April 2021 - Gradstudents - mailman.cs.vt.edu

CS Grad Council Coffee Hour
by Alex Hicks 29 Apr '21

29 Apr '21

Hi all, On behalf of the CS Graduate Council, I would like to invite you to join our Coffee Hour today at 6:00pm. We will be hosting this event in the Discord server that you can join here. We will be using the Coffee Hour channel in the Grad Council section. If you have any difficulties joining the Discord, feel free to reach out. It may be a little late for coffee but feel free to join and chat with your fellow students about research, music, or anything else. Hope to see you there! Alex Hicks Computer Science PhD Student Pratt Fellow - Virginia Tech New Horizons Graduate Scholar E // awh4kc(a)vt.edu P // (540) 336-1860

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MS thesis defense by Emma Meno (tomorrow Friday)
by Daphne Yao 29 Apr '21

29 Apr '21

Good morning! You are cordially invited to Emma's MS thesis defense on neural cryptanalysis tomorrow. Her talk info is below. Have a nice day! *Thesis Title:* Neural Cryptanalysis for Cyber-Physical System Ciphers *Name:* Emma Meno *Date/Time: * April 30th, 2021 10:00 am *Zoom:* https://virginiatech.zoom.us/j/86495332689 Meeting ID: 864 9533 2689 *Abstract:* A key cryptographic research interest is developing an automatic, black-box method to provide a relative security strength measure for symmetric ciphers, particularly for proprietary cyber-physical systems (CPS) and lightweight block ciphers. This thesis work extends the work of the recently-developed neural cryptanalysis method, which trains neural networks on a set of plaintext/ciphertext pairs to extract meaningful bitwise relationships and predict corresponding ciphertexts given a set of plaintexts. As opposed to traditional cryptanalysis, the goal is not key recovery but achieving a mimic accuracy greater than a defined base match rate. In addition to reproducing tests run with the Data Encryption Standard, this work applies neural cryptanalysis to round-reduced versions and components of the SIMON/SPECK family of block ciphers and the Advanced Encryption Standard. This methodology generated a metric able to rank the relative strengths of rounds for each cipher as well as algorithmic components within these ciphers. Given the current neural network suite tested, neural cryptanalysis is best-suited for analyzing components of ciphers rather than full encryption models. If these models are improved, this method presents a promising future in measuring the strength of lightweight symmetric ciphers, particularly for CPS. *Bio:* Emma Meno is a MS student in the Virginia Tech Department of Computer Science. In June 2021, she will begin work as a research engineer at a cybersecurity defense contractor in Northern Virginia. Most of her work has been at the intersection of machine learning and cryptography. Emma has been recognized with a graduate research award from the department, along with multiple awards in her time as an undergraduate. She graduated with her B.S. in Computer Science at Virginia Tech in May 2020 as part of the Accelerated Master's program.

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Fwd: How to Succeed in Graduate School (online panel, May 5 2021)
by Bo Ji 27 Apr '21

27 Apr '21

Dear All, Please see forwarded information about an excellent online panel on "How to Succeed in Graduate School". I am sure many of you (especially those who are more junior) will find it very useful. It is a free event, but you need to register for the event. Best regards, Bo ---------- Forwarded message --------- From: Matthew Caesar <caesar(a)illinois.edu> Date: Tue, Apr 27, 2021 at 11:44 AM Subject: How to Succeed in Graduate School (online panel, May 5 2021) To: <boji(a)vt.edu> Hi Bo, I am writing to let you know that ACM SIGCOMM, the National Science Foundation's PAWR project office, and EMPOWER, are launching a series of periodic talks, panels, and other activities, that will meet twice a month online. The next talk in the series will be on the topic of How to Succeed in Graduate School (abstract appended below). If you think students from VT would be interested to see it, or if you know of anyone else who might be interested, I'd be very grateful if you could let them know about it. Matt ============================== How to Succeed in Graduate School (online event, May 5 2021) Graduate school can be a very different experience than undergrad -- students are often exposed for the first time to independent research, publishing, giving talks and attending conferences, and much more. As such, the set of skills and efforts needed to succeed in graduate school can be quite different as well. In this panel, a team of world-renowned educators will give advice on how students can succeed in graduate school. The panel will include Professor Jennifer Rexford (Princeton University), Professor Edmundo de Souza e Silva (UFRJ, Brazil), Professor Anja Feldmann (Max Planck Institute), and Professor David Patterson (UC Berkeley, Turing Award winner). For more information and to register, go here: https://networkingchannel.eu/advice-on-how-to-succeed-in-grad-school/ Do you have questions for the panel? Please contribute your questions here prior to the event: https://forms.gle/2TuD1qyYiP9urhQXA

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Looking for MS/PhD students to fund
by Matthew Hicks 25 Apr '21

25 Apr '21

I lead a research group in the CS Department and I am looking for MS and PhD students (CS or CpE) to advise and fund fully---starting as early as this summer; this includes those graduate students just looking for something to do for the summer. My group tackles problems in the areas of Computer Security, Computer Architecture, and Embedded Systems. We like to build systems that solve problems that impact the real world and disseminate our results at top-tier venues; we are big believers in open source (https://github.com/FoRTE-Research). I am targeting students who have interests and skills in at least one of the following: · Compilers (i.e., LLVM) · Verilog/VHDL/FPGA development · C/asm-level crypto (e.g., AES and SHA256) developers · Computer architecture (designing and implementing custom RISC-V chips) · RTL testing and verification · VLSI/PCB (to facilitate fabricating our own chips) Here are some of the research thrusts that I am looking to support: · A project where we are harvesting energy from recent 5G cellular deployments. We are building our own 5G energy harvesting computing platform and there are a plethora of problems to solve including: o Building a 5G energy harvester front end o How to prepare software to execute with frequent power resets o Architectural and hardware support to maximize performance o Adapting and optimizing existing cryptographic algorithms for operation on harvested energy o Design and implementation of new hardware support structures for increased software security · A project where we are adapting the most successful software testing technique, i.e., fuzzing, for the verification of hardware designs. · Projects where we leverage the analog-domain aspects of otherwise-digital circuits to attack systems: o To create novel hardware Trojans o To break ARM TrustZone and Intel SGX o To detect recycled counterfeit electronic devices o To break bitstream security on FPGAs · A project where we are re-architecting a RISC-V-based multiprocessor from the ground-up such that it is naturally protected against shared buffer attacks (e.g., Meltdown and Spectre). If you want to learn more, please email me with your CV and your skills/interests. ---Matthew Hicks FoRTE Research Group Assistant Professor, Computer Science College of Engineering, Virginia Tech

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Student Thank You's
by Brittany Rasmussen 23 Apr '21

23 Apr '21

Good Morning CS Students, As the Spring 2021 semester comes to a close, is there a time when you thought, "I would like to thank someone for impacting my college career", but you didn’t know how to do so? Think back over this last academic year. Is there anyone in the CS Department you would really like to thank for making your semester, your year, or even your college career or life better? This could be another student in the department, faculty or staff. Your "thank you" really encourages!! If you would like to thank someone, please complete this form: https://virginiatech.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_8HPWTs0UnuMYQcK We plan to use these thank you's during our end of year celebrations. Please include your name and contact information, so that we can follow up with you if we have questions. If you have any questions, please let me know. Thank you, Brittany Rasmussen (Finn) Event Specialist Department of Computer Science 1139 Knowledge Works II 2202 Kraft Drive Blacksburg, VA 24061 Phone: (540) 231-1369 [unnamed]

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Fwd: MS thesis defense: Daniel Moyer
by Dimitrios Nikolopoulos 22 Apr '21

22 Apr '21

Good afternoon everyone, You are cordially invited to attend the the MS thesis defense of Daniel Moyer on Wednesday, May 5 at 10:00am. You can join the meeting by using the following Zoom link: https://virginiatech.zoom.us/j/88996616029 *Title: * Punching Holes in the Cloud: Direct Communication between Serverless Functions Using NAT Traversal *Abstract:* A growing use for serverless computing is large parallel data processing applications that take advantage of its on-demand scalability. Because individual serverless compute nodes, which are called functions, run in isolated containers, a major challenge with this paradigm is transferring temporary computation data between functions. Previous works have performed inter-function communication using object storage, which is slow, or in-memory databases, which are expensive. We evaluate the use of direct network connections between functions to overcome these limitations. Although function containers block incoming connections, we are able to bypass this restriction using standard NAT traversal techniques. By using an external server, we implement TCP hole punching to establish direct TCP connections between functions. In addition, we develop a communications framework to manage NAT traversal and data flow for applications using direct network connections. We evaluate this framework with a reduce-by-key application compared to an equivalent version that uses object storage for communication. For a job with 100+ functions, our TCP implementation runs 4.7 times faster at almost half the cost. *Committee:* Dimitrios Nikolopoulos (CS@VT, Chair) Ali R. Butt (CS@VT) Godmar Back (CS@VT) — Dimitrios S. Nikolopoulos, PhD John W. Hancock Professor of Engineering Professor, Department of Computer Science Professor (by courtesy), Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering Knowledge Works II, Suite 2214, VT CRC 2202 Kraft Drive, Blacksburg VA 24060-6356 540-231-4260 | dsn(a)vt.edu [image: Horizontal_VT_Full_Color_RGB.jpg]

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CS|SOURCE - EMPLOYER JOB POSTINGS AND EVENTS
by Julia Costello 22 Apr '21

22 Apr '21

CS|SOURCE - EMPLOYER JOB POSTINGS AND EVENTS Current opportunities with employers are listed below. View other available positions in <https://career.vt.edu/job-search/Handshake.html> Handshake. OPPORTUNITY 1 CS|Source companies support students in a variety of ways including mentoring, hiring and providing funds to support activities and scholarships. MITRE <http://www.mitre.org/> is one of our highest-level members in their commitment toward VT computer science students. Check out MITRE today as they are highlighted in a CS|Source company spotlight <https://cs.vt.edu/cs-source/featured-spotlight/mitre.html> . OPPORTUNITY 2 Facebook hosts info session/Q&A on their data centers and career opportunities on Tuesday, April 27, 5-6:30pm EST. Hear directly from members of the Data Center team on their day-to-day roles. RSVP: <https://facebookdatacenterxvirginia.splashthat.com/> https://facebookdatacenterxvirginia.splashthat.com; Attend: <https://l.workplace.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Ffb.zoom.us%2Fj%2F98807886823& h=AT3FSq73Y-8jzGs8Q07Vgyn1y-gIQKHWwqBObheqEmLQFF97do7tn16iudPCdYTur8Xku_ZuDy wHgwn9-9mj-1OdRcVXDO4CY48bXqdA7x3mzmU_VvCBOSQgNBCbx74WHahPaRsiVBSkCoE6UXvh&_ _tn__=-UK-R&c%5b0%5d=AT0QDUCq789FC9Ifnv8gB6r62YFEsu9OlZFC0K-x_ATeNUi39IscQ1t HLnF1wj5-DpFmtwcDs6AP5lVQSvFMEw9g1OIdl0DR2TWfQRq2MbdwRU1R7cpcCK9wgLAwX28TrPc mX7pLL5SXQ9SvGLAbqEIc7IA7T49n64Fm-uYq1V9VvlsTzu0yqV7ipXUO8-E2V-KOGQ9JmlqrCda Q2g> https://fb.zoom.us/j/98807886823, Passcode: 136626, Meeting ID: 988 0788 6823. OPPORTUNITY 3 Career and Professional Development host Diondre Brown for "Create Your Own Career Path through Networking & Mentorship on Wednesday, April 28, 4-5pm. Register: vt.joinhandshake.com Keyword search: Career Path. For more info, email d5brown(a)odu.edu <mailto:d5brown@odu.edu> . Flyer attached. Julia Costello, Strategic Partnership Coordinator Virginia Tech | College of Engineering | Department of Computer Science 2202 Kraft Drive | Blacksburg, VA 24060 Email: <mailto:juliapc7@cs.vt.edu> juliapc7(a)cs.vt.edu CS|Source Website: <https://cs.vt.edu/cs-source.html> https://cs.vt.edu/cs-source.html

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Non-Thesis MS Students: You still need to schedule a " final exam"
by Roxanne Paul 22 Apr '21

22 Apr '21

Dear CS Non-Thesis MS students, This email is to let you know that even if you are a Non-Thesis (Coursework Only) MS student, and you are graduating this semester, you still need to schedule your “final exam” in ESS. This is not a real final exam and you do not need to meet with anyone in person or by Zoom. But, you still need to schedule it in ESS in order to graduate. And, you need to schedule it at least 2 weeks ahead of time. Since this is non-thesis, the last possible date for your final exam is May 17. You can choose a date between now and May 17 with your Committee Chair (from your Plan of Study) or you can just choose May 17 at 10:00am. Go to https://ess.graduateschool.vt.edu and put in your information. For National Capital Region students, when you choose a building, put in “VT-UVA Northern Va Center”. For the room, please put in “General”. If you have any questions, please contact your Program Coordinator. Please note: MEng students have already received separate instructions from Samantha Pipkin Blacksburg MS & PhD students: Sharon Kinder-Potter skpotter(a)vt.edu NCR MS & PhD students: Roxanne Paul roxpaul(a)vt.edu All MEng students: Samantha Pipkin samanthap(a)vt.edu

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MS thesis defense, Chenhan Yuan, N-ary Cross-sentence Relation Extraction: From Supervised to Unsupervised Learning
by Hoda Eldardiry 22 Apr '21

22 Apr '21

Good morning, You are cordially invited to attend Chenhan Yuan’s MS thesis defense on Monday, April 26th at 3:30 PM. Please find more details below. Kind regards, Hoda *Title: *N-ary Cross-sentence Relation Extraction: From Supervised to Unsupervised Learning *Committee:* Prof. Hoda Eldardiry, VT/CS, Chair Prof. Lifu Huang, VT/CS, member Prof. Ismini Lourentzou, VT/CS, member *When: *Monday, April 26th, 2021, 3:30 PM Eastern Time *Abstract:* Relation extraction is the problem of extracting relations between entities described in the text. Relations identify a common "fact'' described by distinct entities. Conventional relation extraction approaches focus on supervised binary intra-sentence relations, where the assumption is relations only exist between two entities within the same sentence. These approaches have two key limitations. First, binary intra-sentence relation extraction methods can not extract a relation in a fact that is described by more than two entities. Second, these methods cannot extract relations that span more than one sentence, which commonly occurs as the number of entities increases. Third, these methods assume a supervised setting and are therefore not able to extract relations in the absence of sufficient labeled data for training. This work aims to overcome these limitations by developing n-ary cross-sentence relation extraction methods for both supervised and unsupervised settings. Our work has three main goals and contributions: (1) unsupervised binary intra-sentence relation extraction methods, (2) a supervised n-ary cross-sentence relation extraction method, and (3) an unsupervised n-ary cross-sentence relation extraction method. To achieve these goals, our work includes the following contributions: (1) an automatic labeling method for n-ary cross-sentence data, which is essential for model training, (2) a reinforcement learning-based sentence distribution estimator to minimize the impact of noise on model training, (3) a generative clustering-based technique for intra-sentence unsupervised relation extraction, (4) a variational autoencoder-based technique for unsupervised n-ary cross-sentence relation extraction, and (5) a sentence group selector that identifies groups of sentences that are spanned by relations. *Zoom Link:* https://virginiatech.zoom.us/my/chenhan *Meeting ID:* 438 188 3583 -- Hoda Eldardiry <http://people.cs.vt.edu/hdardiry/> Director | Machine Learning Lab <http://people.cs.vt.edu/hdardiry/collaborators/> Associate Professor | Computer Science Discovery Analytics Center | College of Engineering | Virginia Tech

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VT CSGC Election Ballot for 2021-2022: Time to Vote Your Representatives on CS Grad Council
by sdavari＠vt.edu 19 Apr '21

19 Apr '21

I've invited you to fill out the following form: VT CSGC Election Ballot for 2021-2022 To fill it out, visit: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScA8qrtJ5cqPRwbMfrr0c2mfQ49ObfBHAl… Dear Grad Students, The ballot to select your 2021-22 Grad Council officers is included in this email. The deadline to submit a vote is the end of the day on Sunday, May 2nd. For each office, you have the option of selecting from the candidates provided, or to write in a vote. If you don't know the candidates yet, our next grad council meeting is this Thursday. This is a good time for you to join, and meet the candidates. Another opportunity is to join the CS Grad Students Discord Server and chat with the candidates. Please make sure you vote with your VT email. Links: Discord Server: https://tinyurl.com/3ns2rbnuCSGC Calendar for meetings and events: https://tinyurl.com/36mvsthm Happy voting! Shakiba President of Computer Science Graduate Council Google Forms: Create and analyze surveys.

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