1995-1996 Academic Activities Report

I. NAME AND DEPARTMENT
NAME: Timothy J. Hickey, 
DEPT: Computer Science

II. INSTRUCTIONAL ACTIVITIES
A. LIST COURSES TAUGHT THROUGHOUT THE YEAR.
 1.Cosci 55a: Computer Graphics. Autumn 1995
   This course had been taught for many years by Max Chretien.
   I took over this course and completely revised it to take
   advantage of the new hardware and software available to our
   students. In particular, the students used SGI and HP
   workstations and were able to have access to sophisticated
   software packages such as OpenGL and X Windows. The course
   focussed on the algorithms and concepts underlying Computer
   Graphics, but a set of homework assignments was developed
   which allowed them to apply this theoretical knowledge to
   concrete problems such as developing (from scratch) 
   a package for examining and manipulating three dimensional
   images. The course had 2 teaching assistants and 32 students
   (about half of whom were graduate students, and half of those
   from departments other than computer science).
 2.Independent Studies Courses:
   a. JinMei Xu, Autumn 95, 
      "Object Oriented Interval Arithmetic Systems"
   b. David Polyak,
      "Java and graphical network programming techniques" 
 3.Transitional Year Program Math.

B. INVOLVEMENT IN READING COURSES, THESES, DISSERTATIONS, AND
   OTHER RESEARCH PROJECTS   
  *** Ph. D. advisees -- Qun Ju
  *** Master's advisees -- Deva Sagar

C. NUMBERS AND CATEGORIES OF ADVISEES
   14 undergrad cosci majors
    2 undergrad general science majors
   13 undergrad undecided students 
    3 Ph.D. students

III. PUBLICATIONS, RESEARCH, AND ARTISTIC CREATIONS
A. THAT HAVE APPEARED FROM MARCH 95 - PRESENT
   --- none
B. COMPLETED MANUSCRIPTS ACCEPTED FOR PUBLICATION
   --- none
C. ONGOING WORK
  I have spent the last 12 months developing the theoretical
  foundations underlying a software system
  to find provably correct solutions to high-level mathematical
  modeling problems using the method of interval arithmetic.
    The main idea is to reduce a complex mathematical problem 
  (possibly involving differential equations or integral
  operators) to a (non-linear) algebraic problem. For example,
  one can use Taylor series approximations with remainder terms
  to reduce differential equations to algebraic constraints on
  their coeficients. The system is nearing completion and
  in the coming year I will be applying the system to many
  application domains and making the system available to the
  research community. 
    During the last 3 months (my first sabatical in 12 years
  at Brandeis and in 18 years of teaching) I have been working
  on developing efficient algorithms for evaluating the elementary
  functions which   produce results which are provably correct upper
  (or lower bounds) on the value and which are provably accurate to
  with in a few bits in the last place. These algorithms form
  the basis of any interval arithmetic system and hence need
  to be correct to the last bit and very efficient. I have prepared
  a technical report which can be accessed from the following page:

     http://www.cs.brandeis.edu/~tim/logic_programming/clpf

  This page also describes other work I am currently working on.
  Th technical report describes only the work on the exponential and
  natural log functions. I'm currently working on the 
  trigonometric and hyperbolic functions and their inverses.
    I expect this work to be the first chapter 
  of a book I am planning on the implementation of 
  interval arithmetic constraint solving systems.


IV. DEPARTMENTAL AND UNIVERSITY SERVICE
 ***  Undergraduate Advisor for Computer Science Department

V. GRANTS
 1. NSF grant CCR 9403427, 
    "Parallel Processors for Constraint Programming",
    Co-PI with Dr. Jacques Cohen,
    Initial grant year: 6/94-6/95  $63,936
    Renewed for:        6/95-6/96, $63,936
    Renewal for         6/96-6/97  is pending.

VI. AWARDS AND HONORS
   --- none

VII. PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITIES OUTSIDE OF THE UNIVERSITY
   --- none

VIII. EMPLOYMENT/CONSULTANT WORK OUTSIDE OF THE UNIVERSITY.
A. COURSES TAUGHT AT OTHER INSTITUTIONS
   --- none
B. ANY OTHER EMPLOYMENT AND/OR CONSULTANT ARRANGEMENTS
   --- none
C. MANAGEMENT OR FIDUCIARY ACTIVITIES IN WHICH YOU HAVE A
   ROLE AS AN OFFICER, DIRECTOR,  TRUSTEE, ...
   --- none


IX. OTHER INFORMATION.
   --- I have been on sabatical during the Spring 96 semester.