The TowerCares Foundation, the philanthropic arm of the Laurel, Maryland-based Tower Federal Credit Union, has partnered with UMBC’s Cybersecurity Institute to create a new scholarship fund for UMBC students studying cybersecurity. The scholarships will support students in the university’s Cyber Scholars Program, a program with a track record of more than 10 years nurturing the next generation of cybersecurity professionals. The program provides financial aid, a welcoming community, unique courses, mentoring, and the chance for students to take part in cybersecurity research and internships early in their academic careers.

 “Our mission is to help our community thrive, and partnering with institutions like UMBC—recognized as a leader in information technology and cybersecurity—is a key part of that effort,” says Allen Brisentine, chairman of the TowerCares Foundation. “The entire Maryland region benefits from UMBC’s renowned and highly regarded cybersecurity program.”

As cyber threats, ransomware, and data breaches have become daily realities in our increasingly digital world, the demand for skilled cybersecurity professionals remains strong. The Cyber Scholars Program has launched the careers of over 100 graduates, many of whom have gone on to jobs safeguarding the digital data of government agencies, businesses, and everyday consumers.

“Last year we celebrated the 10th anniversary of the program, and it was such a great feeling to meet program alumni who have become cybersecurity leaders,” says Anupam Joshi, acting dean of the College of Engineering and Information Technology. “We’re deeply grateful to the TowerCares Foundation for supporting this important work that both helps grow the cybersecurity workforce and makes it more inclusive.”

Naghmeh Karimi, an associate professor in the Department of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering, was recently granted more than $300,000 in funding from the Semiconductor Research Corporation (SRC) to study the security of promising hardware components that speed up the computing process. 

SRC brings together technology companies, academics, and government agencies to tackle large scientific and technical challenges, and Karimi’s research will be funded by three leading technology companies: IBM-Research, AMD, and Siemens. 

Karimi and her team, including graduate students and a collaborator from Arizona State University, will study computer chips whose design and structure allows computing-in-memory (CiM), where data processing happens directly within the computer’s memory. CiM architectures are promising for speeding up the use of machine learning algorithms because they consume less energy.

Different types of CiM devices (such as RRAM, MRAM, and SRAM) each have their own strengths and weaknesses in terms of performance, power use, and size, and to get the best results, engineers need to combine different CiM devices into one system. Building these systems in 3D layers can further improve their efficiency and performance. However, the security of these 3D architectures has received little attention to date. 

Karimi’s team will study the security of 3D CiM technologies used in AI applications. In particular, the research will focus on evaluating the security vulnerabilities of the technologies and developing mitigation strategies. 

“I’m excited about this project because the topic is very timely,” says Karimi. “The support from three leading companies in the AI field shows the importance of the problem and the promise of the solutions we are working on.”

The team aims to enhance the security of CiM-based AI accelerators against physical attacks that adversaries might launch to leak sensitive data or induce malfunctions. The researchers will work closely with the funding companies over the next three years in this area.

For almost 70 years, Milt Halem, now a research professor at UMBC after a career at NASA, has deployed the latest computing technology—from vacuum tubes in the ’50s to artificial intelligence today—to tackle some of science’s toughest problems.

Colorful screen prints cover the walls of Milt Halem’s Rockville, Maryland, apartment. One shows a high-altitude view of the Nile River, cutting through desert sands before emptying into a turquoise Mediterranean. In another, the fragile blue marble of the Earth rises above a desolate lunar surface.

One large picture, taking centerplace on the dining room wall, is more enigmatic—filled with alternating red, yellow, and blue patches. “This is what’s known as the quasi-biennial oscillation,” Halem explains.

Tens of thousands of feet up, in Earth’s stratosphere, the winds around the equator regularly shift direction, blowing east for many months, and then west, and then east again. A satellite measured the shifts, and Halem, a former NASA scientist and current UMBC professor, turned six years of that data into art.

Halem’s framed prints, many of which he created himself while taking evening and weekend classes at the Corcoran School of the Arts and Design in Washington, D.C., are a window into his nearly 70-year-long scientific career. For roughly 40 years of that time, he worked for NASA, the famed federal space agency. Halem harnessed NASA’s space-based instrument “eyes” and ever-evolving computer “brains” to advance humanity’s understanding of Earth and our place in the cosmos and, in 1996, was recognized with NASA’s highest award, the Distinguished Service Medal.

In 2003, after retiring from NASA, Halem joined UMBC as a research professor. In his more than two decades at the university, he has nurtured connections with government and industry, brought in research money and equipment, regularly taught a popular graduate course, and mentored more than a dozen Ph.D. students, helping them pursue their passions and propel their careers.

“I think of myself as a computational scientist: I use computers to both discover and explore new territory,” Halem says. “What I love is the computer’s ability to represent, and to explain, the world around us.”

Charting computers’ evolution

Halem began his working life at the dawn of the computing age, and his career trajectory mirrors the steady rise of those digital devices. After earning a bachelor’s degree in mathematics from the City College of New York in 1951, Halem was drafted into the Korean War effort and served on U.S. Army bases for two years, first in New Jersey and then in Arizona. After a stint clearing rocks off the golf course so that the officers could play, Halem’s skills were better put to use on some of the Army’s first attempts to use what at the time were relatively new-fangled devices called computers to improve surveillance of battlefields.

In 1955, Halem received a fellowship to work with an IBM 704 computer installed at New York University. The computer took up significant floor space with its multiple cabinet-sized components, filled with vacuum tubes for logic operations and magnetic tape for memory. It was state-of-the-art in its day, able to execute about 40,000 instructions per second.

“You could say 1955 was my start in high-performance computing,” Halem says. “I’ve been acquiring and managing and programming and doing research on computers ever since.”

In the late 1950s, NASA established the Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) and, shortly after, opened a New York campus—the Goddard Institute for Space Studies—focused on theoretical research.

Milt Halem delivers remarks during a conference at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, 1986. Photo by NASA. 

Because of Halem’s experience with computers, he was hired as contract support. In the subsequent years, he worked with some of the most advanced computers of the time, using them to model the Earth’s atmosphere and predict the scientific value of launching new Earth-observing instruments. In 1968, he also earned his Ph.D. in applied mathematics from NYU.

Halem at UMBC in 2024.

In the late ’70s, Halem moved to Goddard’s main facility, GSFC, in Maryland to continue his computing work. In 1983, he became chief of the Space Data and Computing Division and shifted from using supercomputers to being a force in their development. The division had recently developed the Goodyear Massively Parallel Processor (MPP), a trailblazing computer containing 16,384 processors working simultaneously. This degree of parallelism, which lies at the heart of today’s supercomputers, marked a radical departure from traditional computing.

“The MPP was a relatively simple concept, but it took us more than a decade to develop it,” says Jim Fischer, who managed the MPP’s fabrication contract and applications programs. “Milt found people to help and money to support the machine. And then he offered it to the U.S. science community to try it out, and they recognized its architecture as a solution. Milt pumped us to world class by force of will.”

In the ensuing years, Halem and Fischer pursued making the power of MPPs more accessible and less expensive. In 1994, their staff demonstrated the “Beowulf” computing cluster, composed entirely of mass market personal computers networked with Ethernet and running the Linux open source operating system.

Now 30 years later, the Beowulf approach sits at the core of most of the world’s supercomputers and much of the cloud infrastructure, putting vast amounts of affordable computing resources at the fingertips of scientists, engineers, and even social media users.

After Halem arrived at UMBC in his 70s, he continued to engage with the latest computing technology. He was instrumental in securing the donation of high-performance IBM computing equipment from NASA to the university, and he helped run a new computing research center. With his students, he has explored the frontiers of quantum computing and AI.

“I’ve followed the evolution of high-performance computing my entire career,” Halem says.

Computing for science

Computers can do many things—from recommending videos you might like to rendering life-like graphics—but Halem is most interested in what they can do for science.

“Science is based on the notion of observations and then explaining the observations by some theoretical process,” says Halem. “That was the way science evolved until the mid-20th century. Then computers came along and became the third pillar of science.”

Halem’s passion fit with NASA’s mission. Though the agency was born out of the Cold War and the space race with the Soviets, it has concentrated its efforts on the peaceful use of space to advance science.

NASA launches satellites that observe Earth from space with a suite of scientific instruments (including some designed at UMBC), and a large part of Halem’s research has been using computers to understand how that data can improve our understanding of the Earth’s air, water, and land and the physical processes that link them. Halem has also advanced weather forecasting through, among other techniques, finding new ways to incorporate observations into the weather models.

As an administrator at NASA, Halem always put the science first, according to his colleagues. “I believe that Milt left a legacy of making decisions that are in the best interest of science,” says Dan Duffy, the chief of the Computational and Information Sciences and Technology Office at GSFC, who sits in Halem’s old NASA office and has continued to work with him on special projects since Halem joined UMBC.

“His motivation was always driven by the scientific community’s needs,” Fischer adds. “It was very high-minded.”

Shaping students’ lives

At UMBC, Halem has continued his devotion to computing for science’s sake. In doing so, he has supported the research community and shaped his students’ lives.

Jennifer Sleeman, Ph.D. ’17, computer science, was co-mentored by Halem on her Ph.D. thesis, which involved mapping topics from past climate reports from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and trying to predict the contents of future reports.

Jim Fischer, Milt Halem, and Sophia Hamer (left to right) in Halem’s UMBC office. One of Halem’s screen prints hangs in the upper right.

“Milt and I would have discussions about my thesis, and I always like to describe it as: Milt decided to adopt me. I was close to the end of my Ph.D., and I changed my focus based on working with him,” she said. “It really changed the trajectory of my career.” After graduating, she became a research assistant professor at UMBC. She currently studies weather and climate-related topics as a senior AI research scientist at Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory while she continues to work part-time with Halem and his students.

Sophia Hamer ’22, mathematics and computer science, who is currently working with Halem as a master’s student, also credits Halem with helping her find her career footing. She first met him to discuss a research project when she was an undergraduate and just emerging from a time when she struggled with her grades and with choosing a major.

“Dr. Halem took a chance on me,” she says. “I honestly think that was the turning point for me. Before I was thinking, ‘I’m just gonna squeak out of here with a degree and hopefully my GPA isn’t too bad to get a job.’ But now, my entire perspective has shifted: I’m about to graduate with a master’s, and I’m doing impactful research in a field I really like. I never thought that would be possible.”

“Milt is tough—he pushes you—but he also works closely with you,” Sleeman adds. “I really grew from that relationship.”

AI for weather and climate forecasting

Both Sleeman and Hamer are working with Halem on a project to be the first to use AI to make regional weather predictions, one of a couple AI projects Halem is currently pursuing.

In his embrace of AI, Halem is yet again advancing alongside the technology that has defined his career. Gone are the days of mere 40,000 instructions per second. Now advanced computer chips power computationally hungry “neural networks” originally inspired by the workings of the human brain. Neural networks are behind celebrity chatbots such as ChatGPT—and forecasters are increasingly turning to them to predict the weather too.

While traditional weather models simulate the physics of the Earth and its atmosphere to make predictions about the future, AI forecasting models simply examine vast datasets of past weather and learn how to spot patterns.

So far, the main advantage of AI forecasting is speed. What can take days for a physics-based model can be done in only minutes or seconds with AI. AI weather models offer great promise for distributed, real-time weather forecasting, for example as natural disasters unfold. Halem and his students are looking in particular to predict wildfires.

While much AI weather forecasting research is undertaken by leading tech companies such as Google and Microsoft, Halem thinks his students are more than holding their own.

“I’ve got a new generation of computer scientists making breakthroughs,” says Halem. “Two students who are writing up their master’s theses are doing leading AI computations to rival what some big tech companies are doing.”

The work of weather and climate modeling is growing in importance as global warming unfolds and the Earth’s natural patterns shift. “Applying what I know to a real-world problem has been an amazing experience,” Hamer says.

The projects are also yet one more demonstration of Halem’s constant intellectual evolution.

“Milt has an amazing ability to learn new things,” says Anupam Joshi, the acting dean of the College of Engineering and Information Technology. “He was trained as a mathematician who then specialized in high-performance computing and in the last few years has become an expert in using AI systems to model weather and climate phenomena. It speaks to his intellectual capabilities but also his perseverance and his grit.”

Halem (far right) poses with (from left to right) NASA’s Jim Fischer and John Dorband, and Microsoft Fellow Jim Gray next to the first Beowulf computing cluster. Photo by NASA.

Into the future

Now in his tenth decade of life, Halem shows few signs of slowing down. When not spending time with his large family, he’s still tackling some of science’s thorniest problems, such as how to predict weather patterns months to years in advance.

“He’s like the energizer bunny,” says Fischer, his former NASA colleague.

Duffy agrees. “He has an amazing amount of energy; he never seems to stop. He has a willingness to listen, learn, and ask questions and is an amazing role model for his students.”

Halem says it’s the computation challenges that drive him. “I have to keep moving because the computational instrument continues to evolve,” he says. He continues to be on the lookout for new ideas—the latest he’s come across being an AI research scientist. “The AI agent can use large language models to read the literature; it can write computer code and conduct experiments by itself. It can write the paper on what it discovered. So that’s probably the ultimate research goal that I would like to see if I can make an impact on,” Halem explains.

“Milt is probably one of the most dedicated people I know to the research,” Sleeman says. “He’s so tenacious, and it’s just so impressive. It’s a privilege to continue to work with him.”

“Milt is incredible,” adds Joshi. “If we could replicate him, we would.” And maybe, in some sense, Halem’s AI scientist would do just that.

UMBC at the Universities at Shady Grove finds itself uniquely situated—at home within the country’s third largest biotech hub where the demand for highly skilled workers is growing. These Retrievers are filling specialized roles after graduating with the training they need to succeed in this booming industry.

It’s an early Friday morning in the Biological Sciences and Engineering Building and nine students, working in small groups, are bustling back and forth between fume hoods and a large centrifuge. They carefully swish flasks containing cells and growth medium. The smell of sanitizing alcohol pervades the space. Neon orange test tube racks and turquoise tube caps stand out within the sterile white look of the work benches, hoods, and lab coats.

As the cells use oxygen to release energy, they produce carbon dioxide. The CO2 turns the solution yellow, indicating successful cell growth. After the experiment, students sterilize their solution with bleach for disposal; in response to the alkalinity, it blooms to a brilliant magenta. In another room, one student offers tips to her classmate on how to use a pipet more effectively, and the instructor flits between groups, answering questions as needed—but for the most part, the students operate confidently on their own.

This is a regular day in Biotechnology 303: Applied Cell Biology in UMBC’s Translational Life Science Technology (TLST) program. The program, offered by UMBC’s College of Natural and Mathematical Sciences (CNMS) exclusively at the Universities at Shady Grove (USG), a multi-institution education facility in Rockville, Maryland, is designed to offer hands-on training to prepare students for careers in the booming biotech industry in USG’s backyard. 

Elizabeth Friar (left) and Samantha Petros ’23 have stayed in touch since Petros graduated. 

A clear direction

It was the promise of experiential work with real-world applications that drew Samantha Petros ’23 to the TLST program. “I really liked the convenience of the USG campus, and a lot of the courses were really focused on hands-on learning,” she says. Without really knowing what the work would look like before she started the program, “I was able to try out a lot of different things in a very low-stakes environment and get an idea as to what I found interesting.”

That turned out to be cell culture work. Applied Cell Biology with Elizabeth Friar, lecturer and undergraduate program director in TLST, “cemented that benchwork is what I enjoy doing,” Petros says. From then on, “There was a clearly defined arrowhead in the direction I wanted to go.”

That was a big shift from where she started, as a film major at Montgomery College (MC). A virology course to meet her science requirement turned her on to MC’s biotech associate degree, and then she transitioned to the TLST program at UMBC. After learning some basic lab techniques in TLST classes, she landed a part-time job, where she carried out entry-level manufacturing tasks for malaria vaccines. Today, Petros is thriving as a cell culture specialist studying malaria at Axle Informatics, a contractor for the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

The position she’s in now traditionally requires a master’s degree, which she doesn’t have—yet, anyway. “Knowing that I have valuable skill sets from TLST—working in manufacturing, getting good connections with my professors, and going to the networking events that TLST offers—all of that compounds and has got me to where I am now,” Petros says. “I genuinely believe that I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for all of those factors, with TLST obviously being the biggest one.”

Location, location, location

TLST is a young program, but it is growing quickly. The first class—just two students—arrived in fall 2019. Friar joined in summer 2020 and began laying the groundwork for the program’s eventual growth. Today, “It’s humming along,” she says. There are currently 50 students who have declared TLST as their major. “Now we’re thinking about what we can do next. How can we expand?” 

TLST is unique as the only undergraduate STEM program at UMBC without a footprint on the main campus. The location choice at USG is intentional. The Capital Biohealth Region, encompassing the District of Columbia, Virginia, and Maryland, is the third most competitive biotech hub in the country—and Montgomery County, Maryland, is the hub of the hub, boasting more than 350 life science companies and located a stone’s throw from the NIH, FDA, and National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). For TLST alumni, the employment options are seemingly limitless: 80 percent of American pharmaceutical companies are within a two-hour drive, and they can expect a nearly 23 percent growth rate in the biotech industry over the next 10 years—well above the national average.

As Friar puts it, “Regenxbio is down the street. MacroGenics is down the street. MilliporeSigma is opening their new lab right next door, and they’ve now hired eight of our alumni. Soon we’ll have an NIH vaccine lab right down the street. ATCC is right down the street.” All these biotech companies need qualified workers—and TLST is providing them.

Steven Schaffer (right) and Princess Nyamali work under a biosafety cabinet in Elizabeth Friar’s Applied Cell Biology course. 

Training lifetime learners

Jeff Galvin, CEO of American Gene Technologies (AGT), has hired TLST alumni and would hire more. “The TLST program seems to provide a great overview of not just biotechnology techniques,” he says, but it gives students “an understanding of the business in general. I find that UMBC students lean toward being self-motivated problem-solvers. It seems that the administration from the top all the way down promotes that idea of creating value through creative, hard work.”

Titina Sirak ’20, TLST, had a major impact at AGT. She established a brand-new laboratory certified to handle human cells from scratch, Galvin says, “And that’s not easy—there’s a lot of regulations associated with that, even economics.” While she wasn’t an expert at first, “she was able to do enough things right that the project came to life.”

Galvin emphasizes the importance of “learning how to learn,” saying, “Things are changing so fast, that it’s the folks who can adapt and become lifetime learners who are going to be the most successful.And that’s something I saw from the students coming out of TLST.”

A vision fulfilled

So far, TLST has graduated 25 students, and 94 percent of them were employed in the biotech industry within three months of walking across the Commencement stage. “We’ve had a number of really standout students who have gone on to do really great things, so I’m very excited about how it’s going,” Friar says. 

Merryll Kallungal ’24 works under a biosafety cabinet at ATCC. Interns Jason Bose (left) and Tamilore Akinde (second from left) and an ATCC lead scientist observe.

So is William R. LaCourse, CNMS dean, which offers the TLST program. He envisioned the program years before the first two students walked onto the USG campus, and it came together with input from faculty at Montgomery College and five departments at UMBC.

“TLST is an innovative and practical education that combines ‘know-what’ and ‘know-how,’” says LaCourse. “It is a highly flexible program with various pathways to serve the ever-changing needs of a growing industry. TLST is where the silos of disciplines break down and cross-disciplinary knowledge is the goal—both in content and practice.”

The program is shaping up just as LaCourse and Annica Wayman ’99, mechanical engineering, and former associate dean for Shady Grove Affairs in CNMS who led TLST’s launch, had hoped. The state of Maryland is growing its biotech hub while UMBC students are gaining the skills they need to succeed in the workplace and getting well-paying jobs, and the student population is growing.

Connections that build confidence

Just as important as high-demand lab skills, students and alumni value the relationships they’ve formed with faculty. “Every teacher I had was very supportive, very understanding, very willing to work with me,” Petros says. “I think it’s important to get your money’s worth out of college, and I definitely feel like I got that and more in TLST because of the support network that I had there and my teachers.”

Petros is still in touch periodically with Wayman and Friar. “Dr. Wayman was a shining inspiration. She’s just a wonderful person. She’s so knowledgeable and always willing to help,” Petros says. The support she has and the success she’s found now have inspired Petros to look back and help those coming up behind her. In addition to USG resources, as a student Petros attended networking events offered by BioBuzz, a community resource for biotech industry professionals and job seekers in the Capital Biohealth Region. In fact, it’s how she found her current role. 

Today Petros is a BioBuzz Ambassador. “I wish I had known about BioBuzz when I first started in biotech,” she says. “Now I want to be that advocate for younger students or people who are just starting in science.”

A strong foundation

“Our students come to us because they want to make a difference in people’s lives, but they don’t necessarily want to go to medical school,” Friar says. It doesn’t hurt that “we have some really spectacular facilities that are a real draw for students,” she adds. 

The Biological Sciences and Engineering Building opened at USG in fall 2019 and boasts beautiful modern laboratories and classrooms plus plenty of comfy nooks for meeting with a study group or just relaxing. TLST has also received over $1 million dollars from the National Institute for Innovation in Manufacturing Pharmaceuticals, some of which has supported further upgrades and additions to the teaching laboratories. 

A flow cytometer, a machine that can detect properties of interest in up to 10,000 cells per minute, will enable a new mixed undergraduate/graduate course in flow cytometry launching next spring, for example. And equipment to practice skills like protein purification, biomanufacturing processes, and cell culture create rare opportunities for undergraduates. A required TLST course covers the wide range of instrumentation you might find in a modern biotech laboratory.

It’s normal for students to start off nervous when they use complicated and expensive equipment or work with human cells for the first time. “But by the end, they are old hands, and I think they would feel comfortable tackling anything in that lab on their own,” Friar says. “And it’s because the curriculum is really well scaffolded. We add skills as they go along, and then we repeat the old skills. The program is set up to foster growth and independence.”

Princess Nyamali stepped away from the centrifuge for a moment during Biotechnology 303 to share that the TLST coursework “is a really good foundation.” She’s currently completing an internship at NIST, and “everything I’m learning in this cell culture class is stuff I’m doing at NIST.” While it might have been daunting at first, trying so many different things across the TLST curriculum “helps you know that you want to do it,” she says, in addition to showing potential employers that you can.

TLST student Fae Switzer works at the microscope with guidance from her mentor, Emma Todd, at ATCC.

Thinking ahead

Although the two-year program initially targeted transfers from regional community colleges, “we were getting so much interest from students on the Catonsville campus, we went ahead and put it on the list of majors for freshmen applying to UMBC,” Friar says. “That’s been the fastest growing cohort in our major.”

Steven Schaffer transferred to TLST after starting on the main campus in bioinformatics. Now he is in the bioinformatics track within TLST; the other option is a biomanufacturing track. Schaffer likes that there is a strong cohort connection because everyone takes mostly the same classes together. “I would recommend TLST. It’s a growing field and the skills you learn are very versatile,” Schaffer adds.

Schaffer hopes to eventually take on a role that leans into engineering at a place like Northrop Grumman. But before that, he’s eyeing UMBC’s Master of Professional Studies in biotechnology. The M.P.S. degree offers advanced instruction in the life sciences, plus coursework in regulatory affairs, leadership, management, and financial management. Friar describes it as “a cross between a science master’s and an M.B.A.”   

Academic decathletes

Soon, the confident students in Friar’s cell biology class will arrive in labs across Montgomery County, the capital region, and beyond. They will contribute to drug discovery and production, design manufacturing processes, and, eventually, lead teams and make strategic decisions for major biotech companies. 

Jeff Galvin, the ATG CEO, referred to TLST alumni as “academic decathletes.” Like decathletes, they have an array of skills and perform all of them admirably. But rather than medals, they’re seeking an opportunity to contribute to positive change through their work. They’ll translate basic science into diagnostic tests, treatments for disease, and more to improve the lives of their neighbors in Maryland and those in need around the world. 

ATCC’s SPARC internship program offers opportunities for TLST students to conduct meaningful work in the biotech industry. Merryll Kallungal (far left) transitioned from her internship to a full-time role at ATCC this summer. 

SPARC-ing Rewarding Careers 

Just 10 minutes from USG in Gaithersburg, Maryland, biotech company ATCC has capitalized on the TLST talent pipeline. Their Student Partnership and Research Collaboration (SPARC) Program requires USG enrollment and offers qualified students paid, part-time career opportunities throughout the academic year at ATCC’s research facility. As the leading developer and supplier of authenticated cell lines, microorganisms, and associated data for academia, industry, and government, a successful internship at ATCC is a feather in the cap for students pursuing a TLST degree.

Of the seven interns selected for the SPARC program this year, four are TLST students—and they are thriving. The interns praised their SPARC experience while donning lab coats, shoe booties, safety glasses, and gloves in one of ATCC’s labs—where keeping employees safe and protecting lab samples and products from contamination is mission critical. 

“I love the TLST program!” exclaimed Fae Switzer, who has wanted to pursue a career in biotech since she learned about CRISPR, the gene-editing platform, as a child. Switzer, a SPARC associate biologist in the microphysiological unit, notes that things she learned in her UMBC classes prepared her for the internship, and things she’s learning at ATCC now are helping her in her classes.

Jason Bose, a SPARC associate biologist on the microbiology team, knew he was interested in biologybut not medical school. When Bose learned about TLST, he thought, “Wow, this aligns with what I want to do,” he says. “It’s been really great so far.” He even uses the basic coding skills and tricks for Excel spreadsheets that he learned in class—which at the time he wasn’t so sure about. “Yep, I use them all the time at ATCC,” he says. 

Tamilore Akinde completed an internship last summer at ATCC’s headquarters in Manassas, Virginia, and now she is a SPARC intern. “I like that TLST teaches multidisciplinary skills,” she says. Being able to pivot toward different opportunities that come her way is valuable, she adds. 

“The hands-on lab training provided by the TLST program has prepared students for impactful careers at ATCC,” shares Ruth Cheng, general manager and senior vice president for research and industrial solutions at ATCC. “Witnessing students like Merryll Kallungal transition from the SPARC program to a full-time role in cryobiology R&D is a testament to the power of this collaboration.”

After interning at ATCC, Kallungal graduated from TLST in May and assumed a full-time associate biologist role in the cryobiology group in June. The lab techniques she learned in TLST came in handy at ATCC, and she has already learned a lot of new things, too. “I absolutely love what I do,” she says. 

A few weeks into her summer internship with pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca, rising senior Ortisemoyowa “Moyo” Ikomi, chemical engineering, attended an event celebrating a milestone in the company’s construction of a new drug manufacturing plant in Rockville, Maryland. During the event, the organizers played a video featuring a young girl whose seemingly terminal cancer was cured with immunotherapy drugs—the same type of drugs that would be manufactured in the new facility.

“This girl was in hospice care, at home with her family who thought they might just have to wait for her life to end, and this drug gave her a new lease on life. It drove home for me how important this work is, and how I would love to keep working in the pharmaceutical industry,” says Ikomi.

Ikomi landed her internship with AstraZeneca after talking with a company representative at the UMBC Career Fair. She worked on the company’s management of the planned Rockville plant, investigating a software tool that could track construction progress.

“It’s not traditional chemical engineering, more within the realm of project management of large-scale engineering projects. I’m definitely enjoying it,” Ikomi says. “I’ve learned so much during the internship. The experience has made me think I’d like to continue working in the engineering project management sphere.”

Ikomi credits the UMBC Career Center with supporting her throughout her internship application process—consulting with her on application timelines, uncovering resources for finding job openings, and offering tips for honing her resume and interviewing skills. “They offer an invaluable service,” she says. “Even more students could benefit from using them.” 

Ikomi, who came to UMBC from Lagos, Nigeria, says she arrived thinking she wanted to be a scientific researcher. When she realized basic research wasn’t the best fit for her, faculty and fellow students listened as she talked through her dilemma and offered advice on other options. She found that her true passions lay in shepherding discoveries from the lab to the wider world, where they could directly impact people’s lives.

Since that celebration event at AstraZeneca, Ikomi says she often thinks back to the video of the young girl who was cured of cancer. “When I think of this internship as a whole, my mind always goes to that experience. That moment crystallized that this type of work is what I want to dedicate my career to.” 

UMBC is strengthening the university’s research connection with the energy company Constellation, expanding on a partnership of more than 20 years with the Baltimore-based business. Constellation, the nation’s largest producer of carbon-free energy, funds scholarships and has endowed a professorship in mechanical engineering at UMBC, regularly recruits students for internships and jobs, and hosts its annual Youth Energy Summit on the UMBC campus.

In March, UMBC and Constellation signed a Master Research Agreement, which will facilitate greater research collaboration between the two organizations. In April, Constellation sent representatives to the College of Engineering and Information Technology’s (COEIT’s) inaugural Research Day to connect with UMBC faculty and students. And in June, research leaders from both organizations met to discuss potential areas of joint work, including carbon-free energy generation, environmental protection and pollution remediation, and efforts to make the power grid more resilient and secure. 

“The best research will happen as we grow this partnership organically,” says Anupam Joshi, acting dean of COEIT. “We are proud to be a Tier 1 university partner of Constellation Energy. The interactions of our faculty and students with Constellation’s representatives during Research Day have already led to initial ideas where we can work together. We are also actively pursuing collaborations in other areas of mutual interest and environmental importance.” 

“As part of our efforts to accelerate the nation’s clean energy future, it’s vital that we enhance our understanding of the emerging technologies being developed today,” said Uuganbayar “Ugi” Otgonbaatar, Constellation’s director of Technology Strategy, Grants, and Partnerships. “We are grateful for our longstanding partnership with a leading local institution in UMBC and look forward to continuing to explore its research portfolio as part of our broader collaboration.”

UMBC and Morgan Stanley have established a new partnership to support students and research in data-intensive computing fields. The collaboration is made possible by Morgan Stanley’s contribution of $125,000 toward several UMBC initiatives, renewable annually for up to four additional years.

The financial services firm will support scholarships for students in UMBC’s computer science programs who are doing research focused on data science related topics, to help meet increasing demand for skilled data professionals in Maryland and across the United States. UMBC’s Center of Accelerated Real Time Analytics will also receive funding from Morgan Stanley to support research addressing major data storage and analytics/machine learning  challenges by using next-generation hardware. Additionally, Morgan Stanley will continue to work with the UMBC Career Center as an employer partner, and leverage UMBC Training Centers for Morgan Stanley leadership and data science course training.

Reflecting on the new scholarship program in particular, Anupam Joshi, UMBC’s chair of computer science and electrical engineering, says, “We are excited to grow our collaboration with Morgan Stanley to prepare talented students for data-focused careers.”

Scholarships will be awarded through the newly established Data Science Scholarship Fund. UMBC faculty and staff will select student recipients based on academic achievement and a desire to do research in data science related areas.

The initial group of selected scholars has four women and four men. “Morgan Stanley already employs so many UMBC graduates and student interns,” says Joshi. “This scholarship fund further supports our shared commitment to developing a diverse talent pool for the future.”

“Training the next generation of data scientists and investing in data science research are both key to advancing technology innovation,” said Michael Wertheimer, Technology Managing Director at Morgan Stanley. “We are thrilled to support UMBC and look forward to welcoming UMBC graduates interested in joining Morgan Stanley.”

Scholarship recipients will also have the opportunity to meet with Morgan Stanley executives to network and learn about career pathways within the company, while taking courses at UMBC in topics such as computing principles, data analysis, machine learning, high performance computing, data management, and ethical and legal issues.

Banner image: Morgan Stanley scholarship recipients with Dr. Joshi in October 2018. From top left, Caroline Kery ’18, computer science and mathematics, and M.S. ’20, computer science; Kasra Darvish, Ph.D. ’24, computer science; and Nitu Choudhary, M.S. ’20, computer science. From middle left, Sandesh Timilsina, M.S. ’20, computer science; Devajit Asem, M.S. ’20, computer science; and Christian Angel Ph.D. ’24, computer science. From bottom left, Prachi Bhalerao, M.S. ’20, computer science, and Rebecca Brennan, M.S. ’20, computer science. Photo by Raquel Hamner ’21, visual arts.

More than 1,800 students arrived with resumes in hand to connect directly with top global and local companies, government agencies, and nonprofit organizations at UMBC’s Fall Career and Internship Fair. Recruiters from 140 employers were drawn to UMBC’s largest annual recruiting event to share opportunities with students across all colleges and programs. In the days before and after the fair, several organizations—such as Google—also made special pitches to UMBC students.

Google’s visit was part of a larger trend at the university. In the fall semester alone, more than twenty Fortune 500 companies will visit campus through the UMBC Career Center to recruit students for internship and job opportunities. This list includes household names like Google, Facebook, ExxonMobil, Microsoft, Northrop Grumman, Morgan Stanley, Wells Fargo, General Motors, and Goldman Sachs. Strong local employers visiting campus to recruit UMBC talent include McCormick, T. Rowe Price, Legg Mason, Big Huge Games, and the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab, among others.

During Google’s campus visit, UMBC students had several opportunities to connect with recruiters from the company. At their information session, Google provided helpful tips on applying for internships and jobs with the company. Later in the week, Google representatives met with students to answer specific questions about working at Google, offered a tech talk, and hosted a coding competition for students.

“Having graduated from UMBC myself, I know firsthand that students here are well prepared for opportunities during and after college,” said Eric Griswold ’13, computer science, an engineer at Google, who led the tech talk on campus. “I am truly inspired by the energy and passion UMBC students have; they are definitely on their way to thriving careers in the tech industry.”

Several current students completed internships at the company last summer, including William Gao ‘19, computer science; Deepika Rajani ‘19, computer science; and Ashley Copenhaver ‘19, mathematics, who has completed multiple Google internships.

“Over the course of my internships with Google,” Copenhaver says, “the most unique aspect I noticed was that Google promotes a constant learning environment. I collaborated with people not only in my office, but also across the globe, and there was never a meeting that I walked out of without learning something new.” She hopes to intern again with the company in summer 2019.

Gao shared a similar experience, noting, “Google helped me learn from industry professionals and use industry level tools.”

That experience also shaped his approach to learning when back on campus. “After the internship,” he says, “I adjusted my approach in the classroom so that I can start cultivating the skills I know I will need in the work environment.”

Students seeking job and internship opportunities can follow the Career Center through myUMBC, utilize the UMBCworks jobs database, and can also take advantage of personalized coaching and support provided by UMBC Career Center staff.

Employers interested in recruiting at UMBC can contact careers@umbc.edu for assistance.

Banner image: Students at a Career and Internship Fair in 2017. Photo by Marlayna Demond ’11 for UMBC.

A team of researchers from UMBC’s Center for Advanced Sensor Technology (CAST) and department of chemical, biochemical, and environmental engineering is working to develop a new, low-cost anti-malarial drug to help tackle a disease that causes over 200 million infections and 400,000 deaths annually, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

Peng Xu, assistant professor; Xudong Ge, research associate professor; and Govind Rao, professor, received $422,623 from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to support the research. Xu and Ge are the co-PIs on the grant, and Rao is the project director.

Therapies that contain artemisinin have shown to be an effective first-line treatment for malaria. Artemisinin is derived from extracts of the wormwood plant. This makes it relatively affordable to produce, but also means the medication supply depends on having an abundant and steady source of the plant.

With the support of the grant, the UMBC research group will develop a scalable and cost-effective production process. Through genetic and process engineering, they will develop an alternative yeast that can be used to more affordably produce artemisinic acid.

“This work builds on CAST’s unique strength in sensor technology and couples it with innovative yeast metabolic engineering,” Rao says. “We are excited to work with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to develop a cost-efficient manufacturing process, and, ultimately, to help eradicate malaria around the world.”

Banner image: Peng Xu, left, and Xudong Ge, right, work with a student to develop an anti-malarial drug. Photo by Marlayna Demond ’11 for UMBC.

UMBC welcomed 50 IBM executives and research leaders to campus on Friday, April 6, for a day-long event designed to broaden the robust research relationship between the two organizations and introduce students to emerging career opportunities at IBM. Nearly 250 faculty, staff, students, and partners participated in IBM-UMBC Day.

UMBC’s work with IBM began nearly 25 years ago and has branched across a wide range of topics. The university’s most recent research collaboration with IBM connects artificial intelligence with cybersecurity, explained Keith J. Bowman, dean of UMBC’s College of Engineering and Information Technology. Two new areas of likely future collaboration include quantum computing and blockchain.

Dave McQueeney, vice president of Corporate Technology and Community and Global University Programs at IBM (and UMBC’s executive champion), gave welcoming remarks for the company. Bowman introduced Anupam Joshi, chair and professor of computer science and electrical engineering (CSEE) at UMBC, who has completed two sabbaticals at IBM. He also welcomed Yelena Yesha, distinguished professor of CSEE, and Andy Rindos, head of IBM’s RTP Center for Advanced Studies, who were instrumental in organizing IBM-UMBC Day. The welcoming speakers set the tone for the event, highlighting a shared commitment to combining diverse perspectives to explore cutting edge research areas in new and exciting ways.

Michelle Browdy, IBM’s senior vice president for legal and regulatory affairs, and general counsel, delivered the keynote talk about the intersection of law, technology, and public policy. “It takes a village,” she said, noting that this phrase is especially important in the science and technology space, where collaboration is crucial.

Browdy emphasized that her legal team regularly works with business teams and engineers, particularly when technologies are being moved from the lab to the public. She shared how she sees engineers as developing products for people to use and enjoy, and her legal team as an essential complement, managing everything from patents to ensuring compliance with regulations.

Following the keynote, technical experts from UMBC and IBM gave brief talks on areas such as quantum computing, cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, cloud computing, the internet of things, and blockchain. UMBC professors Todd Pittman, physics, and Sam Lomonaco, CSEE, joined Andrew Wack, Q platform architect at IBM, in the first technical talk of the day, discussing recent developments in quantum computing and how the field is impacting other industries.

Next, Jeff Crume, distinguished engineer at IBM, and Joshi explored how institutions are making strides in addressing the kinds of cybersecurity concerns that are now making headlines worldwide. Joshi discussed his lab’s work connecting artificial intelligence and cybersecurity, and he also described how combining the expertise of people from different fields is essential to creating effective and lasting solutions to cybersecurity challenges. Speaking in the realm of cyber attack prevention and response, he commented, “We have economists on our faculty who are looking at what the attack costs…and we have public policy colleagues who look at the barriers of adoption of cybersecurity.”

Also highlighted in Crume and Joshi’s talk was the Accelerated Cognitive Cybersecurity Lab, which opened in 2016 as a collaboration between UMBC and IBM. The lab is one of many ways in which UMBC and IBM are continuing to grow their partnership, breaking ground in new research areas by combining the creativity and expertise of UMBC faculty and students with the extraordinary technical capabilities of IBM, and together preparing the next generation of computing professionals.

After a lunch break featuring technical demos, networking opportunities, and student research presentations, participants regrouped for a discussion about the Watson computer system and cloud computing. Presenters included Mac Devine, vice president of IBM Watson and Cloud Platform; Tim Finin, professor of CSEE, an expert on cloud computing; and Yesha, who has worked with IBM on computing research since the 1990s. Yesha is director of the new Center for Accelerated Real Time Analytics, a $3 million NSF partnership. She described how the center will deploy next-generation computing hardware to solve significant infrastructure challenges, such as protecting massive data sets in the cloud.

Nilanjan Banerjee, associate professor of CSEE, next discussed the internet of things and cyber-physical systems, specifically his lab’s work on small sensors. His team’s sensors can be used to monitor whether people operating vehicles are drowsy, and can be used by people with mobility challenges to control devices in their environment. Tim Hahn, distinguished engineer and chief architect of internet of things security at IBM, shared how his team is addressing security issues associated with now-ubiquitous cyber-physical technologies.

Roman Vaculin, IBM research, concluded the technical talks with a discussion of how IBM is developing blockchain solutions that can be used across industries.

Throughout the day, speakers returned time and again to a core idea emphasized at the start of the day: that bringing together different perspectives is key to success in creating new technologies with the potential to change people’s lives. “We need lawyers and we need engineers,” said Browdy, in her keynote address. “We are shaped and we get opportunities to grow by being exposed to people in a lot of different areas.”

Video recordings from IBM-UMBC Day can be found on the UMBC YouTube channel.

Featured image: A student poses with Pepper, a humanoid robot, at IBM-UMBC Day. All photos by Marlayna Demond ’11 for UMBC.