February 28, 2012

To:       The UMBC Community
From:   Freeman Hrabowski, President
Diane Lee, Dean of Undergraduate Education

With great sadness, we must let you know that LaMont Toliver, Director of the Meyerhoff Scholars Program and Assistant Dean of Undergraduate Education, passed away late this morning after suffering a heart attack on campus.

This is a tragic loss for LaMont’s immediate family – his wife, Lisa, and his four sons, Jacquet, Tristan, Julian, and Jordan, and a granddaughter, Kamry Toliver.  (Both Julian and Jordan are students here on campus.)

LaMont’s passing is a tragic loss as well for the Meyerhoff Scholars Program family and the entire University community.  LaMont graced us with his considerable abilities for the past 22 years – his leadership and deep compassion, and his wisdom, wit, and determination.  His example will continue to inspire us, and the strong community of scholars he loved will comfort us in the days ahead.

As soon as we receive information from the Toliver family regarding funeral arrangements, we will let the campus community know.  In the meantime, please keep LaMont and members of his family in your thoughts and prayers.

* * * *

Further information is available online at the Meyerhoff Scholars Program website: http://www.umbc.edu/meyerhoff

Military personnel are facing an increasing security threat posed by their smart phones and other mobile devices, argues an article on DefenseSystems.com. While the potential of mobile devices to leak personal secrets has been a cause for concern for all, the issue has the potential to be devestating for soldiers who could unwittingly leak crucial information to the enemy through compromised networks.

In the article, our very own Richard Forno, graduate program director for cybersecurity, shares his own concerns about cloud safety:

“One key area of emerging concern is data-in-motion within a cloud — i.e., ensuring that data is protected as it transits and/or exists in multiple servers at the same time, and by extension, the issue of ‘availability’ of data in a cloud environment,” Forno said. “The more moving parts you have to deal with, the easier it is to gum up the works, inadvertently cause self-inflicted problems, or make it easier for an adversary to do the same thing.”

Check out the entire article: "Smart phones pose emerging security threat."

Congratulations to CSEE Professor Tulay Adali, who has been named a 2012 IEEE Signal Processing Society Distinguished Lecturer. Nominated by the Machine Learning for Signal Processing Technical Committee, Dr. Adali is one of only five Distinguished Lecturers appointed this year.

The position commits Dr. Adali to travel around to world to present her current research, which focuses on data-driven and complex-valued signal processing and their applications in medical image analysis.

Her lectures will revolve around the following topics:

• Data-driven Analysis and Fusion of Medical Imaging Data
• Complex-valued Adaptive Signal Processing: When and How to Take Noncircularity into Account
• ICA, ISA, and IVA: Theory, Connections, and Applications in Medical Image Analysis
• Optimization in the Complex Domain using Wirtinger Calculus: Applications to ICA
• Joint Blind Source Separation: Applications in Medical Image Analysis

“My research group,theMachine Learning for Signal Processing Lab [MLSP-Lab], has been conducting research in two of the most active areas in my field: data-driven signal processing and medical image analysis and fusion,” explains Dr. Adali. “I am looking forward to telling a wider audience than I have in the past about the exciting research results we have, as well as better introducing these important areas to new audiences.”

The appointment will last from January 1, 2012 until the end of December 2013.

Jaws Film Screening

Student Events Board
Thursday, March 1, 2012
10:00pm
Shuttle from The Commons Circle begins @ 9:00pm
All Guests = $3.00

Ticket #: 2

Norouz

Persian Student Association

Saturday, March 3, 201

8:00pm

University Center, Ballroom

UMBC ID = FREE (limit 1 per ID)

General Admission = $15.00

Ticket #: 38

fun.

Student Events Board

Sunday, March 4, 2012

8:00pm (doors open at 7:00pm)

University Center, Ballroom

All Guests = $10.00 (must show UMBC or photo ID)

Ticket #: 1355

D. C. Bus Trip

Student Events Board

March 31, 2012

Bus departs The Commons Circle @ 10:00am

All Guests = $15.00

Ticket #: 39

Thanks to NPR

Is the air in your neighborhood toxic?

For thousands of Americans the answer to that question is “yes”.

Americans living near power plants endure cancerous pollutants and the subsequent illnesses due to the compromised atmosphere.

The evidence is staggering. Now citizens are increasingly demanding the Environment Protection agency (EPA) live up to its name.

A particular case is in Tonawanda, NY . Jeani Thomson who survived multiple cancers has rallied for over 30 years asking the EPA to notice the needs of her community:

Her voice has that raspy smokers sound although she has never had a cigarette.

On the other hand, there are problems regulating toxic emissions…particularly if the monitoring is left to the polluting companies themselves.

Coincidentally, a documentary was just released that is sure to make a splash discusses “one of the largest water contamination incidents in US history,”which, to boot, harmed our own service men and women.

It appears the much maligned (and under staffed) EPA has got its work cut out for it.