September 9-15, 2013

Newsletter

September 9, 2013

Faculty News

Research & Grants:

Prof. Claire Monteleoni (CS) has received a three-year, $90,702 NSF grant to support the Climate Informatics Workshop and supporting activities.  She is the sole PI on the grant.

Publications:

Prof. Adam Wickenheiser (MAE) has had the following article published: Wickenheiser, A. M. "Model reduction in stochastic vibration energy harvesting using compressive sampling," Smart Materials and Structures, Vol. 22, No. 9, 094029.  This is a special issue of selected papers from the ASME 2012 conference on Smart Materials, Adaptive Structures and Intelligent Systems, held in September 2012 in Stone Mountain, GA.

Conferences & Presentations:

On August 28, Prof. Volker Sorger (ECE) presented a reviewed conference paper, titled "Si-Based Plasmonic & Graphene Modulators," at the 2013 IEEE International Conference on Group IV Photonics.  This work was based on his recent publication in the peer-reviewed IEEE Photonics Journal 5,4 (2013).

Other News:

Prof. Gabe Sibley (CS) has been invited to serve as an associate editor of the IEEE Robotics and Automation Society’s conference editorial board for the 2014 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA 2014).

Student News

Nima Keivan (CS) won Best Student Paper for his paper with Prof. Gabe Sibley in the conference Towards Autonomous Robots, 2013, held August 29 in Oxford, UK.  The paper is titled “Realtime Simulation-in-the-loop Control for Agile Ground Vehicles.”

Members of GW's Institute for Magnetics Research, in collaboration with G.E. Global Research, have had the following paper published in Physica B: Condensed Matter: Maryam Ovichi, Hatem ElBidweihy, Mohammadreza Ghahremani, Lawrence Bennett, Edward Della Torre, Francis Johnson, and Min Zou, "Self-similar field dependent curves for a Heusler alloy."

Other News


GW's Cyber Security and Privacy Research Institute (CSPRI) has launched "The CSPRI Byte," a new "student- and alumni-run blog on all things cybersecurity."  It's a writing opportunity for SEAS faculty and students and a reading opportunity for everyone.

Team Capitol DC's Harvest Home was profiled in another article, "Team Capitol DC to hit Solar Decathlon with home that heals, harvests," published September 4 on mothernaturenetwork.com.

Guest Vignette

"Accelerated Bridge Construction: Full-Depth Precast Concrete Deck Panel Systems"

Public inconvenience and loss of income during bridge construction and rehabilitation have prompted exploration of rapid construction methods, and in response, the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) launched the Accelerated Bridge Construction (ABC) initiative about 12 years ago.  ABC is a bridge construction that uses innovative planning, design, materials, and construction methods in a safe and cost-effective manner to reduce the construction time associated with maintenance of traffic when building new bridges or replacing and rehabilitating existing bridges.

The cast-in-place (CIP) bridge deck slab represents a significant part of the construction of stringer-type bridge superstructures, as much of the construction time is consumed in deck forming, placement and tying of steel bars, and placement and curing of CIP deck concrete.  As a result, full-depth precast concrete deck panel systems have been increasingly used to replace CIP decks to enhance the speed of deck construction.  In addition to high construction speed, full-depth precast concrete deck panel systems have many advantages, such as high-quality plant production under tight tolerances, low permeability, and much reduced volume changes cracking due to shrinkage and temperature effects during initial curing.  High-quality precast concrete decks, often two-way pre-stressed, have a lower life-cycle cost even though they may have higher costs in some US markets.  As a result, use of full-depth, precast concrete deck panel systems has been steadily increasing, especially over the past 10 years.

Dr. Sameh Badie of CEE previously worked on developing the first- and second-generation of full-depth precast concrete deck panel systems through three major grants funded by the National Cooperative Highway Research Program (NCHRP) of the Transportation Research Board, 1997-2010.  Recently, Dr. Badie received a new three-year grant from NCHRP (Project 12-96) to develop the third-generation of full-depth precast concrete deck panel systems.  The criteria of the third generation include developing systems that: simplify the fabrication process of the deck panels, minimize the construction time, allow better inspection of the grouted areas between the deck panels and the supporting girders, and allow future replacement of the deck. Also, the project will develop recommended guidelines and proposed AASHTO LRFD specification language for the design, fabrication, and construction of transverse, full-depth precast concrete deck panel systems.  (Provided courtesy of Prof. Sameh Badie of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering)
 

SEAS Events

CS Colloquium: “A Year of Teaching and Coordinating MOOCs: A Positive View without Hyperbole”
Speaker: Dr. Dan Grossman, University of Washington
Tuesday, September 17
12:00 pm
736 Phillips Hall

CEE Seminar: “Assimilation of Satellite Observations into Land Surface Models”
Speaker: Gabriëlle J.M. De Lannoy, Global Modeling and Assimilation Office, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
Friday, September 20
10:30 am
Dean's Conference Room, Tompkins Hall

GW Institute for Biomedical Engineering Seminar: "The Fluid Dynamics of Human Birth"
Speaker: Prof. Megan Leftwich (MAE)
Tuesday, October 15
1:00 - 2:00 pm
736 Phillips Hall

MAE Seminar: “Modeling Inelastic Behavior of Metals at Multiple Scales for Multiple Purposes”
Speaker, David L. McDowell, Georgia Institute of Technology
Monday, November 25
736 Phillips Hall

Career Center Events

Siemens General Information Session
Wednesday, September 11
6:00 - 8:00 pm
538 Marvin Center

General Dynamics/Electric Boat Information/Resume Review Sessions (walk-in)
Wednesday, September 11: 3:00 - 6:00 pm
Thursday, September 12: 9:00 - 11:00 am
Friday, September 13: 9:00 - 11:00 am
Dean's Conference Room, Tompkins Hall

IBM Information Session: Public Sector Consulting
Thursday, September 12
6:00 – 7:30 pm
451 Duques Hall

GW FALL 2013 CAREER and INTERNSHIP FAIR
Thursday, September 12
1:00 - 5:00 pm

Entrepreneurship & Other Events

Lean Startup Workshops: "Why Startups are Not Smaller Versions of Large Companies"
Friday, September 13
1:00 - 2:00 pm
GW Office of Entrepreneurship - 2033 K Street, Suite 750

Entrepreneur Office Hour
Friday, September 13
2:00 - 3:00 pm
GW Office of Entrepreneurship - 2033 K Street, Suite 750

DC I-Corps, a new, NSF-supported program designed to foster, grow and nurture an innovation ecosystem in the Mid-Atlantic Region, is now accepting applications for its fall cohort, beginning on October 7. Applications will be accepted on a rolling basis up until that date. Apply here.

Teams with GW professors, post-docs, or graduate students AND GW-owned intellectual property may also be eligible for $5,000 commercialization grants. For more information on these grants, please contact Jim Chung.  I-Corps is a joint effort by GW, the University of Maryland, and Virginia Tech.

SEAS Entrepreneurship Course: SEAS 6200 - Launching Technology Ventures

The course's purpose is to explore lean startup management practices and learn how to develop a complete business plan. Startups usually fail due to lack of customer demand, not product development problems. These new ventures burn through their capital, wasting money on engineering and marketing before discovering they have built a product no one wants. LTV will explore lean startup practices and focus on the integration of marketing and engineering functions and emphasize MVP (Minimum Viable Product). Register today! For more information, e-mail the instructor, Mr. Richard Stroupe.

10th International Conference on Intellectual Capital, Knowledge Management and Organizational Learning
The George Washington University
Thursday and Friday, October 24 and 25