Research Project Proposals

Gita Alaghband

Purpose:
The purpose of our seminar series is to familiarize ourselves with recent and important research topics and advances in the field. This research oriented study has numerous advantages. To name only a few would be the ability to use your background knowledge for further study in an area, preparation for graduate level research, familiarity with recent advances in the field, self study in an interest area, and the opportunity to communicate research ideas to others.

Research and Project implementations will be carried out by individuals (at times by teams depending on class size). You will be graded based on your work, organization, analysis and clarity of your presentation. Depending on the number of students in class, we may form teams per project.

You will select a research topic to investigate and present to class in preparation for your project implementation. You must try to choose your research topic so that your studies will enhance your knowledge in support of selected project. You will mplement all or part of your study on a parallel computer, write a report and present it to class.

Your proposal (both research and project) should be one typed page long describing the research/project briefly complete with references. It should describe what will be covered in your research/project.

Research Topic to Study and Project Scope to Implement:

1. Propose a topic to study in depth. You may investigate parallel architectures, languages, compilers, algorithms, performance modeling, operating systems, synchronization mechanisms, etc. See the general topics provided.
2. From your proposed area of study above, propose a related project that you will implement on one or more parallel computers that you have access on. You may choose to implement an algorithm using different languages on the same or different machines, measure performance of different implementations, develop a set of bench marks, study system effects of specific architecture on performance such as caching, paging, latency, etc. This may be all or part of your research topic.

What to Submit for the Research Presentation:

1. Email a copy of your anotated PowerPoint slides to me on the day of your presentation.
2. Post your presentation on your website and email the URL to the class on the day of your presentation.
   

What to Submit for the Project Report:

1. A report in your own wording on the final project is needed.  I would need an E-mail copy of the completed report, the program, test data sets, and instructions for running the program. The report must explain your methods, findings, comparisons, and learning experience. An adequate list of references should be included with each project.

2. Your projects must also be posted on your website on the day of your presentation so that your classmates can review them and provide a peer review.

Presentation:
We will organize and schedule the presentations by topics.
Use the seminar preparation guide (included in this hand out) to help prepare your presentation.

Seminar Preparation Guide

While preparing for your presentation, keep the following questions in mind. These are provided to give guidance for your presentation effectiveness. After you are prepared, grade yourself with a number between 0-10 on each question and give an overall letter grade (A-F) on each of the 3 areas.

I. Communication [Letter Grade =}

 1. Is the “problem” defined clearly?
 2. Are explanations clear?
 3. Is it clear how the system was developed?
             (i.e.: Language, Architecture, Commercial Software, Algorithms,....)
 4. Is the material well organized? (Both individual and team work)
 5. Effective visual aids?
 6. Creative and interesting?

II. Research [Letter Grade=]

  1. Good knowledge of the field?
  2. Clear comparison between well known related systems or topics?
  3. Has clearly identified the technical successes, failures, and limitations of their system?
 4. Relates clearly and precisely to Parallel Processing problems?
 5. Specific references to material discussed in class?
 6. Appropriate and accurate use of technical words?

III. Analysis   [Letter Grade=]

 1. Problem is well analyzed, bringing out the critical issues?
 2. Use of graphs, charts, statistics, equations, examples, etc.?
 3. Logical structure of the problem is well analyzed?
 4. Distinction made clearly between the use of logic versus the use of probability?