ICNC

Linos J Jacovides (NAE Member, SAE/IEEE Fellow)
Professor, Michigan State University, USA

Keynote Title: Transition of the Automobile to a Computer Controlled Mechanical Device
Time: 8:30-9:30AM, Thursday, January 26, 2017

Abstract:
Fifty years ago the only electronic device in an automobile was the radio which was invented by Motorola in 1930. Today a high end vehicle has many more lines of code (100M) than the F-35 fighter jet (8M). How did this happen in an industry that has a reputation for slow adoption of technology. Initially the driving force was government regulation to meet emissions coming out of the tailpipe. Internal combustion engines burn liquid fuel and in addition to CO2 and water, produce nitrous oxides and unburned hydrocarbons that cause smog. Over the years government regulations have reduced these by a factor of about 100. This was accomplished using a so called “catalytic converter” and a very precise control of air fuel ratio to achieve as perfect combustion of the fuel as possible. This in turn required precise delivery of fuel and spark timing that can only be achieved by a microprocessor, electronic ignition and electronic fuel injection. The next step was safety that required airbags and antilock brakes and these used more processors and more sophisticated sensors. Information and entertainment systems came in 1990 and GM introduced the OnStar system that used GPS and a cell phone providing navigation and other services to the driver. Navigation was superseded by connecting smart phones and other devices to the car. In today’s cars all systems from engine/transmission to brakes, steering, heating and cooling and infotainment are computer control. The propulsion system is getting electrified also with hybrid and battery electric vehicles primarily to reduce fuel consumption and greenhouse gases. The next step will be automated vehicles that come with their own challenge’s and benefits.

Biography:

Dr Jacovides joined General Motors Research and Development in 1967 after a two-year assignment at the Defense Research Laboratories in Goleta, California. He held several positions becoming one of GM’s youngest executives at age 35. He became department head, Electrical and Electronics Engineering in 1985. He transitioned as Head of the Delphi Research Labs when GM spun off its automotive components groups as Delphi Corp. His areas of research were the interactions between power electronics and electrical machines in electric vehicles and locomotives. He worked on some of the electric vehicles of the 60’s to the 80’s at GM. By the 80’s he argued against commercializing the EV1 maintaining that the batteries were not ready for the market. At Delphi his technical interests were on fuel economy, electronics and alternative fuels. In January 2014 he joined the Electrical and Computer Engineering Dept. at Michigan State University as a tenured professor. Dr. Jacovides is the recipient of IEEE Transportation Technologies Award – Inaugural recipient (2014), IEEE Millennium Medal (2000).

Vincent Poor (NAS/NAE Member, AAAS/IEEE/RAE Fellow)

Dean and Michael Henry Strater University Professor, Princeton University, USA

Keynote Title: Privacy-Utility Tradeoffs in the Smart Grid
Time: 8:30-9:30AM, Friday, January 27, 2017

Abstract:
The deployment of advanced cyber infrastructure in the electricity grid introduces concerns about the privacy of the parties interconnected by the grid. Absolute privacy is generally not desirable in this setting, but rather the tradeoff between the privacy of data and its usefulness, or utility, is of interest. This talk will describe a fundamental characterization of such tradeoffs, first in a general context, and then in two specific problems arising in smart grid: smart meter privacy, in which either source coding at the meter or control of local storage can be used to enable the tradeoff; and competitive privacy, in which each of a group of multiple grid actors seeks to optimize its individual privacy-utility tradeoff while interacting with the other actors in information exchange. The principles introduced in this smart-grid setting can be applied in other settings as well, such as biometric systems and social networking, and some of these will be discussed briefly.

Biography:

H. Vincent Poor is the Michael Henry Strater University Professor of Electrical Engineering at Princeton University, and is currently visiting the University of California at Berkeley as a Miller Visiting Professor. His research interests are in the areas of information theory, statistical signal processing and stochastic analysis, and their applications in wireless networks, smart grid and related fields. Among his publications in these areas is the book Smart Grid Communications and Networking (Cambridge University Press, 2013). Dr. Poor is a member of the National Academy of Engineering and National Academy of Sciences and a foreign member of the Royal Society. Recent recognition of his work includes the 2014 URSI Booker Gold Medal, the 2016 John Fritz Medal, and honorary doctorates from several universities in Asia and Europe.

John A. Stankovic (ACM/IEEE Fellow)

BP America Professor, University of Virginia, USA

Keynote Title: Research Challenges and Directions for the Internet of Things
Time: 8:30-9:30AM, Saturday, January 28, 2017

Abstract:
As the Internet of Things (IoT) matures and supports increasingly sophisticated applications, the research needs for IoT also expand considerably. This talk discusses major research challenges for the future IoT where billions or even trillions of devices are connected to the Internet. A brief discussion on the relationship of IoT, to Cyber Physical Systems (CPS), and Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN) is presented. Research topics covered include massive scaling, properties of a required new architecture, new types of interdependencies that arise across simultaneously executing IoT applications, robustness and safety questions, and new problems due to openness, security, privacy, and humans in the loop. The list of topics is not meant to be comprehensive, but does address many of the main research issues. For some of the research problems, ideas for solutions and for promising research directions are also presented.

Biography:

Professor John A. Stankovic is the BP America Professor in the Computer Science Department at the University of Virginia. He served as Chair of the department for 8 years. He is a Fellow of both the IEEE and the ACM. He has been awarded an Honorary Doctorate from the University of York. He won the IEEE Real-Time Systems Technical Committee's Award for Outstanding Technical Contributions and Leadership. He also won the IEEE Technical Committee on Distributed Processing's Distinguished Achievement Award (inaugural winner). He has seven Best Paper awards, including one for ACM SenSys 2006. He also has two Best Paper Runner Up Awards, including one for IPSN 2013. He has also been a finalist for multiple other Best Paper Awards. Stankovic has an h-index of 108 and over 42,000 citations. In 2015 he was awarded the Univ. of Virginia Distinguished Scientist Award, and in 2010 the School of Engineering’s Distinguished Faculty Award. He also received a Distinguished Faculty Award from the University of Massachusetts. He has given more than 40 Keynote talks at conferences and many Distinguished Lectures at major Universities. Currently, he serves on the National Academy’s Computer Science Telecommunications Board. He was the Editor-in-Chief for the IEEE Transactions on Distributed and Parallel Systems and was founder and co-editor-in-chief for the Real-Time Systems Journal. His research interests are in real-time systems, wireless sensor networks, wireless health, cyber physical systems, and the Internet of Things. Prof. Stankovic received his PhD from Brown University.

Wei Zhao (IEAS Member, IEEE Fellow)
Rector and Chair Professor, University of Macau, China

Keynote Title: Fair and Efficient Data Trading: Opportunities and Challenges for both IT and non IT majors
Time: 8:30-9:30AM, Sunday, January 29, 2017

Abstract:
Sharing physical goods by trading has always played a critical role in the progression of our civilization as it benefits both providers and consumers, stimulating productivity and improving efficiency. In this digital era, we have to address how to share data in a fair and efficient manner. There are currently two prevailing viewpoints: One group promotes free-sharing data, while another argues for protection of data due to privacy concerns. While each of these has merit in some situations, we believe that most of the time data should be shared via trading. Unfortunately, as we will discuss in this talk, the conventional system for trading physical goods may not be suitable for trading data. Innovations are badly needed for developing a new system enabling fair and efficient data trading. In this talk, we will examine various legal, economical, and technical issues related to fair and efficient data trading in order to develop new data industry and business that can benefit everybody.

Biography:

Professor Wei Zhao completed his undergraduate studies at Shaanxi Normal University, China, in 1977, and then received his MSc and PhD degrees in Computer and Information Sciences at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, USA, in 1983 and 1986, respectively. In 2008, Professor Zhao was appointed as the 8th Rector for the University of Macau. Prior to this position, Professor Zhao also served as the Director of the Division of Computer and Network Systems at the US National Science Foundation, the Dean of Science at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and the Senior Associate Vice President of Research at Texas A&M University, making him one of the few scholars from Mainland China who have ever held such senior posts in the US federal government and high education institutions.

As an IEEE fellow, Professor Zhao is internationally acclaimed for his research in the areas of Internet of Things, distributed computing, and cyber-physical systems. His research team has won numerous awards from international research community. In recognition of his outstanding achievements in scientific research and contributions to higher education, he has been conferred honorary doctorate degrees by twelve world-renowned universities. In 2011, he was appointed by the Chinese Ministry of Science and Technology as the Chief Scientist of the Internet of Things - a national 973 project. In 2012, he was elected to be an Academician of the International Eurasian Academy of Sciences.

John Apostolopoulos (IEEE Fellow/IEEE Distinguished Lecturer)
CTO and Vice President, Cisco, USA

Plenary Title: IoT Opportunities in Wireless and Edge Computing
Time: 16:00-18:00, Friday, January 27, 2017

Abstract:
Rapid advances in sensing, analytics, networking, communication, and computing are transforming how we interact with the world around us – the newly networked world often referred to as the Internet of Things (IoT). We highlight some of these exciting opportunities by describing the application areas, their technical challenges, and recent advances that are making them possible. For example, improved location accuracy for indoor-location-based services, reliable low-latency communication for augmented reality and virtual reality, and distributed, edge-based deep learning for real-time scalable visual analytics. In each case, we will also highlight promising future directions of research.

Biography:

John Apostolopoulos is VP/CTO of the Cisco’s Enterprise Segment where he drives the technology and architecture direction for Cisco’s efforts in the enterprise space. He also founded and leads Cisco’s Innovation Labs, covering Internet of Things (IoT), wireless, application-aware networking, multimedia networking, indoor-location-based services, and deep learning for visual analytics. Previously, he was Lab Director for the Mobile & Immersive Experience Lab at HP Labs. His work spanned novel mobile devices and sensing, client/cloud multimedia computing, multimedia networking, immersive video conferencing, SDN, and mobile streaming media content delivery networks for all-IP (4G) wireless networks. He is an IEEE Fellow, IEEE SPS Distinguished Lecturer, named “one of the world’s top 100 young (under 35) innovators in science and technology” (TR100) by MIT Technology Review, and received a Certificate of Honor for contributing to the US Digital TV Standard (Engineering Emmy Award 1997). He has published over 100 papers, including receiving 5 best paper awards, and has about 70 granted US patents. John also has strong collaborations with the academic community and was a Consulting Associate Professor of EE at Stanford (2000-09), and frequently lecturers at MIT. He received his B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. from MIT.

Bo Begole (ACM Distinguished Scientist)

Vice President, Huawei, USA

Plenary Title: Frontiers of Natural Interaction
Time: 16:00-18:00, Friday, January 27, 2017

Abstract:
The evolution of input technologies continually pushes our expectations of what is “natural” interaction – whereas using a mouse was once considered perfectly natural (compared to the previous command-line interfaces), today we expect nothing less than direct multi-touch interaction with pressure sensitivity and vibro-tactile feedback. Soon we will be manipulating virtual reality objects in midair so what is the next frontier of natural interaction? Perception and cognition technologies have evolved to a point where systems need not simply react to user commands, but can now proactively sense the environment and predict the user’s intentions to deliver information that responds dynamically to the users' attention, engagement and context. Such techniques are necessary to make new computing paradigms useful. Examples: information needs to be filtered so that augmented reality systems do not overwhelm users; semi-autonomous vehicles need to attract driver’s attention when traffic conditions become complex; robots and intelligent agents need to anticipate user needs and serve them in advance; and media entertainment systems can dynamically adapt content to maximize individual audience member’s engagement. These kinds of responsive media experiences will be more like engaging in conversations with humans, rather than directly commanding a computer system.

Biography:

Dr. Bo Begole is VP and Global Head of the Media Technologies Lab for Huawei R&D whose mission is to create the future of media experiences through innovations in ultra-high-efficiency compression, computer vision/hearing, 3D modeling, augmented/virtual reality, full field communications and personalized responsive media. Previously, he was a Sr. Director at Samsung Electronics’ User Experience Center America where he directed a team to develop new contextually intelligent services for wearable, mobile and display devices. Prior to that, he was a Principal Scientist at Xerox PARC where he directed the Ubiquitous Computing research program creating machine learning technologies for user-behavior modeling, mobile location-based recommendations and responsive media. An inventor of 30+ issued patents, he is also the author of Ubiquitous Computing for Business (FT Press, 2011) and dozens of peer-reviewed research papers. Dr. Begole is an ACM Distinguished Scientist, active in many research conferences and was co-Chair of the 2015 ACM conference on human factors in computing systems (CHI 2015) in Seoul, Korea. Dr. Begole received a Ph.D. in computer science from Virginia Tech in 1998 and prior to that was enlisted in the US Army as an Arabic language interpreter.

Achin Bhowmik (SID Fellow)

Vice President, Intel, USA

Plenary Title: The Emergence of Intelligent Devices and Machines
Time: 16:00-18:00, Friday, January 27, 2017

Abstract:
The world of intelligent and interactive systems is undergoing a revolutionary transformation. With rapid advances in natural sensing and perceptual computing technologies, devices are being endowed with abilities to “sense”, “understand”, and “interact” with us and the physical world. This keynote will describe and demonstrate the Intel® RealSenseTM Technology, which is enabling a new class of applications based on real-time 3D-sensing and visual intelligence, including interactive computing devices, autonomous robots and drones, as well as immersive merged-reality devices, blurring the border between the real and the virtual words.

Biography:

Dr. Achin Bhowmik is vice president and general manager of the perceptual computing group at Intel, where he leads the development and deployment of Intel® RealSense™ Technology. His responsibilities include creating and growing new businesses in the areas of interactive computing systems, immersive virtual reality devices, autonomous robots and unmanned aerial vehicles. Previously, he served as the chief of staff of the personal computing group, Intel’s largest business unit with over $30B revenues. Prior to that, he led the development of advanced video and display processing technologies for Intel’s computing products. His prior work includes liquid-crystal-on-silicon microdisplay technology and integrated electro-optical devices.

As an adjunct and guest professor, Dr. Bhowmik has advised graduate research and taught courses at the Liquid Crystal Institute of the Kent State University, Stanford University, University of California, Berkeley, Kyung Hee University, Seoul, and the Indian Institute of Technology, Gandhinagar. He has >100 publications including two books and >100 granted and pending patents. He is a Fellow of the Society for Information Display (SID), and serves on the board of directors for SID and OpenCV, the organization behind the open source computer vision library.

David Du (IEEE Fellow)

Quest Chair Professor, University of Minnesota, USA

Plenary Title: Future Infrastructure Support in Big Data Era
Time: 13:30-14:30, Thursday, January 26, 2017

Abstract:
The Internet today has grown to an enormously large scale. Devices large and small are connected globally from anywhere on the earth. With the rapid advancement of technology, we now also have cheap, small and smart devices with high computing power and large storage capacity. These devices like sensors and mobile devices are designed to improve our daily life by monitoring our environment, collecting critical data, and executing special instructions. These devices have gradually become a dominant part of our Internet. Many imaging, audio and video data are converted from analog to digital and digital data like sensor data and location data are generated at an alarming rate. As a result, unprecedented amount of data are available and continuous being generated. How to store, process, manage and look for the desired information becomes a great challenge. How to preserve these data becomes a crisis. We can certainly say that we are in a big data era. In this talk, we will examine the challenges in developing infrastructure to support many emerging applications like service-oriented, location based, data access and management. In this talk, we will focus more the challenges of data storage and data management. What are the essential changes in data representation, information retrieval, storage systems and networking design will be discussed. We will also present a number of research projects that are currently under investigation in our NSF I/UCRC Center on Intelligent Storage. These projects include data deduplication, long-term data preservation, data archiving, and how to efficiently use non-volatile memory, solid state drives, shingle magnetic recording drives and Kinetic drives in the future infrastructure.

Biography:

Dr. Du is currently the Qwest Chair Professor of Computer Science and Engineering at University of Minnesota, Minneapolis. He is the Center Director of the NSF multi-university I/UCRC Center of Research in Intelligent Storage (CRIS). In additional to NSF, CRIS is currently sponsored with 11 companies with 15 sponsored memberships. He was a Program Director (IPA) at National Science Foundation CISE/CNS Division from March 2006 to August 2008. At NSF, he was responsible for NeTS (Networking Research cluster) NOSS (Networks of Sensor Systems) Program and worked with two other colleagues, Karl Levitt and Ralph Wachter, on Cyber Trust (Internet Security) Program. In 2008 he was also assigned to CSR (Computer System Research) Cluster for handling research in computer systems. Dr. Du receives a B.S degree in Mathematics from National Tsing-Hua University (Taiwan) in 1974 and an M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from University of Washington (Seattle) in 1980 and 1981 respectively. He joined University of Minnesota as a faculty since 1981. Dr. Du also has been a visiting professor in Germany, Korea, Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan.

Liu Qiao

Technical Director, Software Electronics & Mechanical Systems Laboratory

3M Company, USA

Plenary Title: Digital Transformation for IoT
Time: 16:00-18:00, Friday, January 27, 2017

Abstract:
The Internet of Things (IoT) has begun to increasingly impact to the industry, society and life. These interconnected smart “things” have the potential to significantly benefit our customers and manufacturers. Critical enablers include smart materials, smart devices and smart systems which can be easily sensed and connected with minimum cost, negligible dimensions, ultra-low power and computation power consumptions. These innovations are necessary in order to electrify and digitize traditional materials, products and services.

Biography:

Liu Qiao received his B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Beijing University of Technology and his Ph.D. degree from Tohoku University, Japan concentrating in learning algorithm in control systems. Liu worked both in academia as assistant professor of control systems at Beijing University of Technology and in automotive R&D as an engineering and leader at Hitachi Automotive Products and Toyota Motor Engineering and Manufacturing North America before joining 3M. Liu started his industry career as an advanced automotive control system expert and progressed to technical operations manager in service, vehicle program manager, e-Business manager and research manager. Liu successfully led Toyota’s first Canadian hybrid vehicle program and its market introduction. Liu is also a founding member of Toyota Research Institute of North America, and drove establishment of Toyota’s technologies, engineering platforms and programs on Power Electronics, Active Safety Systems, Autonomous Driving, Drivetrain Management, Robotics and Intelligent Transportation System. Liu’s current efforts have focused on building technology platforms, infrastructure, and product pipelines to mechanize, electrify, and digitize advanced 3M materials to accelerate business growth globally. Liu holds 12 US patents, has 49 publications and is also an active member/supporter of many academic and industrial professional associations. Liu was recently recognized as the Smart Industry 50 Innovators on the leading edge of digital transformation.

Majid Sarrafzadeh (IEEE Fellow)

Distinguished Professor, University of California at Los Angeles, USA

Plenary Title: Remote Health Monitoring
Time: 14:30-15:30, Friday, January 27, 2017

Abstract:
Many of the largest information technology industry leaders today have turned their attention to mHealth (mHealth) , new personal hardware products, search technologies that focus on health and wellness with data and guidance. The impact on individuals is also unprecedented with individualized, lifetime, health promotion, services that join consumer fitness and entertainment, disease management, and a major advance in geriatric care with individualized guidance and monitoring for individuals in their homes and institutions. Research inmHealth is radically different from research in other areas of Computer Science and Engineering. In this talk we will review key ingredients of a successful research paradigm in mHealth. We use Remote Health Monitoring Systems as a case study. We will concentrate on Congestive heart failure, a chronic condition that is a leading cause of hospitalization in the world and a major part of the rising health care costs. It is the decrease in cardiac function caused by damage to the heart as a result of a heart attack, chronic hypertension, or exposure to toxins. The heart’s inability to effectively pump blood results in fluid accumulation, that manifests in the symptomatology of hearth failure namely shortness of breath, lower extremity swelling, chest pain, and limitation of exercise tolerance. We will review research that led to succesful launch of a large multi-instituitional clinical trial involving Congestive Heart Failure Patients. We will also shows examples of evidence based diabetes and weight-loss research.

Biography:

Majid Sarrafzadeh (http://www.cs.ucla.edu/~majid) received his Ph.D. in 1987 from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in Electrical and Computer Engineering. He joined Northwestern University as an Assistant Professor in 1987. In 2000, he joined the Computer Science Department at University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) where he is current a distinguished professor of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering. He is a co-founder and co-director of the Center for SMART Health. His recent research interests lie in the area of Embedded Computing and Data Anlytics with emphasis on healthcare. Dr. Sarrafzadeh is a Fellow of IEEE. Professor Sarrafzadeh has published more than 500 papers, co-authored 5 books, and is a named inventor on many US patents. Dr. Sarrafzadeh has collaborated with many industries in the past 30 years. He co-founded two companies around 2000 - they were both acquired around 2004. He has recently co-founded three companies in the area of Technology in Healthcare

Jie Wu (IEEE Fellow)

Associate Vice Provost, Chair and Laura H. Carnell Professor, Temple University, USA

Plenary Title: Algorithmic Crowdsourcing and Applications in Big Data
Time: 13:30-14:30, Friday, January 27, 2017

Abstract:
This talk gives a survey of crowdsourcing applications, with a focus on algorithmic solutions. The recent search for Malaysia flight 370 is used first as a motivational example. Fundamental issues in crowdsourcing, in particular, incentive mechanisms for paid crowdsourcing, and algorithms and theory for crowdsourced problem-solving, are then reviewed. Several applications of algorithmic crowdsourcing applications are discussed in detail, with a focus on big data. The talk also discusses several on-going projects on crowdsourcing at Temple University.

Biography:

Jie Wu is the Associate Vice Provost for International Affairs at Temple University. He also serves as the Chair and Laura H. Carnell professor in the Department of Computer and Information Sciences. Prior to joining Tempe University, he was a program director at the National Science Foundation and was a distinguished professor at Florida Atlantic University. His current research interests include mobile computing and wireless networks, routing protocols, cloud and green computing, network trust and security, and social network applications. Dr. Wu regularly publishes in scholarly journals, conference proceedings, and books. He serves on several editorial boards, including IEEE Transactions on Service Computing and the Journal of Parallel and Distributed Computing. Dr. Wu was general co-chair/chair for IEEE MASS 2006, IEEE IPDPS 2008, IEEE ICDCS 2013, and ACM MobiHoc 2014, as well as program co-chair for IEEE INFOCOM 2011 and CCF CNCC 2013. He was an IEEE Computer Society Distinguished Visitor, ACM Distinguished Speaker, and chair for the IEEE Technical Committee on Distributed Processing (TCDP). Dr. Wu is a CCF Distinguished Speaker and a Fellow of the IEEE. He is the recipient of the 2011 China Computer Federation (CCF) Overseas Outstanding Achievement Award.

Michele Zorzi was born in Venice, Italy, on December 6th, 1966. He received the Laurea Degree and the Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Padova, Italy, in 1990 and 1994, respectively. During the Academic Year 1992/93, he was on leave at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), attending graduate courses and doing research on multiple access in mobile radio networks. In 1993, he joined the faculty of the Dipartimento di Elettronica e Informazione, Politecnico di Milano, Italy. After spending three years with the Center for Wireless Communications at UCSD, in 1998 he joined the School of Engineering of the University of Ferrara, Italy, where he became a Professor in 2000. Since November 2003, he has been on the faculty at the Information Engineering Department of the University of Padova. His present research interests include performance evaluation in mobile communications systems, random access in mobile radio networks, ad hoc and sensor networks, energy constrained communications protocols, and broadband wireless access.

Dr. Zorzi was the Editor-In-Chief of the IEEE Wireless Communications Magazine in 2003--2005, is currently the Editor-In-Chief of the IEEE Transactions on Communications, and serves on the Editorial Boards of the IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications, the Wiley Journal of Wireless Communications and Mobile Computing and the ACM/URSI/Kluwer Journal of Wireless Networks. He was also guest editor for special issues in the IEEE Personal Communications Magazine ("Energy Management in Personal Communications Systems," Jun. 1998) and the IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications ("Multi-media Network Radios," May 1999, and "Underwater Wireless Communications and Networks," to be published in 2008). He is a Fellow of the IEEE.