Friday, November 2, 2012

Nov 2, 2012 Review


Abstract

Morning presentations
8:30 Continental breakfast
9:00 Welcome
9:05 Content-centric message forwarding in ad-hoc networks, Rene Cruz, UCSD
9:33 Ultra-low-power radios for miniaturized wireless systems, Patrick Mercier, UCSD
10:01 Cloud mobile media: opportunities and challenges, Sujit Dey, UCSD
10:29 Break
10:44 Qualcomm Research: Radios and a whole lot more, Charles Bergan, Qualcomm
11:12 Real-time communication over unreliable wireless channels, P.R. Kumar, Texas A&M
11:40 Device-to-device and relay-enhanced cellular architecture - Larry Milstein
12:00 Lunch


Afternoon project reviews
1:00 Switching-mode power amplifiers for multiband applications - Peter Asbeck
1:20 Enabling circuits for wideband wireless communications - Ian Galton
1:40 Towards enabling personalized and interactive video services - Sujit Dey
2:00 Next generation cognitive networks - Bhaskar Rao
2:20 Break
2:30 1-minute poster overviews
3:00 Posters and demos
3:50 Reception


Friday, October 26, 2012

Towards Computational Sensing through large number of Networked Sensors

Prof. Lin Zhang

Host: Prof. Young-Han Kim

Abstract
Today, Internet users and networked sensors generate hundreds of gigabytes of data every minute, yet people are still feeling lost in an ocean of data, sometimes being starved of knowledge. In this talk, I will try to convince the audience, by sharing some experimental results in the systems the we developed and deployed in the past few years, that a surprisingly better understanding of the reality could be attained by performing state-of-art algorithms over large volume of data collected through networked sensors.


I will show two cases: one is a structure safety sensing system in the Tsinghua EE Hall and the other is a larger scale taxi-based sensing system in Beijing. Both cases show the power of cross-domain data correlation and analysis. Then, the idea of people-in-the-loop sensing will be presented by elaborating a smart building control experiment that is now conducted in the EE Halls on the Tsinghua and UC Berkeley campuses.
Finally, I will argue that a united theoretical fr [More...]

Bio
Lin Zhang received all his degrees from Tsinghua University in Beijing (B.Sc. '98, M.Sc. '01, Ph.D. '06) and is currently an associate professor at Tsinghua University and a visiting associate professor at Stanford University. His current research focuses on wireless sensor networks, distributed data processing, and information theory. He is a co-author of more than 40 peer-reviewed technical papers and five U.S. or Chinese patents applications. Lin and his team were also the winner of IEEE/ACM SenSys 2010 Best Demo Awards.




In 2006 Lin led a 2008 Beijing Olympic Stadium (the "Bird's Nest”) structural security surveillance project, which deployed more than 400 wireless temperature and tension sensors across the stadium's steel support structure and dome. The system adopted a flexible spectrum sensing and adaptive multi-hop routing algorithm to overcome strong radio interference and long-distance transmission channel-fading, and played a critical role in the construction of the st [More...]

Thursday, October 25, 2012

Three Open Problems in Network Communication

Michael Langberg

Abstract
In this talk I will discuss three natural open questions in the context of multi-source/ multi-terminal network communication via network coding. (a) What is the maximum loss in communication rate experienced from removing a single unit capacity edge from a given network? (b) What is the maximum loss in rate when insisting on zero error communication as opposed to vanishing decoding error? (c) What is the maximum loss in rate when comparing the communication of source information that is ``almost' independent to that of independent source information?




Recent results including intriguing connections between the three questions will be presented.




Based on joint work with Michelle Effros.
Bio
Michael Langberg is an Associate Professor in the Mathematics and Computer Science department at the Open University of Israel. Previously, between 2003 and 2006, he was a postdoctoral scholar in the Computer Science and Electrical Engineering departments at the California Institute of Technology. He received his B.Sc. in mathematics and computer science from Tel-Aviv University in 1996, and his M.Sc. and Ph.D. in computer science from the Weizmann Institute of Science in 1998 and 2003 respectively.




Prof. Langberg's research is in the fields of Information Theory and Theoretical Computer Science. His work focuses on the design and analysis of algorithms for combinatorial problems; emphasizing on algorithmic and combinatorial aspects of Information Theory, and on probabilistic methods in combinatorics.

Thursday, October 4, 2012

Queue-Size Scaling in Switched Networks

Devavrat Shah

Abstract
We consider a switched (queueing) network in which there are constraints on which queues may be served simultaneously; such networks have been used to effectively model input-queued switches, wireless networks and more recently data-centers. The scheduling policy for such a network specifies which queues to serve at any point in time, based on the current state or past history of the system. As the main result, we shall discuss a new class of online scheduling policies that achieve optimal scaling for average queue-size for a class of switched networks including input-queued switches. Time permitting, we shall discuss various exciting open questions in the domain of stochastic networks.




This is based on joint work with Neil Walton (Univ of Amsterdam) and Yuan Zhong (MIT).
Bio
Devavrat Shah is currently a Jamieson associate professor with the department of electrical engineering and computer science, MIT. He is a member of the Laboratory for Information and Decision Systems (LIDS) and Operations Research Center (ORC). His research focus is on theory of large complex networks which includes network algorithms and statistical inference. He has received 2008 ACM Sigmetrics Rising Star Award and 2010 Erlang Prize from the Applied Probability Society of INFORMS. He currently serves as an associate editor of Operations Research, Queueing Systems and IEEE Transactions on Information Theory.

Tuesday, August 14, 2012

Long Range Dependent Markov Models

Barlas Oguz

Abstract
We discuss countable state Markov chains as a flexible class of models for long range dependent sources. We state sufficient conditions under which an instantaneous function of a long range dependent Markov chain has the same Hurst index as the underlying chain. We discuss several applications of the theorem in the fields of information theory, queuing networks, and finance.
Bio
Barlas Oguz graduated from Bilkent University in 2007 where he completed his undergraduate studies in Electrical Engineering. He went on to continue his studies at the University of California Berkeley, where he is currently finalizing his PhD. His current research interests include probability theory and stochastic processes with applications in information theory and communication networks. Specifically, he is developing new models for network traffic and information sources that exhibit heavy dependence over time and investigating the consequences of this dependence in contrast to more traditional models.

Friday, June 15, 2012

On q-ary Antipodal Matchings and Applications

Gadiel Seroussi

Abstract
We define a q-ary antipodal matching to be a perfect matching in the bipartite graph with vertices corresponding to words of length m over the integer alphabet Q={0,1,...,q-1} wherein the left and right vertices are those with respective component sums greater and smaller than m(q-1)/2, and wherein two
vertices are connected by an edge if one of the corresponding words dominates the other. We present two different constructions of efficiently computable q-ary antipodal matchings. We then show how such matchings can be used for encoding arbitrary data into n x n arrays over the alphabet Q all of whose row and column sums are at most n(q-1)/2. Such encoders might be useful for mitigating parasitic currents in a next generation memory technology based on crossbar arrays of resistive devices.




(Joint work with Erik Ordentlich and Ronny Roth.)
Bio
Dr. Gadiel Seroussi received his B.Sc. degree in Electrical Engineering, and his M.Sc. and D.Sc. degrees in Computer Science from Technion – Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, Israel, in 1977, 1979, and 1981,respectively. From 1981 to 1987 he was with the faculty of the Computer Science Department at Technion. During the 1982--1983 academic year, he was a Postdoctoral Fellow at the IBM T.J. Watson Research Center, Yorktown Heights, NY. From 1986 to 1988 he was a Senior Research Scientist at Cyclotomics Inc., Berkeley, CA. Since 1988 he has been with Hewlett--Packard Laboratories, Palo Alto, California, where he founded the Information Theory Research Group and was its director until 2005. During the 2005--2006 academic year, he was Associate Director of the Mathematical Sciences Research Institute in Berkeley, California. Since 2004, he has held a joint appointment in Computer Science and Electrical Engineering at Universidad de la Rep'ublica, Montevideo, Uruguay. He is a co-auth [More...]

Monday, June 11, 2012

Data Compression and Secrecy

Prakash Narayan

Abstract
The multiterminal data compression problem of attaining omniscience and the secrecy problems of secret key generation and secure computing might suggest contrasting communication requirements. In fact, they are innately coupled. In this talk, we discuss connections between omniscience attainment by multiple terminals which observe separate but correlated signals, and secret key generation and secure function computation by those terminals, all in a distributed manner. Simple constructive schemes that are motivated by these connections will be described for elementary models.
The talk is based on joint works with Imre Csiszár, Sirin Nitinawarat, Himanshu Tyagi and Chunxuan Ye.
Bio
Prakash Narayan received the Bachelor of Technology degree in Electrical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras in 1976, and the M.S. and D.Sc. degrees in Systems Science and Mathematics, and Electrical Engineering, respectively, from Washington University, St. Louis, MO, in 1978 and 1981.
He is Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Maryland, College Park, with a joint appointment at the Institute for Systems Research. His research interests are in multiuser information theory, communication theory, communication networks, cryptography, and information theory and statistics.
He has held visiting appointments at ETH, Zurich; the Technion, Haifa; the Renyi Institute of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest; the University of Bielefeld; the Institute of Biomedical Engineering (formerly LADSEB), Padova; and the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore.
Narayan has served as Associate Editor for Shannon Theory for the IEEE Transact [More...]

Monday, April 30, 2012

On Source-Channel Communication in Networks

Jun Chen

Abstract
This talk is divided into two parts. In the first part of this talk, I will present several results on the optimality and approximate optimality of the source-channel separation architecture for lossy source coding in general networks. These results are shown without explicitly characterizing the achievable joint source-channel coding distortion region or the achievable separation-based coding distortion region. The second part of this talk is devoted to the problem of sending two correlated vector Gaussian sources over a bandwidth matched two-user scalar Gaussian broadcast channel, where each receiver wishes to reconstruct its target source under a covariance distortion constraint. I will present a lower bound on the optimal tradeoff between the transmit power and the achievable reconstruction distortion pair. The derivation of this lower bound is based on a new bounding technique which involves the introduction of appropriate remote sources. Furthermore, it is shown that this lower b [More...]

Bio
Jun Chen received the B.E. degree with honors in
communication engineering from Shanghai Jiao Tong University,
Shanghai, China, in 2001 and the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical
and computer engineering from Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, in 2004
and 2006, respectively. He was a Postdoctoral Research Associate in
the Coordinated Science Laboratory at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL, from 2005 to 2006, and a Postdoctoral Fellow at the IBM Thomas J. Watson Research Center, Yorktown Heights, NY, from 2006 to 2007. He is currently an Assistant Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada. He holds the Barber-Gennum Chair in Information Technology. His research interests include information theory, wireless communications, and signal processing. He received several awards for his research, including the Josef Raviv Memorial Postdoctoral Fellowship (2006), the Early Research Award from the Province of Ontari [More...]

Monday, April 2, 2012

On the Development of Tools for System Design

Alessandro Pinto, Systems Department, United Technologies Research Center

Host: Lorenzo Coviello

Abstract
The design of large systems is divided into vertical refinement steps. The system is also partitioned into sub-systems that are designed in isolation and integrated in the prototyping and testing phase. Many design projects, commercial and military, incur in cost and schedule overruns mainly caused by errors discovered during testing. The correction of such errors typically requires undergoing long re-design cycles. The use of an appropriate methodology supported by tools can help avoiding these problems.
In this talk, we present a language for the contract-based specification of components and product families and we show how architectures can be checked for correctness. The language allows capturing static properties that are the ones typically considered in the preliminary design of systems. We then present methods to design and verify systems when dynamics and uncertainty are taken into account.

Given the expressiveness required to capture realistic systems, analysis methods d [More...]

Bio
Alessandro Pinto is a researcher in the Systems Department at the United Technologies Research Center (UTRC) Inc., Berkeley, California. His research interests are in the area of computer aided design for cyber-physical systems with particular emphasis on autonomous systems. He received a Ph.D. degree in Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences from the University of California at Berkeley in 2008, and a M.S. degree in Electrical Engineering in 2003 from the same University. He holds a Laurea degree from the University of Rome “La Sapienza”. From 1999 to 2001, he was a consultant at Ericsson Lab Italy in Rome, Italy, working on the design of system-on-chips and wireless access networks.

Wednesday, December 7, 2011

Photonics based Telemedicine Technologies toward Smart Global Health Systems

Aydogan Ozcan, Bioengineering Department, California NanoSystems Institute, UCLA

Host: Mehmet Parlak

Abstract
Today there are more than 5 billion cell-phone users in the world, and the majority of these cellphones are being used in the developing parts of the world. This massive volume of wireless phone communication brings an enormous cost-reduction to cellphones despite their sophisticated hardware and software capabilities. Quite importantly, most of these existing cellphones are also already equipped with advanced digital imaging and sensing platforms that can be utilized for various health monitoring applications. This impressive advancement is one of the central building blocks of the emerging fields of Telemedicine and Wireless Health. The success of these fields will surely increase the quality of health care and reduce the insurance costs in developed countries like the United States, however, their most important and immediate impact will be to provide breakthrough technological solutions to various Global Health Problems including infectious diseases such as HIV, TB or malaria. Spec [More...]

Bio
Dr. Aydogan Ozcan received his Ph.D. degree at Stanford University Electrical Engineering Department in 2005. After a short post-doctoral fellowship at Stanford University, he is appointed as a Research Faculty Member at Harvard Medical School, Wellman Center for Photomedicine in 2006. Dr. Ozcan joined UCLA in the summer of 2007, where he is currently an Associate Professor leading the Bio- and Nano-Photonics Laboratory at the Electrical Engineering and Bioengineering Departments. Dr. Ozcan holds 17 issued patents and another 12 pending patent applications for his inventions in nanoscopy, wide-field imaging, lensless imaging, nonlinear optics, fiber optics, and optical coherence tomography. Dr. Ozcan is also the author of one book and the co-author of more than 200 peer reviewed research articles in major scientific journals and conferences. In addition, Dr. Ozcan is the founder and a member of the Board of Directors of Microskia Inc., and is a member of the program committee of SPIE P [More...]

Friday, November 4, 2011

Nov 4, 2011 Review






Agenda

Friday, May 27, 2011

Cascades in Networks and Aggregate Volatility

Prof. Alireza Tahbaz-Salehi

Host: Lorenzo Coviello

Abstract
one of the main features of all modern economies is the very high level of interconnectivity between different firms and sectors, as a firm's production depends on a rich array of intermediate goods, as well as financial and other services provided by different sectors in the economy. In this talk, I provide a general framework for the study of cascade effects created by such interconnections. Focusing on a competitive multi-sector economy where firms use outputs of other sectors as intermediate goods for production, I show how structural properties of the network determine whether aggregate volatility vanishes as the number of sectors increases, as well as the rate at which this happens. Our main results characterize how aggregate volatility is related to first- and higher-order interconnections between different sectors. Such a characterization enables us to determine which supply networks are more conducive to propagation of technological shocks across the economy, and thus, lead to [More...]

Bio
Alireza Tahbaz-Salehi is a Post-doctoral Associate at the Laboratory for Information and Decision Systems (LIDS), Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), where he works with Professors Daron Acemoglu and Asuman Ozdaglar. Alireza received his Ph.D. in Electrical and Systems Engineering from University of Pennsylvania in 2009, under the supervision of Professor Ali Jadbabaie. In Fall 2011, he will be joining the Columbia Graduate School of Business as an Assistant Professor of Decision, Risk and Operations.
His research interests include theoretical and applied microeconomics, social and economic networks, decision theory and game theory.

Tuesday, April 19, 2011

Reducing Beamformer Selection Complexity in Multiple Antenna Systems

Prof. David J. Love, Purdue University

Host: Eitan Yaakobi

Abstract
beamforming is a critical spatial processing technique employed in a variety of multiple antenna wireless applications. A major issue is properly designing the beamforming vector, especially when faced with imperfect channel knowledge assumptions. In this talk, we deal with two specific beamforming design scenarios. The first addresses the problem of choosing a beamforming vector using finite rate feedback with a large number of antennas. Because the beamformer search complexity grows exponentially with the number of antennas, we propose new reduced complexity techniques based on trellis coded line packing. The second addresses the problem of beamforming in mmWave applications. In this scenario, maintaining a large beamforming gain is critical to prevent link outage. However, it is impractical to sound the entire channel matrix. To deal with this we propose, a new multiphase beamforming alignment algorithm.
Bio
David J. Love received the B.S. (with highest honors), M.S.E., and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from the University of Texas at Austin in 2000, 2002, and 2004, respectively. Since August 2004, he has been with the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, where he is now an Associate Professor. Dr. Love currently serves as an Associate Editor for the IEEE Transactions on Signal Processing and the IEEE Transactions on Communications. He has also served as a guest editor for special issues of the IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications and the EURASIP Journal on Wireless Communications and Networking. His research interests are in the design and analysis of communication systems, MIMO array processing, and array processing for medical imaging. Dr. Love is a Senior Member of the IEEE. Along with co-authors, he was awarded the 2009 IEEE Transactions on Vehicular Technology Jack Neubauer Memorial Award for the best systems pape [More...]

Friday, April 8, 2011

MILLIMETER-WAVE MOBILE BROADBAND – UNLEASHING THE 3–300 GHz SPECTRUM FOR MOBILE COMMUNICATION

ZHOUYUE PI : Director, Samsung R&D Center, Dallas, Texas
FAROOQ KHAN : Senior Director, Samsung R&D Center, Dallas, Texas

Abstract
Almost all cellular mobile communications -- including first generation analog systems, second generation digital systems, third generation WCDMA systems and fourth generation OFDMA systems -- use an Ultra High Frequency (UHF) band of radio spectrum with frequencies in the range of 300MHz-3GHz. This band of spectrum is becoming increasingly crowded due to spectacular growth in mobile data services. The portion of the RF spectrum above 3GHz has been largely unexploited for commercial mobile applications. In this tutorial, we discuss propagation and device technology challenges associated with this band, as well as its unique advantages such as spectrum availability and small component sizes for mobile applications. We also present a practical millimeter-wave mobile broadband (MMB) system that can achieve multi-Gbps data communications in an urban environment.

Download presentation

Tuesday, March 8, 2011

Emerging ADCs

Prof. Un-Ku Moon, Oregon State University

Host: Nevena Rakuljic

Abstract
Most analog IC designers and students are drawn to ADCs. While some ADC realizations have had a lasting impact, examples including pipelined ADCs with digital redundancy, flash ADCs with folding and interpolation, and multi-bit delta-sigma modulators with dynamic element matching, there are many more recent and emerging ADC design techniques that are receiving much attention and also gaining momentum in some areas. Many of these ideas are showered with doubts and honest criticism. However, we may also be entering a new era where a few of these developments would help resolve the tough submicron scaling challenge that analog designers face today. This talk will summarize and ponder the impact of a few selective as well as random slices of these emerging ADC designs.
Bio
Prof. Un-Ku Moon has been with the Oregon State University since 1998. Prior to that, he was with Bell Labs 1988-1989 and 1994-1998. He received a bachelor's degree from the University of Washington, a master's degree from Cornell University, and a Ph.D. from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Prof. Moon's past work includes highly linear and tunable continuous-time filters (Ph.D. work), telecommunication circuits including timing recovery and analog-to-digital converters (a bit of Ph.D. work), frequency synthesizers, and switched-capacitor circuits. His current research interests include high-frequency switched-capacitor filters, low-voltage switched-capacitor circuits, high-resolution and oversampling data converters, and highly linear continuous-time filters.

Monday, February 28, 2011

Workshop on SILICON AND SYSTEMS IN PACKAGE TECHNOLOGIES FOR RF TRANSMISSION MODULES.

Dr. Antonino Scuderi, ST Microelectronics

Host: Arline Allen

Abstract
This workshop will present the latest market trends, design concepts and developments in RF module/RFIC power amplifiers as well as base-stations covering the RF system requirements for multi-mode and multiband power amplifiers and FEM from a silicon-maker perspective.
Despite the market domain of GaAs and InGap HBT for RF PAs, silicon-based solutions are mature enough to compete against other non-silicon technologies and could be used widely in handheld cell-phones exploiting some new developments in device technologies and circuit solutions, as well as system-level improvements. Challenges remain in terms of output power, efficiency, linearity, mismatch handling, bias and control techniques, and multimode and multiband capability. All of them will be analyzed and, after a brief review of basic concepts, the workshop will present and discuss technology and circuital mitigation techniques, as well as the advantages and disadvantages of CMOS and silicon-based power amplifiers. New devi [More...]

Bio
Antonino Scuderi was born in Catania, Italy, in 1972. He received the Laurea degree in electronics engineering (cum laude) from the University of Catania, Catania, Italy, in 1997. From 1999 to 2005, he was with the Radio Frequency Advanced Design Center (RF-ADC), a joint research center supported by the University of Catania and STMicroelectronics, where he managed the STMicroelectronics RF PA advanced design team. In 2006 he received the Ph.D. degree in electronics and automation engineering at the University of Catania. Since 2006 he has been with STMicroelectronics, where he served as manager of RF power developments until 2009. Currently, he is the senior manager of microsystems developments in the fields of power RF, power compounds, flexible electronics and healthcare. He is the author of 38 scientific papers and holds eight industrial patents.

Thursday, February 17, 2011

Microelectronics: A Changing Playing Field with Many R&D Opportunities.

Dr. Andreia Cathelin, ST Microelectronics

Host: Arline Allen

Abstract
The semiconductor business landscape evolution
ST overview and strategy
R&D focus areas
Bio
Andreia Cathelin (M’04) started her electronic studies at the Polytechnic Institute of Bucarest, Romania and graduated from the Institut Supérieur d’Electronique du Nord (ISEN), Lille, France in 1994. In 1998, she received the Ph. D. degree from IEMNISEN, Lille, France regarding the work on a fully-integrated BiCMOS low power – low voltage FMRDS receiver.
From 1997 till 1998, she was with Info Technologies, Gradignan, France, working on analog and RF communications design. Since 1998, she has been with ST Microelectronics, Crolles, France, now in the Technology R&D, Central CAD and Design Solutions, Innovation & External Research design team.
Andreia is a senior design expert and her major fields of interest are RF and mmW systems for wireless communications, MEMS devices co-integration and SOI technologies. She is a member of the Technical Program Committee of ISSCC, VLSI Symposium on Circuits and ESSCIRC. She is member of the experts’ team of the AERES (French Evaluation A [More...]

Friday, February 4, 2011

Band Edge Filters: Characteristics and Performance in Carrier and Symbol Synchronization.

Prof. fred harris, San Diego State University

Host: Arline Allen

Abstract
It is amazing how many papers on radio systems, networks, error correcting codes, and related topics contain a version of the sentence “Let’s assume the system is synchronized.” Alright, let’s assume the system is synchronized. But I have a few questions: Who did it? How did they do it? Who will do it in the next decades as many of us retire from the field? An important one is; where are they acquiring the skills required to negotiate and navigate the future physical layers? This presentation deals with one aspect of synchronization, the frequency and phase alignment the digital down converter sinusoid with the frequency and phase of the suppressed carrier underlying the received modulated signal.
The second tier processing task performed by a radio receiver is that of estimating the vector of unknown parameters associated with its received signal. These estimators fail when the received signal has a significant unknown frequency offset. Hence, when a frequency offset does exi [More...]

Bio
I hold the Signal Processing Chair of the Communication Systems and Signal Processing Institute at San Diego State University where since 1967 I have taught courses in Digital Signal Processing and Communication Systems. I hold 17 patents on digital receiver and DSP technology and lecture throughout the world on DSP applications. I consult for organizations requiring high performance, cost effective DSP solutions. I am an adjunct member of the IDA-Princeton Center for Communications Research.
I have written over 170 journal and conference papers, the most well known being my 1978 paper “On the use of Windows for Harmonic Analysis with the Discrete Fourier Transform”. I am the author of the book Multirate Signal Processing for Communication Systems and I have contributed to a number of other books on DSP applications including the “Source Coding” chapter in Bernard Sklar’s 1988 book, Digital Communications and the “Multirate FIR Filters for Interpolation and Resampling” [More...]

Friday, January 28, 2011

Reverse Engineering the Web and How to Make Money from it.

Dr. Behnam Rezaei, NetSeer CTO and co-founder

Host: Ehsan Ardestanizadeh

Abstract
the Internet has enabled the emergence of global-scale information networks, such as the world wide web and the various social media and ecommerce transaction portals. These overlay networks provide an unprecedented venue for information sharing, collaboration, and competition for ideas and attention. For the first time, information scientists, sociologists, economists, and engineers have the opportunity to investigate and manipulate a purely organic information system, as mysterious and complex as any physical system. It provides a rich platform for both analysis and design. A fertile collaborative field has developed involving information theory, thermodynamics and statistical physics, and social sciences. We will discuss recent joint work on the distillation of knowledge from large scale processing of content on the web that lead to foundations of NetSeer Inc., an internet advertisement company in silicon valley with strategic partnerships with Google and Yahoo!. We will overview cu [More...]

Bio
Behnam A. Rezaei received his B.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from Sharif, and UCLA, respectively. His research topics include mining and modeling of complex systems and information networks. he currently leads NetSeer's team in the design and implementation of its technological innovations as Founder/CTO and is the primary inventor of the company's ten patent applications to date. Prior to founding NetSeer, Behnam was a lead researcher on several projects in spam filtering, identification of the structure and dynamics in large-scale biological networks, and the development of P2P network clients.

Saturday, January 1, 2011

On Equivalence, Dependence, and Delay: Results from a Simple Tool for Information Theory

Michelle Effros

Abstract
The expansion of information theory from the study of very small networks to the understanding of extremely large networks is often viewed as both critically important and insurmountably difficult. Nonetheless, many general properties of large networks can be derived using very simple tools. This talk focuses on a reduction strategy borrowed from CS theory, exploring a few simple applications and their implications for understanding the nature of noise, the impact of dependence, and the consequences of delay for reliable communications in large (and small) communication networks.
Bio
Michelle Effros received the B.S. degree with distinction in 1989, the M.S. degree in 1990, and the Ph.D. degree in 1994, all in electrical engineering from Stanford University. During the summers of 1988 and 1989 she worked at Hughes Aircraft Company, researching modulation schemes, real-time implementations of fast data rate error-correction schemes, and future applications for fiber optics in space technology.




She is currently Professor of Electrical Engineering at the California Institute of Technology; from 1994 - 2000 she was Assistant Professor of Electrical Engineering; and from 2000 - 2005, Associate Professor. Her research interests include information theory, data compression, communications, pattern recognition, speech recognition, and image processing.




Professor Effros received Stanford's Frederick Emmons Terman Engineering Scholastic Award (for excellence in engineering) in 1989, the Hughes Masters Full-Study Fellowship in 1989, the National Science Foundation G [More...]