------------------------------------------------------------------------ Undergraduate Newsletter for September, 2004 ---------------------------------------------- Dear CS Student: Welcome back to BU and a new school year! As usual, I wish the summer had gone on for a few more weeks, but I am looking forward to the new semester and its challenges, and I hope you are too. Before I proceed to the details of new courses, changes to the Fall schedule, and so on, I would like to first of all tell you that starting September 2004 I will be stepping down from my role as Director of Undergraduate Studies in CS; replacing me will be Associate Professor Margrit Betke. Prof. Betke received her PhD at MIT in 1995 and has been a member of BU's Computer Science Department since 2000. Her research area is computer vision. She is interested in biomedical imaging, human-computer interfaces for rehabilitation, video analysis of animals, and intelligent vehicles, and has worked with undergraduate research assistants in these areas. She teaches Introduction to Artificial Intelligence (CS 440) and Image and Video Computing (CS 585). I will be moving on to the position of Associate Chairman of CS, and will of course continue to be involved and interested in undergraduate issues, as well as continuing to be an Undergraduate Advisor in the CAS Advising Office, in CAS 105 (Fall hours: F 8:40-9:40, 11-2). It was an honor to work with so many talented students over the years as DUS for the department, and I look forward to working with Margrit as she brings her characteristic cheerful enthusiasm and competence to her new duties. Please join with me in wishing her well, and take advantage of the new opportunities she will bring to your attention this year. Wayne Snyder -------------------------------------------------------------------- Dear CS Student, BU's Computer Science Department is a wonderful community of students, staff, faculty, and alumni. When I joined the Department four years ago, I felt at home in this community. I am now very happy and honored to serve as its Director of Undergraduate Studies and hope to bring a fresh perspective to the undergraduate program. In the upcoming semester my focus will be to get to know you and your ideas and needs. Please stop by my office (MCS 286). My hours during the fall semester are Tuesdays 4-5, Wednesdays 4-5:30, and Thursdays 2-4. Cheers, Margrit Betke -------------------------------------------------------------------- Now on to the other news, in approximate order of urgency.... New Courses ----------- We are pleased to offer four new courses this semester: CS 107 -- Computational Systems ------------------------------- Instructor: Mark Crovella Time: TR 2-3:30 Place: MCS B33 As part of our continuing effort to develop new courses for non-majors, Professor Mark Crovella has developed a new course that introduces the basic notions of computation through four distinct information processing systems: cells, subatomic particles, braings, and electronic computers. Of particular interest will be the problems that can occur in computational systems, such as viruses which infect both cells and electronic computers. No previous experience in computer science or biology will be required. This course will not count towards the CS concentration, but would be a very interesting elective course if you have the room in your schedule. Take a look at the web page for further details: www.cs.bu.edu/faculty/crovella/courses/CS107 and email Professor Crovella with any questions: crovella at cs.bu.edu. CS 235 -- Algebraic Algorithm ----------------------------- Instructor: Leonid Levin Time: TR 2-3:30 Place: FLR 134 This course is one of the new theory classes we have been rolling out starting last year. CS 235 discusses basic concepts and algorithms for manipulating algebraic objects, such as matrices and polynomials, and includes applications to important CS areas such as cryptography and fault-tolerance. This course counts in the CS concentration as a Background Course. CS 591 T1 -- Computational Geometry ------------------------------- Instructor: Shang-Hua Teng Time: M 10-1 Place: SED 208 This course will present the fundamentals of computational geometry to graduates students and advanced undergradutes. Computational geometry studies the design and analysis of algorithms for geometric problems arising in computer graphics, robotics, databases, and many other fields. This class will count as an upper-level elective for the CS concentration, or towards the MA or PhD degree. See the follow brief description for more information: www.cs.bu.edu/courses/cs591.txt or email Dr. Teng: steng at cs.bu.edu. CS 591 B1 -- Pattern Matching/Detection --------------------------------------- Instructor: Gary Benson Time: TR 3:30-5 Place: MUG 205 Pattern matching and pattern detection are common problems in various areas of computer science, including text processing, data mining, and computational biology. This course is an introduction to matching and detection algorithms in biological sequence data, such as DNA and protein chains. Such algorithms are critical to the success of modern genetics, and will be studied in the context of correctness, complexity, sensitivity/specificity tradeoffs, and the generality of their approach. This course may be counted as an upper-level elective in the CS concentration, or in the MA or PhD program. New Staff Person in the CS Office --------------------------------- Chris Ellis is our new Administrative Assistant in the CS department this term, replacing Theresa, who has gone on to McGill University to continue her education. Chris was a full-time Psychology major at BU and has elected to complete his degree part-time while working at the University. Chris has worked on campus as a work-study student both at Sargeant College and at Computing Services in CAS. Please say hello to Chris the next time you stop in the office. New Instructors --------------- We have two new instructors in the department this term, Aaron Stevens (who will be teaching CS 108 for SMG), and John Ruark (who is teaching CS 411). Aaron has an undergraduate degree in CS, but is currently pursuing a PhD in Finance at SMG, John has a PhD in Operations Research from MIT, and is a founding partner in the company Optiant, which produces software for managing the distribution of supplies for large companies. Please join with me in welcoming these two new instructors to our teaching staff. Change of Instructor for CS 320/520 ----------------------------------- Professor Kfoury will teach CS 520, and Professor Xi will teach CS 320 in the fall term. (In the previous schedules, these two instructors were exchanged.) Please see the course web pages for details. Advising Notes for Freshmen and Transfers ----------------------------------------- If you have just arrived in our department, you will be assigned an advisor in due course; however, if you need to speak to an advisor now, please see Prof. Betke. Job Opportunities for Undergraduates ------------------------------------ Finally, I'd like to call your attention to job opportunities for undergraduates in the department: o Graders for CS classes, from CS 101 to the 500 level are needed. Duties include grading homework in consultation with the instructor and Teaching Fellow, and maintaining the course database of grades. Please follow the link on the main CS page for details. o Terminal Assistants in the CS lab. Duties include staffing the help desk and (depending on your level of experience) helping maintain the department computing cluster. Please see Ernest Kim in the CS lab (krazykid at cs.bu.edu). Big changes to CS 111: C++ -> Java ---------------------------------- Although this does not affect most of the people reading this message, this Fall we will be moving our introductory curriculum from C++ to Java. Prof. Snyder will be teaching both sections of CS 111 in Java this fall, and we will be teaching CS 112 and higher-level courses in Java as the semesters roll on. If you have to retake CS 111 for some reason, or wish to learn Java, please talk to Prof. Snyder. ------------------------------------------------------------------------