Interdisciplinary Scientific Visualization

CLASS CALENDAR

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previous years: 2007 2006* 2005 2004* 2003 2002* 2000 1999
* VR Design for Science. Brown/RISD class. Now CS137

 

Brown          Brown CS          Brown CS Visualization

 

All handins are due by 10AM the same day of class to allow for review before class.

Please get your reviews and readings done in time. The whole point of the class is to get different points of view for interdisciplinary research problems. It'll make classes much more fun if everybody participates and has an opinion. It's not fair to others to make them always carry the weight of leading the discussions. Prepare for a dynamic and open discussion in almost every class.

Handins are to be made online (logged into a machine in the CS department) to a directory on the CS department machines. You must have a CS account to do this, so please make sure that you get an account the first day of classes. Talk to David and sign up for an account the first day of classes, Thursday 9/2 at 1:20pm. You can also email Wenjin Zhou (wzhou@cs.brown.edu) or David Laidlaw (dhl@cs.brown.edu), but you will need to pass by David's office to get the temporary password for your account. They cannot be emailed outside CS.

When you are logged in to a CS machine (in the Sun lab, for instance, or over the network), you can deliver assignments to:

     /pro/web/web/courses/cs237/assignments/DATE/LOGIN.EXT

where you replace DATE with the due date (e.g., 9-7), LOGIN with your CS login (e.g., dhl), and EXT with the type of file (e.g., txt). If multiple handins are due the same day, please number them (e.g., dhl1.txt, dhl2.txt). For handins the first week, those without CS account can e-mail their handins to wzhou@cs.brown.edu and she will put them into the appropriate assignments directory.

IMPORTANT NOTE!!! Some of the readings needed for the class are PASSWORD PROTECTED due to copyright issues. Make sure to contact Wenjin Zhou (wzhou@cs.brown.edu) or David Laidlaw (dhl@cs.brown.edu) to get the username and password THE FIRST DAY OF CLASS.

Visit the first 2 links in the links page if you are not familiar with UNIX.

Almost all of the readings we will do are online to reduce copying effort and costs, and to keep color imagery intact. Printing them for your own use is fine. Please look at the color images in color, though! Some of the files are huge (40-50 Mb). You will not be able to get them over a phone line.

Please respect the grant proposals you will be reading. They are not published documents and should not be circulated outside of class. Please make sure that you destroy any copies of those documents when you are finished with them for class.

 

 

Topic

Assignment

 

 

 

-------First Class: Thu 9/2, 1pm---------

Introduction

  • Goals
  • Organization
  • Schedule
  • Definition of Visualization

 

  

 

  • Sign up for a CS account

 


 

 

Tue 9/7

  • Open problems in Visualization
  • What makes a good problem?

 

If you don't already have one, make sure you are signed up to get a CS computer account! Contact wzhou@cs.brown.edu.

 

Read before class, with an eye toward your essay:

 

Deliverables (by 10AM Tue):

  •  personal background
  •  an essay, 250-750 words, describing three visualization research topics of interest to you. Base the topics on the readings. For each topic, explain your motivation and how it fits in (or doesn't) with all of the readings.

 

Thu 9/9

  • Review and discuss NSF ITR proposal:
    Understanding Unsteady Bioflows through Simulation, Modeling, Visualization, Art, and Psychology (Laidlaw, Swartz, Lauder, Karniadakis, Richardson, Breuer, Tarr, Warren, Drury)
  • Evaluating project possibilities

These readings will give you a feel for what goes into a research grant proposal:

  • NSF Grant Proposal Guide (2004) describes how to write a grant proposal. While some of the instructions are specific to NSF, much of the document gives good advice on how to write any proposal.
    • Skim: whole thing
    • Read: I.B, II.C.2.a-f, II.C.2.h-k, III(intro), III.A, III.E-F, VI.G

Deliverables:

  • Hand in by 10AM Thursday your own review for the ITR grant.
  • Read NSF reviews of the proposal (after you write yours) and add any new discussion questions to your review.
  • Hand in a list of four possible collaborators from class or from other disciplines for your class project. Read the RFP for class projects to understand more about the criteria for judging a project idea. Possible collaborators can be from the class, the list of project ideas suggested by various researchers around campus, and any personal contacts you have. Describe the discipline of each possible collaborator and how it is distinct from your area. At least two must be contributors to the list of project ideas or established researchers.

Collaborator's list - You will need to meet with at least three of the four possible collaborators and report on those meetings on 9/20. These meetings will help you develop the interdisciplinary par project. Get started scheduling these meetings and look at what you'll need to hand in as a report.

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Tue 9/14

  • Review of NSF CAREER proposal
    Shape Capture and Modeling for Wrist Dynamics and Ancient Pottery Analysis using Manifold Surfaces and Signed-Distance Volume Images (Laidlaw)
  • Evaluating project possibilities
 Readings:

 

Deliverables:

  • CAREER grant review   Write: your own review. Do the review before reading the NSF reviews, and then answer the subsequent questions after the other readings.
  • Continue interviewing collaborators
  • Read NSF reviews of the proposal (after you write yours) and add any new discussion questions to your review.
  • Read: annual status report to NSF. Once again, this gives a feel for what NSF is interested in.
  • Continue interviewing possible collaborators.

NEW: compiled collaborators list.

 
 

 

Thu 9/16

  • Discuss project ideas
  

Deliverables: (extended to 9/21)

  • Read Request For Proposals
  • Consult previous proposals in the Ideas page
  • Interview reports
  • Three possible proposal titles  For each, include a brief description, a list of participants, and your evaluation of the proposal you imagine. Use the RFP to guide your project ideas and to self-evaluate them.

 

 

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Tue 9/21

  • librarian-led lab in class - Please bring a laptop to class.
  • Review and discuss NIH proposal
    DTI+MRI-based Tools for Analyzing White Matter Variation (Laidlaw, Ahrens, Allman, Bastin)
Readings:

Option 1:

Option 2:

 

Deliverables:

  • NIH grant review (do the review for the first application you read: for option 1 review the first grant application, for option 2 review the first revision - A1)
  • Read NIH reviews of the proposal (after you write yours) and add any new discussion questions to your review.

 

 

Thu 9/23

  • Taxonomy of visualization methods and problems
 Readings:
  • Read Visualization Handbook.'s table of contents. For the class, try to see if the topics in the book suggest some extra readings related to your project. Are there any new ideas in there for a different project? The authors are in there also, and these are all the big guys in sci-viz, so google for their web pages and see what other stuff they are working on.
    THE BOOK IS ON RESERVE AT THE SCIENCES LIBRARY! Read through it for interesting articles!

Deliverables:

  • Hand in results from literature search. You should do this search on the project you are most seriously considering doing out of all the ideas you have. Look here for links to research publications.
  • Continue developing your project proposal, filling in any weaknesses, fleshing out the related work section, etc.
  • Be prepared to briefly describe the project idea you are most seriously considering and any issues, concerns, problems, etc. that we can discuss in class.

 

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Tue 9/28

  • Review and discuss NIH proposal
    Quantitative Inverse Electrocardiography (Johnson).
  • Meet with Chris Johnson via phone conference
 Readings:

 

Deliverables:

  • Your review of Johnson's NIH grant
  • Wenjin will explain how to make your reading lists in VISWEB. Take a look at this document and print it out before class. You don't need  to do anything with it before the class, just read over it and bring it to class.
  • IMPORTANT: bring to class three questions for Chris Johnson.

 

 

Thu 9/30

  • Proposal presentations
 Deliverables:
  • Preliminary proposal due; writen part + presentation in class (Word is the preferable format since we can comment directly on the documents; if you are using LaTex please convert to pdf before sumbitting. Also put the ppt in the submission folder and make it readable to others - we will log into one account and run all the presentions from there)
  • Visweb reading list
  • Compiled Preliminary Proposals

 

Topic

Assignment

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Tue 10/5

  • Proposal presentations
  
  • Read proposals from the /assignments/09-30/ directory

 

Thu 10/7

  • Understanding Imaging Data
  

Deliverables:

 

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Tue 10/12

 
  • User studies
  • Project Schedules

 

Deliverables: Final proposals DUE NOON TUESDAY (note: earlier deadline!)

Compiled Final Proposals

Thu 10/14

  • Data modeling
  

Deliverables:

  • Final proposals' reviews
    • Check your assigned proposal review here.

 

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Tue 10/19

  • Study section (evaluate, score, "fund'' proposals)

 

Deliverables:

  • Submit a list of 6 papers from the "cs237 interesting papers" list. From that list we'll choose two papers for you to present in class in the following weeks. For each paper indicate:
    - Title
    - Preference value (1-6 among your six papers. Don't repeat values!)
    - Reason why you want to present it.

    • - You can add additional papers to your list if there is something you feel is missing from the "interesting papers" list, but it should extend your list, not replace one of the six
 

Thu 10/21  It would need to be able to connect to the Brown wireless and run a browser.  

  • Study section (evaluate, score, "fund'' proposals)

Deliverables for Friday 10/22 - noon!!! (please put them in the folder 10-22)

  • how do you feel about working solo? Possible answers are:

    • I'd prefer working solo to having a Co-PI

    • I'd be willing to work solo

    • I'd do it, but with some misgivings

    • I'd prefer to have two people

    • I'd rather eat paste than do my proposal alone

  • how would the scope of your project change with a single person:

    • I still would do everything I proposed

    • I could still make a significant impact and have solid results (enumerate)

    • I'm not sure it would be possible to finish anything significant

  • summary statements.  Label them "[proposer]_by_[proposee].txt" (don't be late)

 

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Tue 10/26

  • No Class!  VIS Conference in Salt Lake City, Utah

 

 

Thu 10/28

  • No Class! -- Make sure you have put review numbers in for any papers you care about. They should all be in the vis09 spreadsheet. I will choose discussion leaders and papers from that spreadsheet starting today!  VIS Conference in Salt Lake City, Utah

 

 

Topic

Sections

Assignment

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Tue 11/2

  • Vis Conference review

 

 

Thu 11/4

  • Presentation

 

Non-presenters hand in 3 discussion points for each of the papers being presented

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Tue 11/9

  • Presentation

 

Present your own personal views on the paper depending on the goals you want to achieve. Please bring your comments printed in large format to class. We will put them up and discuss about them.

Thu 11/11

  • Project progress. Questions, problems

 

 

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Tue 11/16

  • Presentation

 

Read both the papers and do a grant-style review for one of them. Use your own criteria or the ones we discussed in class. The review should be about a page of content, printed on 4 pages.

Thu 11/18

 

 

 

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Tue 11/23

  • Project progress. Questions, problems.

 

 

Thu 11/25

  • No Class. Happy Thanksgiving!

 

Topic

Assignment

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Tue 11/30

 

  • Class Review Forms to be filled out

  • Discussion of last weeks project plans

  • Schedule final presentation and Shiyin meetings

 


PROJECT REPORTS:
Bring your schedules for the final 2 weeks.
Shiyin will be in class to schedule 2 meetings per group. See the Project Assignment details for more info.

 

Thu 12/2

  • Presentations

 

 Bring your preliminary project abstracts to class.

 

Read both the papers and do a grant-style review for one of them. Use your own criteria or the ones we discussed in class. The review should be about a page of content, printed on 4 pages.

 

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Date to be determined:

Final Project Presentations

 

 

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