environmental engineering, and director of USC's Center on Megacities."
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Martin Gundersen Assists in
September 16, 2009
The Hsieh Department professor's role in the Catalyst Workshop, a DOD-funded effort to train scientists and engineers as screenwriter/directors, is explored in an L.A. Times feature about the first film to come out of the program.
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IMSC Teams With the Thornton School and KUSC on
September 16, 2009
As part of what Integrated Media Systems Center Director James Baker calls the convergence of radio and the Internet, students will submit proposals for multimedia projects centered on classical music for USC's top-ranked music station.
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<b>CACM</b> Looks at Viterbi Medical Nanobot Research
September 11, 2009
“The mechanisms of life operate at the nanoscale,” says Aristides Requicha, director of the [Computer Science Department's] Laboratory for Molecular Robotics. “If we build devices at their scale, we will be able to interact intimately with them.”
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Target:
September 04, 2009
P. Daniel Dapkus of the Hsieh Department and Professor of Chemistry Mark Thompson discuss the research plans for the Energy Frontiers Research Center for Emerging Materials for Solar Energy Conversion and Solid State Lighting, recently funded by the U.S. Department of Energy/ (Video)
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Google's Singularity University Reaches out to Epstein Department Innovator
September 03, 2009
AP reports: "An architect ... suggested the team get in touch with [the Viterbi School's] Behrokh Khoshnevis, who had developed a rapid prototyping technology that can be used to make walls. Khoshnevis agreed to work with the students as their chief technology officer."
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Paul Ronney offers perspectives on U.S. Energy future
August 28, 2009
In a 15-minute interview on Tech Talk with Craig Peterson, the AME professor discusses future fuels, vehicles, carbon dioxide limitation, wind power and much more, including strategies for effecting change. (podcast)
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<b> New York Times</b> Reports on Alan Willner’s Work with Hewlett-Packard
August 19, 2009
The New York Times article notes, "Alan E. Willner, an electrical engineer at the University of Southern California, is one of those academics (working with industry). He is an expert in photonics, using light photons instead of electrons to transmit information.”
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Viterbi School Computer Security Expert Explains Twitter Vulnerabilities on <b>Politico</b>
August 07, 2009
"'The goal of the attack is to bring service down so clients cannot get to it,' said Jelena Mirkovic, a computer scientist at USC’s Information Services Institute.'It is very, very difficult to tell whether A certain client is a human client or an [Internet bot].'"
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<b>L.A. Business Journal</b> Reports on New Viterbi M.S. Degrees
July 20, 2009
"'We’re responding to what we perceive are needs and demands,' said Dean Yannis Yortsos. 'We offer an immediate way for engineers out there to specialize in these new areas of economic growth.'"
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Viterbi BME Research Featured in <b>US News & World Report </b>
July 20, 2009
"'Our results show how much the mechanics of the body, and a given task, affect what the brain can or can't do,' said Francisco Valero-Cuevas of the Brain-Body Dynamics Lab at the University of Southern California, who led the research."
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ICT Director of Technology Awarded Major AI Honor
July 16, 2009
William Swartout, a research professor of computer science at the USC Viterbi School, has received the Robert S. Engelmore Memorial Lecture Award from the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence.
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Weeklong USC Workshop Welcomes Minorities to the World of Computing
July 15, 2009
A joint Viterbi School/College project directed by Priya Vashishta of the Mork Department reaches out to engage underrepresented communities.
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Epstein Department Grad Profiled in <i>El Pueblo</i>
July 09, 2009
"Brenton Guy: A Profile in Leadership" is front page news in the city employee newsletter for July.
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Kenneth Klein, BMEE ’82, elected USC Trustee
June 25, 2009
The namesake donor of the Klein Institute for Undergraduate Engineering Life, 2008 Viterbi School commencement keynoter and CEO/President of Wind River Systems Inc. is now a member of the university's governing board.
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June 18, 2009
"Chunqi Jiang at the University of Southern California and her colleagues have come up with a dental plasma torch. [She] reckoned that a cold plasma rich in oxygen ions would do the job of breaking up biofilm without harming the patient." -- The Economist
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<b>DrBicuspid.com</b> Shines a Light on Viterbi Pulse-Plasma Dental Probe
June 17, 2009
"Scanning electron microscopy showed complete destruction of endodontic biofilms inside a root canal after plasma treatment, according to Chunqi Jiang, a research assistant professor in USC's Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical Engineering."
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Viterbi School Games and Gamers Star at EC3
June 05, 2009
"This is a historic occasion," GamePipe's Mike Zyda said in NPR coverage of the Electronic Entertainment Expo. "This is the first time a student-built game has gone directly from class to sale." Besides Zyda, two CS students spoke about their game work.
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A Software Program for Aspiring Rock Stars Everywhere
May 25, 2009
Ching-Hua Chuan, Ph.D. alumna of Elaine Chew's Music Computation and Cognition Lab, is the subject of "The Great Gig," the cover story of the magazine of the Florida university where she now teaches.
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USC Videogame Builders Show Their Stuff on Evening News
May 13, 2009
A reporter from KABC-TV visited Tutor Hall, interviewing GamePipe Lab Director Mike Zyda and GamePipe students demonstrating their creations to scouts from an industry paying $80,000 starting salaries.
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<B>LA Times</b> on
April 01, 2009
"In the past, very talented kids would go into business school," said Yannis C. Yortsos. But now "they may go into engineering instead." ME senior Loni Iverson says she "became an engineer because of alternative energy."
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<b>Daily Trojan:</b> Students win video game competition
April 01, 2009
"A lot of people really liked our concept," said Computer Science senior Keith Co, one of the leaders of the GamePipe Team that created the prizewinning mobile game Reflection
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March 11, 2009
A Washington Post feature focuses on socially assistive robots: "That term was coined by Maja J. Mataric´, director of the Center for Robotics and Embedded Systems at the University of Southern California, and her research group."
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<i>BusinessWeek</i>:
March 09, 2009
"Students may resist geek studies. But they'll flock in for the opportunity to change the world," Vivek Wadhwa reported in BusinessWeek, after observing all of the excitement that was sparked, despite the snow, sleet and ice.
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Duke University National Survey Results
March 09, 2009
Full results of the newly released survey, conducted by Duke University, on American attitudes toward engineering and engineering challenges.
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Astani Department Surfer-Scientist Speaks Out on Artificial Reefs and Coastal Protection
March 05, 2009
Jose Borrero was featured on the popular San Diego Sports Talk Station XTRA (1360 AM) in two consecutive segments, discussing what people should and shouldn't do to Southern California beaches.
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<i>Proto Magazine</i> focuses on
February 24, 2009
"Bandit II is the poster boy for 'socially assistive' robots, a term coined by his creators, the University of Southern California's Maja Mataric´ and her team."
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<b>Fox 11 News</b>: USC Students'
February 24, 2009
Reporter Phil Shuman interviews CS grad student James Pita and others about their CREATE-funded security software, which is now in routine use at Los Angeles International Airport.
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Student team to test lunar lander for flight in March
February 18, 2009
"The ambitions of eight [engineering] students are about to take off in early March with the first free flight test of their prototype lunar lander," reports the Daily Trojan.
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Taking Control of Prosthetic Arms
February 13, 2009
Gerald E. Loeb's JAMA commentary on a new design for brain-controlled prostheses was widely quoted in the extensive news coverage of the device, including a story in the The New York Times.
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CNN Highlights Gerald Loeb's Viterbi School Hand Research
February 03, 2009
"Fingerprints evolved to augment sensory function while exploring objects. They're not just there for the benefit of the FBI," Loeb said, discussing his work creating better prostheses.
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Daily Trojan Features Engineers Without Borders Water Project
February 02, 2009
The Viterbi School chapter says work on a new water system in two small Honduran towns could begin this spring.
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Theodore Tsotsis Invited Speaker at University of Houston's Luss Lectures
January 30, 2009
The Viterbi School's Robert E. Vivian Professor of Energy Resources and Chair of the Mork Family Department of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science spoke and participated in a two-day program honoring U-H's Dan Luss
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UPI Features EE Team's Groundbreaking Brain Nanocircuit Project
January 28, 2009
A team of electrical engineers at USC is applying nanocarbon technology to synthesize neural activity in the brain in a three-year, NSF-funded investigation.
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Viterbi School Faculty Member and Former Student Speak Out on L.A. Light Rail Design Safety
January 27, 2009
In a L.A. Daily News op-ed, Professor Najmedin Meshkati and recent grad Robert "BJ" Takushi criticize the MTA for "continuing to squander millions of dollars" on legal maneuvers instead of spending the money on improving safety.
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ISE Helps Hospital Surgical Department Improve On-Time Record
January 17, 2009
"Riverside County's largest hospital is performing about 40 more surgeries a month based on production principles learned last year during participation in a University of Southern California Viterbi School of Engineering project," reports the Riverside Press-Enterprise
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Viterbi Grad Student-Developed iPhone App Is iTunes Bestseller
January 15, 2009
iPhone users are listening to more than 4000 radio stations thanks to work by Jin Pei Li (EE), Lecturer Dr. Marco Papa, Raed Shomali (CS) and Chaitanya Ramavajjala (CS).
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Viterbi Experts Bring Air Safety Message to New Zealand
January 06, 2009
The lessons of classes conducted in Auckland by Mike Barr and Paul Krivonos of the USC Aviation Safety and Security Program make up an entire issue of Safety Link magazine.
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Nuevo acuerdo de ingeniería UNAM—USC
January 05, 2009
The Spanish-language daily La Opinión reports on the new collaboration between the Viterbi School and the largest and oldest university in Mexico initiated by BME's professor Francisco Valero Cuevas.
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Epstein Department Faculty and Students Help Surgery Departments Cut Turnover Time.
January 04, 2009
"Engineering professors and students at the University of Southern California are applying Southwest Airlines quality improvement concepts to cut operating room turnover times in California," Outpatient Surgery reports, interviewing David Belson.
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