Four Trailblazing Faculty Named Among Top Scholars

Posted: 

 

The Department of Computer Science and Engineering and Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering in the College of Engineering are starting 2013 with four faculty members earning one of the nation’s most prestigious scientific awards– the Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) award. Given each year to the nation’s top scholars, the CAREER award supports junior faculty who exemplify the role of teacher-scholars. Among the criteria used for the National Science Foundation award: outstanding research, excellent education, and the integration of education and research within the context of the mission of each organization.  In conjunction with the award, these assistant professors will receive at least $400,000 to support their research – an investment that according to the NSF will help these young scholars build a foundation for “a lifetime of leadership in integrating education and research.” Below are their stories.


 

Mike Bond

Mike Bond joined Ohio State in 2011 with the goal of making modern computer systems reliable and efficient. Achieving this goal presents serious challenges as chip manufacturers make processors faster by adding more and more cores; this trend makes it notoriously difficult for programmers to develop and debug software that is both accurate and fast.

As part of his current project, “Practical Language and System Support for Reliable Concurrent Software,” Professor Bond will work closely with graduate and undergraduate students in his research group, Programming Languages and Software Systems (PLaSS), to design and implement the first practical approaches for guaranteeing reliable parallel execution without sacrificing performance. These innovations will ultimately help parallel software systems overcome existing challenges and address society’s growing computing needs.


 

Kannan Srinivasan

Kannan Srinivasan studies and develops wireless network and communication systems with the aim of improving performance, reliability, and security.  He joined the university in 2011 and during that time has investigated everything from networking protocols to measurements to wireless nodes.

His current project, “Together We Rise: A Unified MIMO - Full Duplex Network Architecture,” aims to find a solution for one of the field’s most pressing problems: the need for higher capacity wireless networks. In the past, wireless networks have relied on a system that uses either all of its antennas for transmission or for reception; or, uses half of them for transmission and the other half for reception. Working closely with students and researchers, Professor Srinivasan will develop more flexible radios that can dynamically choose the number of antennas to transmit and receive, greatly increasing their capacity. Such a flexible radio can be used for optimizing reliability, security, or capacity. After development, he plans to work closely with Ohio State’s Technology Commercialization Office to patent and market the fully  redesigned system.


 

Radu Teodorescu

Radu Teodorescu leads Ohio State’s Architecture Research Lab, a group focused on computer architecture, power management, and the impact of technology scaling on microprocessor design. Since joining the faculty in 2008, Professor Teodorescu’s research has centered on improving the energy efficiency of computing devices.

His current project, “An Integrated Treatment of Voltage Noise and Process Variability in Many-core and GPU Systems with Microarchitectural Solutions,” aims to develop a new class of microprocessors that dynamically adapt to their environment and the applications they run, reducing energy usage. These systems are essential for big data centers, as well as personal gadgets such as mobile phones and portable devices, both of which are experiencing an increased demand for faster, more energy efficient computing. Teodorescu will partner closely with the Metro Early College High School, recruiting minority and female students as part of the project.

 

 

 




 




 

msrinivasan.jpg

Manoj Srinivasan, Assistant Professor in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, with his research proposal, titled "Towards An Optimization-Based and Experimentally Verified Predictive Theory of Human Locomotion," has earned support from the National Science Foundation's Early CAREER Development program.



According to Srinivasan, “the objective of his research is to obtain a sufficiently accurate, and broadly applicable, predictive theory of how people walk, run, and stabilize their movements. It is already possible to predict some aspects of human walking and running, by computing motions that minimize energy consumption. However, it is not known if such minimization can simultaneously predict the results of many different experiments, or the differences between different subjects, or how accurate such predictions could be in general.” As the principle investigator of the research, he will attempt to “reverse engineer” what quantity people are minimizing while moving  (if not energy), if indeed they are minimizing something. More specifically, “he will use 'inverse optimization’ to try to deduce a single objective function, perhaps loosely correlated with energy use, which, when minimized in the context of a computer model of the human-body, predicts the outcomes of many different human movement experiments.”

Results of his research may eventually enable the systematic model-based design of prosthetic and orthotic devices, and aide the diagnosis and treatment of movement pathologies, including possibly guiding surgical interventions. 

In addition, Srinivasan expects to integrate his research into a number of educational activities, aimed at different student groups, from K-12 to graduate students. In collaboration with Ohio State's Women in Engineering program, Srinivasan plans to create educational modules that will emphasize the interplay between mathematical theories, computer simulations, and experiments in science and engineering.

The NSF CAREER award supports the dual commitment to scholarship and education of junior faculty. Srinivasan will receive $400,000 in funding over five years. Srinivasan directs thMovement Lab within the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and has been a member of the department faculty since 2009.


Srinivasan’s recent research, published in the Journal of Royal Society Interface (2013), about walking and running was featured in various popular publications and blogs including the National Geographic, Wired Magazine, Science NOW, and Runner’s World.