Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Blockchain Based Access Control For Enterprise Blockchain Applications, Lei Xu, Isaac Markus, Subhod I, Nikhil Nayab

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

Access control is one of the fundamental security mechanisms of IT systems. Most existing access control schemes rely on a centralized party to manage and enforce access control policies. As blockchain technologies, especially permissioned networks, find more applicability beyond cryptocurrencies in enterprise solutions, it is expected that the security requirements will increase. Therefore, it is necessary to develop an access control system that works in a decentralized environment without compromising the unique features of a blockchain. A straightforward method to support access control is to deploy a firewall in front of the enterprise blockchain application. However, this approach does not …

Kcrs: A Blockchain-Based Key Compromise Resilient Signature System, Lei Xu, Lin Chen, Zhimin Gao, Xinxin Fan, Kimberly Doan, Shouhuai Xu, Weidong Shi

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

Digital signatures are widely used to assure authenticity and integrity of messages (including blockchain transactions). This assurance is based on assumption that the private signing key is kept secret, which may be exposed or compromised without being detected in the real world. Many schemes have been proposed to mitigate this problem, but most schemes are not compatible with widely used digital signature standards and do not help detect private key exposures. In this paper, we propose a Key Compromise Resilient Signature (KCRS) system, which leverages blockchain to detect key compromises and mitigate the consequences. Our solution keeps a log of …

An Accelerated Hierarchical Approach For Object Shape Extraction And Recognition, Mahmoud K. Quweider, Bassam Arshad, Hansheng Lei, Liyu Zhang, Fitratullah Khan

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

We present a novel automatic supervised object recognition algorithm based on a scale and rotation invariant Fourier descriptors algorithm. The algorithm is hierarchical in nature to capture the inherent intra-contour spatial relationships between the parent and child contours of an object. A set of distance metrics are introduced to go along with the hierarchical model. To test the algorithm, a diverse database of shapes is created and used to train standard classification algorithms, for shape-labeling. The implemented algorithm takes advantage of the multi-threaded architecture and GPU efficient image-processing functions present in OpenCV wherever possible, speeding up the running time and …

Safedb: Spark Acceleration On Fpga Clouds With Enclaved Data Processing And Bitstream Protection, Han-Yee Kim, Rohyoung Myung, Boeui Hong, Heonchang Yu, Taeweon Suh, Lei Xu, Weidong Shi

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

This paper proposes SafeDB: Spark Acceleration on FPGA Clouds with Enclaved Data Processing and Bitstream Protection. SafeDB provides a comprehensive and systematic hardware-based security framework from the bitstream protection to data confidentiality, especially for the cloud environment. The AES key shared between FPGA and client for the bitstream encryption is generated in hard-wired logic using PKI and ECC. The data security is assured by the enclaved processing with encrypted data, meaning that the encrypted data is processed inside the FPGA fabric. Thus, no one in the system is able to look into clients' data because plaintext data are not exposed …

A Novel Method For Intelligent Single Fault Detection Of Bearings Using Sae And Improved D–S Evidence Theory, Jianguang Lu, Huan Zhang, Xianghong Tang

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

In order to realize single fault detection (SFD) from the multi-fault coupling bearing data and further research on the multi-fault situation of bearings, this paper proposes a method based on features self-extraction of a Sparse Auto-Encoder (SAE) and results fusion of improved Dempster–Shafer evidence theory (D–S). Multi-fault signal compression features of bearings were extracted by SAE on multiple vibration sensors’ data. Data sets were constructed by the extracted compression features to train the Support Vector Machine (SVM) according to the rule of single fault detection (R-SFD) this paper proposed. Fault detection results were obtained by the improved D–S evidence theory, …

The Computer Science Professional's Hatchery, Amit Jain, Noah Salzman, Donald Winiecki

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

As a recipient of a National Science Foundation Revolutionizing Engineering and Computer Science Departments (RED) grant, the Computer Science Department at the Boise State University is building a Computer Science (CS) Professionals Hatchery. This paper is a summary to accompany the poster to be presented.

Event Trend Aggregation Under Rich Event Matching Semantics, Olga Poppe, Chuan Lei, Elke A. Rundensteiner, David Maier

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

Streaming applications from cluster monitoring to algorithmic trading deploy Kleene queries to detect and aggregate event trends. Rich event matching semantics determine how to compose events into trends. The expressive power of stateof- the-art streaming systems remains limited since they do not support many of these semantics. Worse yet, they suffer from long delays and high memory costs because they maintain aggregates at a fine granularity. To overcome these limitations, our Coarse-Grained Event Trend Aggregation (Cogra) approach supports a rich variety of event matching semantics within one system. Better yet, Cogra incrementally maintains aggregates at the coarsest granularity possible for …

A Holistic Approach For Enhancing Distributed Education With Multi-Campus Course Delivery Methods, Mahmoud K. Quweider, Ala Qubbaj, Liyu Zhang, Fitratullah Khan, Hansheng Lei

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

To create an emerging research institution, a regional university was created that spans multiple campuses within a radius of more than one hundred miles by merging at least three current institutions. The merge allowed the university to pool its human and technical resources. Students can now pursue new degrees that were not available before at one campus or another, take a newly available technical or specialty courses, and even select their own preferred professor when a course is offered by many faculty. In order to serve students at multiple campuses that are geographically far a part, the university instituted policies …

Cross-Validating Traffic Speed Measurements From Probe And Stationary Sensors Through State Reconstruction, Jia Li, Kenneth Perrine, Lidong Wu, C. Michael Walton

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

Traffic speed on freeways can be measured by two types of technologies, i.e. probe sensors and stationary sensors. Cross-validation is critical to ensure the consistency between heterogeneous measurements. A challenge lies in the mismatch of probe and stationary measurements in space and time, especially when one of them is relatively sparse. Towards filling the gap, this paper presents a cross-validation method based on traffic state reconstruction. The proposed method is computationally simple and robust. This makes it ready to be implemented for large data sets without complicated tuning. We present analytical formulation of the proposed method and an analysis of …

Optimal Staged Self-Assembly Of Linear Assemblies, Cameron Chalk, Eric Martinez, Robert Schweller, Luis Vega, Andrew Winslow, Tim Wylie

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

We analyze the complexity of building linear assemblies, sets of linear assemblies, and O(1)-scale general shapes in the staged tile assembly model. For systems with at most b bins and t tile types, we prove that the minimum number of stages to uniquely assemble a 1 n line is (logt n + logb n t + 1). Generalizing to O(1) n lines, we prove the minimum number of stages is O( log n tb t log t b2 + log log b log t ) and

( log n tb t log t b2 ). Next, we consider assembling sets …

High-Speed Video From Asynchronous Camera Array, Si Lu

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

This paper presents a method for capturing high-speed video using an asynchronous camera array. Our method sequentially fires each sensor in a camera array with a small time offset and assembles captured frames into a high-speed video according to the time stamps. The resulting video, however, suffers from parallax jittering caused by the viewpoint difference among sensors in the camera array. To address this problem, we develop a dedicated novel view synthesis algorithm that transforms the video frames as if they were captured by a single reference sensor. Specifically, for any frame from a non-reference sensor, we find the two …

Good Similar Patches For Image Denoising, Si Lu

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

Patch-based denoising algorithms like BM3D have achieved outstanding performance. An important idea for the success of these methods is to exploit the recurrence of similar patches in an input image to estimate the underlying image structures. However, in these algorithms, the similar patches used for denoising are obtained via Nearest Neighbour Search (NNS) and are sometimes not optimal. First, due to the existence of noise, NNS can select similar patches with similar noise patterns to the reference patch. Second, the unreliable noisy pixels in digital images can bring a bias to the patch searching process and result in a loss …

Cophosk: A Method For Comprehensive Kinase Substrate Annotation Using Co-Phosphorylation Analysis, Marzieh Ayati, Danica Wiredja, Daniela Schlatzer, Sean Maxwell, Ming Li, Mehmet Koyutürk, Mark R. Chance

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

We present CoPhosK to predict kinase-substrate associations for phosphopeptide substrates detected by mass spectrometry (MS). The tool utilizes a Naïve Bayes framework with priors of known kinase-substrate associations (KSAs) to generate its predictions. Through the mining of MS data for the collective dynamic signatures of the kinases’ substrates revealed by correlation analysis of phosphopeptide intensity data, the tool infers KSAs in the data for the considerable body of substrates lacking such annotations. We benchmarked the tool against existing approaches for predicting KSAs that rely on static information (e.g. sequences, structures and interactions) using publically available MS data, including breast, colon, …

Randomized Parameterized Algorithms For The Kidney Exchange Problem, Mugang Lin, Jianxin Wang, Qilong Feng, Bin Fu

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

In order to increase the potential kidney transplants between patients and their incompatible donors, kidney exchange programs have been created in many countries. In the programs, designing algorithms for the kidney exchange problem plays a critical role. The graph theory model of the kidney exchange problem is to find a maximum weight packing of vertex-disjoint cycles and chains for a given weighted digraph. In general, the length of cycles is not more than a given constant L (typically 2 L 5), and the objective function corresponds to maximizing the number of possible kidney transplants. In this paper, we study the …

Recommender Systems Notation, Michael D. Ekstrand, Joseph A. Konstan

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

As the field of recommender systems has developed, authors have used a myriad of notations for describing the mathematical workings of recommendation algorithms. These notations appear in research papers, books, lecture notes, blog posts, and software documentation. The disciplinary diversity of the field has not contributed to consistency in notation; scholars whose home base is in information retrieval have different habits and expectations than those in machine learning or human-computer interaction.

In the course of years of teaching and research on recommender systems, we have seen the value in adopting a consistent notation across our work. This has been particularly …

Artificial Intelligence Hits The Barrier Of Meaning, Melanie Mitchell

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

Today’s AI systems sorely lack the essence of human intelligence: Understanding the situations we experience, being able to grasp their meaning. The lack of humanlike understanding in machines is underscored by recent studies demonstrating lack of robustness of state-of-the-art deep-learning systems. Deeper networks and larger datasets alone are not likely to unlock AI’s “barrier of meaning”; instead the field will need to embrace its original roots as an interdisciplinary science of intelligence.

Fairness And Discrimination In Recommendation And Retrieval, Michael D. Ekstrand, Robin Burke, Fernando Diaz

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

Fairness and related concerns have become of increasing importance in a variety of AI and machine learning contexts. They are also highly relevant to recommender systems and related problems such as information retrieval, as evidenced by the growing literature in RecSys, FAT*, SIGIR, and special sessions such as the FATREC and FACTS-IR workshops and the Fairness track at TREC 2019; however, translating algorithmic fairness constructs from classification, scoring, and even many ranking settings into recommendation and other information access scenarios is not a straightforward task. This tutorial will help orient RecSys researchers to algorithmic fairness, understand how concepts do and …

Full Tilt: Universal Constructors For General Shapes With Uniform External Forces, Jose Balanza-Martinez, Austin Luchsinger, David Caballero, Rene Reyes, Angel A. Cantu, Robert Schweller, Luis Angel Garcia, Tim Wylie

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

We investigate the problem of assembling general shapes and patterns in a model in which particles move based on uniform external forces until they encounter an obstacle. In this model, corresponding particles may bond when adjacent with one another. Succinctly, this model considers a 2D grid of “open” and “blocked” spaces, along with a set of slidable polyominoes placed at open locations on the board. The board may be tilted in any of the 4 cardinal directions, causing all slidable polyominoes to move maximally in the specified direction until blocked. By successively applying a sequence of such tilts, along with …

Pushing The Boundaries Of Participatory Design With Children With Special Needs, Jerry Alan Fails

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

Despite its inherent challenges, participatory design (PD) has unique benefits when designing technology for children, especially children with special needs. Researchers have developed a multitude of PD approaches to accommodate specific populations. However, a lack of understanding of the appropriateness of existing approaches across contexts presents a challenge for PD researchers. This workshop will provide an opportunity for PD researchers to exchange and reflect on their experiences of designing with children with special needs. We aim to identify, synthesize and collate PD best practices across contexts and participant groups.

Panel: Broadening The Discussion Of Ethics In The Interaction Design And Children Community, Christopher Frauenberger, Monica Landoni, Jerry Alan Fails, Janet C. Read, Alissa N. Antle, Pauline Gourlet

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

Interaction Design and Children (IDC) as an academic field, and as a community, has a responsibility to engage with the many and diverse ethical challenges that arise from work that concerns the creation of digital technology for and with children – both in terms of research and industry contexts. This panel builds on a short history of similar events at previous conferences and aims to foster and strengthen the debate about ethical conduct and moral responsibilities in IDC. In this year’s panel, we seek to broaden the discussion by collecting ethical concerns, issues or dilemmas from within the community to …

"Anon What What?": Children's Understanding Of The Language Of Privacy, Stacy Black, Rezvan Joshaghani, Dhanush Kumar Ratakonda, Hoda Mehrpouyan, Jerry Alan Fails

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

Internet usage continues to increase among children ages 12 and younger. Because their digital interactions can be persistently stored, there is a need for building an understanding and foundational knowledge of privacy. We describe initial investigations into children’s understanding of privacy from a Contextual Integrity (CI) perspective by conducting semi-structured interviews. We share results – that echo what others have shown – that indicate children have limited knowledge and understanding of CI principles. We also share an initial exploration of utilizing participatory design theater as a possible educational mechanism to help children develop a stronger understanding of important privacy principles.

“My Name Is My Password:” Understanding Children’S Authentication Practices, Dhanush Kumar Ratakonda, Tyler French, Jerry Alan Fails

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

Children continue to use technology at an increasing rate, more and more of which require authentication via usernames and passwords.We seek to understand how children ages 5-11 years old create and use their credentials. We investigate children’s username and password understanding and practices from the perspective of both children and adults within the context of three security categories: credential composition (e.g. length of password), performance (e.g. time to enter), and credential mechanisms (e.g; a pattern or characters). We conducted a semi-structured interview with 22 children and an online survey with 33 adult participants (parents and teachers) to determine their practices …

Predicting Human Interpretations Of Affect And Valence In A Social Robot, David Mcneill, Casey Kennington

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

In this paper we seek to understand how people interpret a social robot’s performance of an emotion, what we term ‘affective display,’ and the positive or negative valence of that affect. To this end, we tasked annotators with observing the Anki Cozmo robot perform its over 900 pre-scripted behaviors and labeling those behaviors with 16 possible affective display labels (e.g., interest, boredom, disgust, etc.). In our first experiment, we trained a neural network to predict annotated labels given multimodal information about the robot’s movement, face, and audio. The results suggest that pairing affects to predict the valence between them is …

3Rd Kidrec Workshop: What Does Good Look Like?, Theo Huibers, Jerry Alan Fails, Natalia Kucirkova, Monica Landoni, Emiliana Murgia, Maria Soledad Pera

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

Today’s children spend considerable time online, searching and receiving information from various websites and apps. While searching for information, e.g. for school or hobbies, children use search systems to locate resources and receive site recommendations that might be useful for them. The call for good, reliable, child-friendly systems has been made many times and the thesis that the algorithms of “adult” information systems are not necessarily suitable or fair for children is widely accepted. However, there is still no clear and balanced view on what makes one search/recommendation system for children good or better than other systems, nor on what …

With A Little Help From My Friends: Use Of Recommendations At School, Maria Soledad Pera, Emiliana Murgia, Monica Landoni, Theo Huibers

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

In this exploratory paper, we study the usage of recommendations by and for children (ages 9 to 11) in an educational setting. From our preliminary analysis, it becomes apparent that recommender systems (RS) could provide extra support to and help children successfully complete inquiry tasks. Nonetheless, children have difficulty in recognizing the role of RS, in terms of aiding information discovery for classroom assignments. Findings from our study set a foundation that can inform future design and development of RS for children that support classroom-related work.

High-Speed Video From Asynchronous Camera Array (Poster), Si Lu

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

Poster presented at: 2019 IEEE Winter Conference on Applications of Computer Vision (WACV)

Here, There, And Everywhere: Building A Scaffolding For Children’S Learning Through Recommendations, Ashlee Milton, Emiliana Murgia, Monica Landoni, Theo Huibers, Maria Soledad Pera

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

Reading and literacy are on the decline among children. This is compounded by the fact that children have trouble with the discovery of resources that are appropriate, diverse, and appealing. With technology becoming an evermore presence in children’s lives, tools that can minimize choice overload and ease access to online resources become a must. A powerful but underutilized tool in regards to children that could assist in this situation is a recommender system (RS). We posit that RS could be used to impact children’s learning, using them to not only suggest what children might like but what they need in …

Investigating The Social And Temporal Aspects Of Children’S Physical Activity Games, Ankita Samariya, Jerry Alan Fails, Derek Hansen

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

There are a variety of fitness technologies such as activity trackers, exergames and mobile applications available to promote physical activity. Based on our previous research, we found that children prefer having social interaction, a narrative and flexibility while interacting with such technologies. Other research has shown that persuasive displays encouraged adults towards physical activity. In this research, we present the initial results from a user study conducted on 16 children (ages 6-11) who used the Kidfit suite, a collection of mobile applications that combine and utilize the elements found from previous research to promote activity in children.

Kidled: A Colorful Approach To Children's Activity Awareness, Ankita Samariya, Anud Sharma, Margiawan Fitriani, Tucker Ferguson, Jerry Alan Fails

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

Obesity in children is a growing cause of concern as it affects more than 18% of children in the United States. Sedentary behaviour is one of the contributors to childhood obesity. Technological interventions like activity trackers and fitness games have been introduced to motivate both children and adults to be physically active. Most of these technologies encourage activity by making them aware of their activity levels. While awareness of current activity levels may help motivating adults, it can be difficult for children to understand their activity levels in terms of number of steps (the most common method used by adults). …

The Seven Layers Of Complexity Of Recommender Systems For Children In Educational Contexts, Emiliana Murgia, Monica Landoni, Theo Huibers, Jerry Alan Fails, Maria Soledad Pera

Computer Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

Recommender systems (RS) in their majority focus on an average target user: adults. We argue that for non-traditional populations in specific contexts, the task is not as straightforward–we must look beyond existing recommendation algorithms, premises for interface design, and standard evaluation metrics and frameworks. We explore the complexity of RS in an educational context for which young children are the target audience. The aim of this position paper is to spell out, label, and organize the specific layers of complexity observed in this context.