the alumni magazine of polytechnic institute of new york university

The alumni magazine of Polytechnic Institute of New York University

Spring 2012 Vol. 39 I No. 8

SPRING2012

launchpad Letter from the President 4 NYU Abu Dhabi’s First Peer-Reviewed Paper 5 23 Brooklyn School Teams Advance to Regional Robotics Challenge 6 The Textbook That Explains the Internet 8 DoT and NYU Explore Transportation and Research Opportunities 8

features A Perfect Circle: NYU-Poly Opens Its Doors at 2 MetroTech Center 10 Innovation NYC: NYU-Poly Launches DUMBO Business Incubator 12 Braking Power: Low-Weight and High-Durability Brake Rotors 16 Citizen Science: Collaborating for a Cleaner Community 18 Seizures in Focus: Capturing the Brain’s Electric Activity 20 Capturing C02: Turning Waste to Good Use 22 See the Ideas: Changing the Culture of Data Provenance 24

poly buzz Say It Isn’t So…Rose Emma and Teresina Tam Retire 28 Valerie Cabral Joins NYU-Poly as Director of Alumni Relations 28 NSBE Hosts Reception During National Engineering Week 29 i2e Spotlight Series 29

faculty feature Faculty Notes 30 Myles Jackson Elected to German National Academy of Sciences 30

alumni news Letter From the Alumni President 31 IEEE Elects Research Pioneer President 32 Louis Alpinieri: Paying It Forward 32 One in a Thousand and One 34 Judea Pearl Receives Harvey Prize 34 Leading the Nation’s Civil Engineers 35 Pilot of His Own Success 36 Annual Meeting and Nominations 37

obituaries In Memoriam 38

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Jerry MacArthur Hultin President

Barbara Noseworthy Vice President

Development and Alumni Relations

Valerie Cabral Director of Alumni Relations

Michelle Kerr Director of Communications

Cable Editor

Kathleen Hamilton Patrick Keeffe Cielo Lutino

Karl Greenberg Elinor Nauen

Contributing Writers

L.F. O’Connell Associates Publication Design

Marian Goldman Elena Olivo

Jeffrey Schifman Principal Photography

Address correspondence to: Michelle Kerr, Cable Editor

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Change of address: Office of Development and Alumni Relations

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Email [email protected] or call (718) 260-3885

Polytechnic website: www.poly.edu

Produced by Polytechnic Offices of Development and Alumni

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opportunity to all employees and to all applicants for employment regardless of race, color, sex, religion, national

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Printed on partially recycled paper. Certified processed chlorine free.

In the fall issue of Cable, the article, “STEM: Women Engineers Breaking Through” on page 18, identification of Nicole Abaid and Dustyn Roberts was inadvertently

switched and Ms. Abaid’s name was misspelled. Cable regrets the error.

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Below: The data monitor room maintained by faculty members Claudio Silva and Juliana Friere. Featured story, See the Ideas, pp. 24-27.

POLY.EDU / CABLE Cable NYU-Poly’s Alumni Magazine Spring 2012 3

Because we do not have email addresses for all of our alumni and friends, I want to take this opportunity to share with each of you this news, a general update on the state of NYU-Poly and our plans for the search for my successor.

Let me begin by saying what a privilege it has been to serve as Poly’s 10th president these past seven years, and in the coming months, I will continue to help drive the Institute forward. For instance, we have increased and expanded the geographic base of our pool of applicants along with a concomitant increase in quality (this year’s fresh-man class has an average SAT score of 1305). Our faculty and staff are making i2e (invention, innovation, and entrepreneurship) into an integral part of our courses, programs and degrees, connecting our engineer-ing and technology education to the tools for building a better world. We have recruited and retained outstanding faculty, many of whom have new joint appointments with schools of New York University. We have expanded into MetroTech 2 and 15, putting us on all four sides of the MetroTech Commons, which I now call “Innovation Square.” This summer, renovations start on Rogers Hall and Dibner Library. Finally, our fiscal, research and development performance is greatly improved from 2005: our books are balanced, even with surpluses; our research funding is projected to exceed $15 million this year; and the support of our alumni, corporations and foundation partners, and friends of Polytechnic is growing thanks to your generosity.

NYU-Poly is also gaining recognition for its programs and the ac-complishments of its alumni. The following occurred in March 2012 alone: Judea Pearl ’66 won the A.M. Turing Award, often called the “Nobel Prize in Computing” for his advance in probabilistic and causal reasoning. Nobel Laureate and NY Times best seller Daniel Kahneman addressed a packed auditorium at the 14th annual Lynford Lecture. Mayor Bloomberg celebrated the success of NYU-Poly’s incubators at a joint press conference with me, by announcing compelling news: 22 companies graduated from our incubator program, over $38 mil-lion was raised from venture capital, and nearly 400 new jobs were created. Two young members of NYU-Poly’s faculty were honored with NSF CAREER Awards. Poly students tutored junior high school

students from Brooklyn to take first place in the New York City FIRST robotics com-petition. You can see why you should feel proud of NYU-Poly’s performance.

An international search is now being initiated for the next President of Polytechnic, with NYU-Poly Provost Katepalli Sreenivasan serving as its chair and NYU-Poly trustees, faculty, and students, along with members of NYU, joining him on the search committee. In recognition of the growing importance of engineering and sciences to all of NYU’s research and teaching agenda, the next president of NYU-Poly will carry the additional title of Dean of Engineering for all of NYU.

In the meantime, there is still much to be accomplished. This year we continue to merge databases and operations with NYU. We are recruiting several outstanding new faculty. Laboratory and classroom renovations are taking place in 2 MetroTech along with this coming year’s renovations of Rogers Hall and Dibner Hall. With NYU, we will be launching the Center for Urban Science and Progress (CUSP) here in MetroTech.

As I think about what still needs to be achieved, I am mindful of the importance of private gifts in supporting deserving and innovative stu-dents at Polytechnic and in helping NYU-Poly achieve its full potential. Each year, many of you contribute to endowed scholarships and to the Promise Fund, our largest scholarship activity. Other donors make gifts to help us retain outstanding faculty or support our highly successful undergraduate summer research program. Over the next few months, Poly students will be calling you—our alumni and friends—to ask for a gift to support either the Promise Fund or the Polytechnic Fund. I hope you will make a gift to NYU-Poly, at whatever gift level you can afford. We, in turn, will be good stewards of your generosity.

Again, thank you for your support of Polytechnic’s growth and progress during my years as President. I look forward to hearing from you and working together in the coming months to achieve even more and to welcome Poly’s 11th President to this great institution.

With warmest regards,

Jerry M. Hultin

LETTER FROM THE PRESIDENT

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At the end of March, many of you received an email with the news that I plan to step down as President of NYU-Poly, effective the summer of 2013.

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Songyishu Yang is the first NYU Abu Dhabi (NYUAD) student to be invited to present a peer-reviewed paper at the third International Renewable Energy Congress (IREC).

NYU AbU DHAbI SOPHOMORE PRESENTS UNIvERSITY’S FIRST PEER-REvIEwED PAPER

While most students spend winter break reconnecting with friends, catching up on some much-needed sleep and pre-paring for J-Term courses, sophomore Songyishu Yang traveled to Hammamet, Tunisia. Yang is the first NYU Abu Dhabi (NYUAD) student to be invited to pres-ent a peer-reviewed paper at the third International Renewable Energy Con-gress (IREC).

During the three-day event, which pro-vides a forum for researchers and practi-tioners around the world to discuss recent developments in the fields of renewable energy, 115 participants from 32 countries gathered to attend a variety of sessions with scopes ranging from sustainability and energy sources (wind, photovoltaic, solar thermal, hybrid, biomass, hydraulic, and nuclear) to environmental forecasting, poli-cies, and regulation.

Yang’s paper, co-authored by NYU-Poly’s Industry Professor of Philosophy Harold P. Sjursen—and one of 112 accepted presentations from 188 submis-sions—discusses water management in Chinese cities and puts forth the argument that energy conservation, factors of climate change, and water management should not be considered mutually exclusive. As Sjursen explained, “The argument tries to establish that energy conservation cannot be in actuality separated from factors of climate change and these, in turn, cannot be dealt with apart from approaches to water management. Further, it is asserted that the intercon-nectedness of all of these concerns is best addressed from the perspective of a naturalistic ecology.”

Having done preliminary research dur-ing her freshman year on water manage-ment problems in China—completed in

anticipation of participating in the AECOM Student Design Competition on water in urban areas—Yang developed her proposal with Sjursen’s help during her time in New York City last summer, when she attend-ed NYU-Poly’s summer program. There, she worked with Sjursen and a group of graduate students on Sjursen’s research project, “China’s Energy Future.”

Quick to perceive a connection be-tween water management and the issues of energy use and climate degradation, Yang focused on two urban areas in China “deeply affected by the problems of cli-mate change (flood-drought cycle) whose remediation would involve non-standard and ecologically sensitive engineering so-lutions,” Sjursen explained. “The thesis for the paper emerged from the research which indicated potentially significant correlations between ecological urban water manage-ment strategies and energy choices.”

Attracted to the interdisciplinary nature of Yang’s proposal, Sjursen enjoyed work-ing with the “brilliant, hard-working, and committed student.” “From the standpoint of a teacher, the experience epitomized the best kind of teaching-learning experience,” he said. And according to Yang, the feeling was mutual. “It was a wonderful experience on so many levels,” she said. “…Professor Sjursen taught me quite a lot about con-ducting research, and more importantly I think, how to be a scholar. As a mentor, he also creates amazing opportunities and guides me to develop my interest and life goals.”

As a civil engineering major with a con-centration in urbanization, Yang is poised to become an urban planner, and the IREC provided her with the opportunity to “dis-cuss topics that I am fascinated by and receive critiques on my research,” she said.

“ Professor Sjursen taught me quite a lot about conducting research, and more importantly I think, how to be a scholar.�

- Songyishu Yang

the soil conditions of gardens and plastic packaging that measures the amount of oxygen to which sliced chicken sold at groceries may be exposed. (The higher the oxygen, the higher the possible incidence of bacterial contamination.)

FLL is one of four robotics programs offered by FIRST, a not-for-profit that inspires students to get involved in science and technol-ogy via exciting, hands-on robotics competitions. FLL introduces elementary and middle school students to the thrill of hands-on robotics, research, teamwork and inquiry-based problem solving, in order to spark a lifelong passion for science and technology. The top honor Champions Award went to P.S. 399, Team: Gear Hawk, M.S. 113, Team: Falcon Robotic Allstars and I.S. 383, Team: Skybots.

Brooklyn ElEmEntary and middlE School tEamS advancE to nEw york rEgional roBoticS challEngE

The gym was packed to the rafters. The excitement of 400 Brooklyn youngsters, their teachers and scores of family and well-wishers was palpable. The event had always been a huge draw for eager, young minds to explore the wonders of STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics). The annual Brooklyn qualifying round for FIRST® (For Inspiration and Recognition of Sci-ence and Technology) LEGO League (FLL®) has always been a crowd-pleaser and the 12th annual event on Saturday, January 14 promised not to disappoint. Each team’s demonstration repre-sented months of serious research on food safety and the robots they built and programmed to demonstrate food safety issues.

With NYU-Poly as host and FIRST’s New York City-affiliate partner, as well as a supporter of many of the schools’ year-round robotics programs, the annual FLL Brooklyn qualifier has grown to become the largest in New York City. Once again this year, the Brooklyn qualifying event was filled to capacity, with some Brook-lyn teams competing in Queens.

Of the 42 teams of 9- to 14-year-olds who competed at NYU-Poly, 23 advanced to the Citywide FLL Robotics final that was held at Jacob K. Javits Convention Center in Manhattan in March.

During long weeks of practice and research, FLL teams de-vised technological and robotic applications to real-world prob-lems related to a topic. In 2012, the budding engineers and in-novators were asked to solve issues related to the theme “Food Factor®: Keeping Food Safe.” Coached by their teachers, as well as by NYU-Poly graduate fellows who conducted in-school les-sons to complement the robotics program at 18 of the schools, the students produced such novel proposals as apps to monitor

LEGO League teams devised technological and robotic applications to real-world problems. NYU-Poly graduate fellows conducted in-school lessons at 18 of the participating schools.

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NYU-Poly supports in-school robotics initiatives in 23 Brooklyn elementary, middle and high schools as part of two affiliated initiatives, called Applying Mechatronics to Promote Science (AMPS) and Central Brooklyn STEM (sci-ence, technology, engineering and mathematics) Initiative (CBSI). Together, they send NYU-Poly graduate students into local schools to challenge students to design, build and operate robotic devices, teach science and engineer-ing, and provide training to advance teachers’ understand-ing of STEM subjects. The results are powerful: 65 percent of participating students increased their STEM grades by a half or full-letter grade.

AMPS/CBSI is a public-private partnership supported by The Black Male Donor Collaborative, the Brooklyn Com-munity Foundation, JP Morgan Chase Foundation, Xerox Foundation, NY Space Grant Consortium and the White Cedar Fund, and the supporting graduate fellows program receives major funding from National Science Foundation’s GK-12 Fellows Program.

NYU-Poly works with New York FIRST on all four FIRST programs, which engage kids from the age of six through high school. In 2012, FIRST programs will involve more than 293,000 participants.

In addition to the FLL, FIRST offers Junior FIRST LEGO League (Jr. FLL) for 6- to 9-year-olds, and FIRST Tech Challenge (FTC) and FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC), both for high school students. FRC, known as a “Varsity Sport for the Mind™,” challenges teens to design, build, program and test a robot to meet a specific challenge. The FIRST contests at NYU-Poly are sponsored by Time Warner Cable and Con Edison.

23 out of 42 teams of 9- to 14-year-olds advanced to the Citywide FLL Robotics final at Jacob K. Javits Center.

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As part of its commitment to improving research and education in the Emirate of Abu Dhabi, in line with the Abu Dhabi Plan 2030, the Department of Transport (DoT) in Abu Dhabi and New York Uni-versity announced a strategic partnership to explore joint education and research

opportunities in the field of transportation. The Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) enables graduates of Abu Dhabi’s Higher Colleges of Technology, which focuses on transportation in their curriculum, to attend the Brooklyn campus of Polytechnic Insti-tute of New York University (NYU-Poly) to pursue master’s degrees in the field. The two institutions also plan to investigate the potential of faculty exchanges, joint research, classes in Abu Dhabi and other areas of mutual interest.

With one of the oldest transportation planning and engineering programs in the

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DOT AND NYU ExPLORE JOINT OPPORTUNITIES IN TRANSPORTATION EDUCATION AND RESEARCH

nationally and internationally, and the fifth most popular computer science textbook overall, excluding introductory programming textbooks. Read by more than 100,000 students and professors worldwide every year, it has been trans-lated into 14 languages (English, French, Spanish, German, Italian, Portuguese, Dutch, Greek, Polish, Russian, Chinese,

Korean, Japanese, Turkish) and is a blockbuster for the publisher. Computer Networking, whose sixth edition has just appeared

[April 2012], is by James F. Kurose, professor of computer science at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and Keith W. Ross,

Since 2000, a textbook co-authored by an NYU-Poly professor has very successfully made this complex subject easier to learn. The result is that Computer Networking: A Top-Down Approach is the most popular textbook on computer networking both

ThE SUbjEcT Of cOMPUTEr NETwOrkING cOvErS ThE cONcEPTS, PrOTOcOLS ANd TEchNOLOGIES ThAT UNdErPIN ArGUAbLY ThE MOST IMPOrTANT ANd ExcITING TEchNOLOGY TOdAY, NAMELY, ThE INTErNET.

KEITH W. ROSS

The TexTbook ThaT explains The inTerneT

country, NYU-Poly focuses on the high-way and mass transit challenges of the congested urban environment, as well as smart transportation systems. Its faculty members have helped shape the Transpor-tation Research Board’s Highway Capacity Manual, the primary reference used by en-gineers and planners to assess traffic and environmental effects of highway projects.

NYU-Poly alumni have been at the forefront of numerous highway and mass transit advances through positions in government, industry, consultancies and academia. In addition to master’s and doc-

toral programs in Transportation Planning and Engineering, NYU-Poly also offers a master’s degree in Transportation Manage-ment, as well as certificate programs, and the collaboration is considered a proactive, conscientious and respectful step towards sustainable environment and research in the Abu Dhabi Emirate.

In this regard, H.E. Mohamed Hareb Al Yousef, the Executive Director of the Department of Transport, said: “We are delighted to initiate this cooperation with a renowned university such as NYU-Poly and we look forward to a long-term, mutu-

ally beneficial relationship to develop UAE human capital academically to realize a globally leading transport sector and network in Abu Dhabi.”

Jerry M. Hultin, NYU-Poly president, said: “NYU-Poly eagerly embraces this opportunity to apply the scholarship and hands-on expertise that we have developed to the varied requirements of the transportation sector in Abu Dhabi. This is a remarkable opportunity to build upon the deep educational partnership between NYU and Abu Dhabi.”

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the Leonard J. Shustek Chair in Computer Science and professor and head of the computer science and engineering department at NYU-Poly. Ross is also a renowned researcher, IEEE Fellow and recipient of three major best paper awards. As an entrepreneur, he founded and was CEO of Wimba audio and video e-learning tech-nology, which was acquired by Blackboard in 2010.

Computer Networking is different from similar books in a num-ber of important ways. “Traditionally, the subject is taught start-ing with hardware and communication links and concluding with

Internet applications such as social networks,” Ross explains. “Our book broke new ground 12 years ago by treating net-working in a top-down manner. We started talk-ing about the applica-tions and worked our way down to the physi-cal layer, the hardware. Students are inspired when they first learn about how networking applica-tions work—applications such as email and the Web, which most stu-dents use on a daily ba-sis.” Part of Computer

Networking’s success is that it thoroughly covers all the essential material in a warm and friendly writing style. The authors use clever analogies to explain tough concepts. “A lot of the analogies have nothing to do with a computer network—such as highway traffic or a family in a household,” Ross says. “We also have some jokes sprinkled here and there,” he adds.

The textbook includes access to a companion web site with a vast array of supplemental materials, including online quizzes, hands-on Wireshark labs, retired sections from previous editions, Python socket programming assignments and interactive Java ap-plets. “A Java applet speaks a million words that can really drill home the concept,” Ross notes. “Interactive homework problems mean that students can generate a new version of the same prob-lem with new parameters. They can generate an unlimited num-ber of similar problems, and so they can work until the material is truly mastered.” The new edition has also added a blog, Facebook page, and video notes, which are basically PowerPoint slides that the authors talk over and explain. There’s also new material on data centers, video streaming and how various ISPs connect to form one coherent worldwide Internet. Java has been replaced by Python, a programming code that is easier to understand and provides more features. (Java-based material remains available on the book’s web site.) In being so highly regarded, as well as being adopted by so many universities worldwide, Computer Network-ing has provided significant branding for NYU-Poly. “The book has done better than we expected,” Ross says. “We suspected it could do well, as did the publisher, who put a lot into it. In the end, its success exceeded our expectations.”

The new space, located on the south side of the MetroTech Center Commons, which President Hultin dubbed “Innovation Square” now that the Institute holds a post on its ev-ery side, features a dedicated NYU-Poly lobby, the backdrop for the event, with a wall-sized graphic of the Brooklyn Bridge created com-pletely from computer code, a nod to the building’s new tenants.

The spirit in the room was one of momen-tum, as the standing-room-only crowd cel-ebrated the latest achievement in NYU-Poly’s campus transformation.

“This is a moment,” said NYU President John Sexton, “but only the latest one [in a con-tinuing series],” referring to the recent, rapid expansion at NYU-Poly and the many excit-ing plans for further expansion in the coming months and years.

The 85,000 square feet of leased space at 2 MetroTech Center, split among three floors, is part of the NYU 2031: NYU in NYC city-wide plan for academic space development and NYU-Poly’s capital plan, called the i2e

(invention, innovation and entrepreneurship) Campus Transformation. The facility is the new hub of NYU-Poly’s entire computer sci-ence and engineering department and a por-tion of the electrical and computer engineering department, which moved to the 10th floor in mid-January.

Much like the real estate deal NYU-Poly negotiated at 15 MetroTech for 35,000 square feet of furnished office space, the leased

space at 2 MetroTech is a deal which includes approximately $1 million in office, workstation and conference room furnishings.

Mirroring the integration of research in the lives of NYU-Poly’s faculty, the pantry/break room on the 10th floor contains a wall of win-dows looking into the data monitor room, a lab run by NYU-Poly faculty members Clau-dio Silva and Juliana Friere, dedicated to data analysis and visualization. Faculty offices, computational labs, workstations for post docs, two conference rooms, an office suite for department advisors and administrators, and a lounge fill the remainder of the 50,000 square feet.

NYU-Poly’s space on the building’s 9th floor, which will include additional research space, faculty offices, and large-capacity classrooms, is currently under development.

President Hultin, who officiated at the rib-bon cutting, was joined by NYU President John Sexton. Also in attendance were Brook-lyn Borough President Marty Markowitz, Deputy Mayor for Economic Development Robert K. Steel, New York State Senator Dan-iel Squadron, New York City Councilmember Gale Brewer, New York City Councilmember

“In many ways this ribbon cutting fulfills a dream that began 30 years ago with forest city ratner and George bugliarello,” said jerry hultin, president of NYU-Poly, at a festive ribbon- cutting ceremony held at 2 MetroTech center on january 20.


The 85,000 square feet of leased space at 2 MetroTech Center is split among three floors.

nyU-Poly'S camPUS continUES to tranSform

POLY.EDU / CABLE Cable NYU-Poly’s Alumni Magazine Fall 2011 25

Stephen Levin, Forest City Ratner CEO and Chair Bruce Ratner, National Grid’s New York President Kenneth Daly ’99, and Downtown Brooklyn Partnership President Tucker Reed. Many members of the faculty and staff of

the CSE and ECE departments joined in the celebration of the new space, as did mem-bers of NYU-Poly’s Capital Transformation Steering Committee and the project team, including project architects Beyer Blinder Belle Architects & Planners LLP, owner’s rep-resentative Jonathan Rose Companies, and construction management firm Turner Con-struction Company.

“This is the latest installment in what is turn-ing out to be a wonderful story about technol-ogy in downtown Brooklyn,” said Deputy May-or for Economic Development Robert K. Steel, perfectly capturing the spirit of the occasion.


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The leased space at 2 MetroTech is a deal which includes approximately $1 million in office, workstation and conference room furnishings.

PICTURED ABOVE: lEfT TO RIgHT, fRONTNYU-Poly VP - Finance and Business Affairs Dennis Dintino, NYU President John Sexton, NYU-Poly President Jerry M. Hultin, Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz.

PICTURED ABOVE: lEfT TO RIgHT, BACk NYU-Poly Provost Katepalli Sreenivasan, NYC Councilmember Gale Brewer, Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce VP Rick Russo, Downtown Brooklyn Partnership President Tucker Reed, New York State Senator Daniel Squadron, Forest City Ratner Companies CEO Bruce Ratner and NYC Deputy Mayor Robert K. Steel

for nearly two years, jeff Soto ran TENdIGI, a startup that develops applications for Apple’s iOS mobile operating system, out of the one-bedroom apartment he shares with his wife in brooklyn’s vinegar hill neighborhood, a small urban enclave nestled between dUMbO and the brooklyn Navy Yard.


tech companies in New York City. Physi-cally, it wasn’t much of a migration; Soto’s apartment is just four and a half blocks from the incubator’s location at 20 Jay Street, which is itself only one block from Brooklyn Bridge Park, an 85-acre stretch of green oases along the East River. “It’s convenient,” Soto says with a laugh.

But for an entrepreneur like Soto, who worked as an engi-neer at Apple headquarters in California for several years before returning to his native New York to launch his own business, con-venience is the least of what the incubator has to offer.

At the beginning of February, however, Soto moved the company into more spacious and better-equipped environs: NYU-Poly’s new DUMBO Incubator, the latest in a series of busi-ness incubators that NYU-Poly has established to nurture young

nyU-Poly laUnchES dUmBo BUSinESS incUBator in Brooklyn

The goal of these incubators is to provide the guidance, expertise, and resources that organizations need to grow into successful ventures.

NYU-Poly inaugurated its first incuba-tor, the Brooklyn Enterprise on Science and Technology (BEST), at its downtown Brooklyn campus in 2004 to stimulate the growth of science and technology-based startups and spinoff companies. In 2009, the University opened two more: Varick Street, a joint effort between NYU-Poly and

the City of New York that supports startups in fields ranging from biotech to financial technology; and the New York City Accel-erator for a Clean and Renewable Economy (NYC ACRE), which provides assistance to companies seeking solutions to climate and energy issues while growing the cleantech

and renewable energy sectors in New York City. The latter receives support from the New York City Economic Development Cor-poration (NYEDC) and the New York State Energy and Research Development Author-ity (NYSERDA). Its director, Micah Kotch, who is also director of incubator initiatives at NYU-Poly, was recently named one of 11 Sustainable Innovators by Ecomagination, a division of GE committed to developing solutions to environmental challenges while driving economic growth. In his citation, Kotch was recognized for his ability to bring ideas “from conception to production” and for “helping other entrepreneurs and startup companies make their sustainable innova-tions a reality.”

The latest addition to the incubator fam-ily is based on a partnership between NYU-Poly, which manages it; the NYEDC; and Two Trees Management, a New York-based real estate development firm that provides space for many of the players on DUMBO’s burgeoning tech scene. (The neighborhood

plays host to a number of tech companies, from the online handicrafts marketplace Etsy to the digital agencies HUGE and Big Spaceship.)

The DUMBO facility is dedicated to digital media startups that focus on areas such as social media, mobile apps, and advertising. But according to Kotch, the DUMBO Incu-bator shares the same fundamental mis-sion of its predecessors: to accelerate the growth of innovative young tech companies by helping them find the resources and opportunities they need to succeed in the marketplace.

Those resources come in many forms. First, there is the physical space itself—no


Micah kotch, director of incubator initiatives at NYU-Poly, was recently named one of 11 Sustainable Innovators by Ecomagination, a division of GE.

The dUMbO facility is dedicated to digital media startups that focus on areas such as social media, mobile apps, and advertising.

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small matter when, as Soto puts it, you have reached the point where you need “to take your professionalism to another level” i.e., one where you have a conference room in which to meet clients and vendors, and workstations at which to place employees and interns. One of the many advantages of the incubator system is that it gives entrepreneurs access to NYU-Poly’s pool of talented student workers, while giving those same students the opportunity to get real-world entrepreneurial experience.

Space was also an issue for Andres Blank, who moved to New York City from Boston with his partners and fellow MIT grads in order to launch Pixable, the first startup to graduate from the Var-ick Street incubator. Pixable offers a free mobile application that allows users to aggregate and sort images and videos from so-cial networks like Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube. The app has been downloaded 1.5 million times since April of last year, and the startup has raised over $6 million to date. When Blank first heard

about Varick Street, he and his colleagues had been working out of “a tiny apartment” in Battery Park City for five months. “The incubator was really a blessing for us,” he says.

In addition to breathing space and physical infrastructure, the incubators offer entrepreneurs valuable legal and business ad-vice, along with opportunities to meet other members of the tech sector and the broader business community—whether through workshops, brown-bag lunches, or the various other programs or-ganized by Kotch and his team. They are currently working on a re-source map that will detail the interests of NYU-Poly faculty, in order to facilitate collaboration between academics and entrepreneurs. They also create an environment where tenants can rub shoulders with one another.

Such encounters can forge the kind of fruitful connections that are a hallmark of the country’s most robust hi-tech communities. According to Blank, two of Pixable’s key technical personnel were


thelead1 Jeff Soto’s company TENDIGI is based out of NYU-Poly’s DUMBO business incubator.2 Micah Kotch is director of incubator initiatives at NYU-Poly and director of NYC ACRE.

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recruited from among “friends of friends” of fellow incubator ten-ants; and the startup’s founders met their first major investor during a casual encounter at an incubator-sponsored event. “That’s what

an incubator is: an environment where everyone is passionate and driven, and great accidents happen,” he says.

Kotch agrees: “Our job is to structure those interactions so that those things actually become more regular, more frequent, and more worthwhile.”

Soto looks forward to similarly serendipitous encounters at the DUMBO Incubator, where his fellow tenants include the software company Filemobile; the online legal document provider Docracy;

and Brooklyn Bridge Ventures, a venture capital fund that focuses on seed investments in tech companies. “You never know when you’ll need each other,” Soto says. “You may be looking for a mobile developer, and he’ll be sitting right next to you.”

Though such meetings might seem like pure happenstance, they are in fact a natural and intended consequence of the incubator environment—an environment that Kotch and his colleagues have engineered to encourage the kind of fortuitous but largely unfore-seen events that help startups to flourish. And by helping to expand the community in which those events occur, the incubators are ex-panding the tech ecosystem in New York City at large—something to which Blank can personally attest. Two years ago, his decision to leave Boston for New York generated a lot of raised eyebrows amongst his entrepreneurial peers. “That’s completely changed,” he says. “Academia really generates a lot of innovation, and there’s definitely a lot of entrepreneurship spinning out of NYU-Poly.”

The incubator system gives entrepreneurs access to NYU-Poly’s pool of talented student workers.

thelead3Andres Blank is the co-founder of Pixable—the first startup to graduate from the Varick Street incubator.

3

Braking

nikHiL gUPTa TakES THE HEaT—anD THE WEigHT—OFF THE BrakES

P WErFew things could be more valuable to automotive manufacturers these days than innovations that lower the cost of ownership of a vehicle. With gasoline prices at historic highs, consumers are more likely these days to consider cars and trucks that are easier on the pocketbook, and cheaper to maintain over the long haul.

One way for manufacturers to achieve that is by decreasing a vehicle’s curb weight and using parts that don’t need replacing. Take something as superficially mundane as brake rotors. They have, for decades, been made of cast iron, which is heavy and prone to overheating and wear, and eventually has to be replaced. But NYU-Poly may soon help in developing a low-weight and high-durability rotor. Researchers at the University are collaborating with Calumet, Michigan-based supplier REL, Inc. to build a rotor that weighs 60 percent less, and is immune to the damaging temperature and pressure differentials that plague traditional brakes. The new rotors may, in fact, never have to be replaced. Overseeing the NYU-Poly side of the equation is Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Associate Professor Nikhil Gupta who, with

his Composites Materials and Mechanics Lab, is near to perfecting the technology that makes these rotors a possibility. The solution lies in a composite of aluminum and glass ceramic. The product isn’t a pipe dream: Gupta and his lab are working with REL toward production this year of a prototype rotor that may revolutionize a market valued at $10 billion annually. In essence, Gupta and REL are developing a one-piece aluminum rotor impregnated at the rim with glass ceramic strands that tolerate high temperatures. The result is a lighter disk whose composition is optimal for autos: even under high-stress braking where disk temperatures can quickly spike to the melting point of aluminum. The new disk tolerates those temperatures and diffuses the heat throughout the rotor for faster cooling. “The temperature of the brake shoes can be several hundred degrees Celsius,” explains Gupta, “so you want a rotor that has a different set of properties at the rim than at the hub, or a gradient structure” he says. “The gradient material allows us to selectively provide reinforcement where additional strength is needed.”

research lOW-WEIGHT AND HIGH-DURABIlITY BRAKE ROTORS


“

WErlow-weight and high-durability rotor

shaves 30 pounds from a mid-size sedan

composite of aluminum and glass ceramic

light-weight composite brakes

shaves 30 pounds from a mid-size sedan

composite of aluminum and glass ceramic

REl already manufactures lightweight

composite brakes for use in high perfor-

mance motorcycles. These composite

bike brakes comprise an amalgam of

aluminum and silicon carbide chips. Gupta

explains that while those brakes are fine for

motorcycles, they don’t work for heavier

vehicles. Under the kind of high-stress

events common in automobile braking the

ceramic particles are excreted by the rotors,

and end up on the brake caliper pads, where

they are about as useful as sandpaper.

“If ceramic particles start coming out by

routine wear, they increase the wear rate

of the rest of the brake disk,” says Gupta.

But the ceramic fibers in the new brake disk

design are arranged something like woven

glass noodles around the part of the disk

where the brake calipers grab. “long fibers

don’t behave that way, which means they

exhibit a longer life,” he says. And the new

brakes also shave 30 pounds from a mid-

size sedan, an important step for an industry

facing fleet fuel economy requirement of

54.5 miles per gallon by 2025.

REl, Inc. in collaboration with Gupta

received a $150,000 Phase I Small Business

Innovation Research Grant from the National

Science Foundation to develop the initial

product design, material and manufacturing

process. “The first prototype will be available

in a couple of months, and a finished product

within the current year,” says Gupta. Among

suitors waiting in the wings is the U.S. Army,

which needs to find ways to lower the weight

of heavy vehicles like up-armored Humvees.

Doing a lot of that work is a pair of

NYU-Poly students–a graduate student and

an undergrad–who are testing the rotors REl

is sending. The students are responsible for

testing stiffness, strength, weight, and high

temperature stability. Says Gupta, “This

experience is extremely important for the

students because it involves an industry/

university partnership. So they are working

on a real project with real-time deadlines

and industrial pressures.”


“

NIKHIL GUPTA

CiTiZEn

SCiEnCEthe gowanus bot


COllABORATING FOR A ClEANER COMMUNITYresearch

SCiEnCE Doing science about people and machines, using people and machines, while contributing to cleaning a polluted Brooklyn waterway: That’s the goal and plan of a new project led by two NYU-Poly professors and funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF).

Oded Nov and Maurizio Porfiri are about to launch an interdisciplinary exploration of the dynamics of a human- machine network that will perform specific tasks in monitoring the highly polluted Gowanus Canal.

The scientific question they will be studying, says Porfiri, associate professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at NYU-Poly, “is the interaction between a network of robots and a network of humans. We hope to contribute to human-robot interactions by understanding networks from both a robot perspective and by collective behavior. The project has very strong social and technical aspects. We want to study the behavior of people with machines and how they cooperate.”

The collaboration came about in a simple way: “We ran into each other and talked about networks and system design, and realized we had interests in similar things from very different perspectives,” says Nov, assistant professor in the Department of Technology Management and an expert on computer-supported collaborative work.

Porfiri was also inspired by his passion for Brooklyn. “The idea was to contribute to the community and something exciting for our people. I really feel good about doing something that can be done in a specific place.”

They wrote a proposal a year ago, and funding from the NSF’s Cyber-Discovery and Innovation Program started last fall [2011]. The team they are building will eventually comprise NYU-Poly

graduate and undergraduate students, with input from the local community and, eventually, hundreds of volunteers from city schools, the metropolitan area and elsewhere—anywhere in the world, in fact, as participants will work from their homes.

While students will do the actual research, a diverse group of online volunteers—or citizen scientists—will help monitor and observe using the platform the researchers develop. “We want to understand the best ways to design and manage complex citizen science systems, and how to attract and retain online citizen scientists,” says Nov. A short tutorial will quickly teach participants to identify certain objects underwater and possibly write a few words about what they see; some will do more complex tasks.

What they will be observing are data sent by under- and above-water cameras attached to sturdy buoys anchored in the Gowanus. Instruments will be controlled by volunteers using a web-based, peer-production system. Participants can spend as little as five minutes a week, or up to a few hours a week. All the information that is gathered will be used by local authorities, the federal Environmental Protection Agency and others.

“Just like participation in projects such as Wikipedia and Linux, citizen science is a powerful trend that enables large numbers of laypeople to contribute to science, essentially offering a new way for scientists to overcome the shortage of people and resources they need for their projects,” says Nov. “A great deal of scientific research involves tasks that don’t require a PhD. Some successful projects in astronomy use hundreds of thousands of volunteers to classify images in the sky. Our project is in the same tradition.”

They also hope the project will get people excited about science and science careers. Says Nov: “We want to do for scientific knowledge what Wikipedia did for encyclopedic knowledge.”

USing HUMan-rOBOT inTEraCTiOn TO CLEan THE gOWanUS CanaL

robotic buoy collect send graphic user interface public educationu

environmental data the robotic buoy can collect:

dissolved oxygen | ph levels of water | temperature of water | video and sediment of gowanus canal

u uu


left: Maurizio PorfiriRight: Oded Nov

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in FOCUSViVEnTi rESEarCH CaPTUrES ViEWS OF THE Brain DUring SEiZUrEIt has been all but impossible until now for researchers to obtain detailed electrical signals from vast areas of the brain. Getting lucid, comprehensible data from wide terrain would require too large a number of electrodes and correspondingly, too many wires. Thus, conducting detailed studies of the human brain in neurological disorders has been science fiction for clinicians and researchers.

Because of such technical limitations, researchers’ efforts to obtain temporal snapshots of diseases like epilepsy has presented a serious dilemma: one could get either a fine-resolution portrait of a small region of the brain, or a vague, impressionistic mural of a larger one. Neither suffices when it comes to solving the puzzle of brain diseases whose hallmarks are miniature electric storms. What researchers have needed to study diseases like epilepsy is the neuro-diagnostic equivalent of an IMAX camera: a device that offers fine, comprehensive and panoramic temporal “movies” of the brain’s electric activity.

Jonathan Viventi, an assistant professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at NYU-Poly, and 2012 recipient of the Taking Flight Award from the Citizens United for Research in Epilepsy (CURE) Foundation, may have developed just such a camera. Viventi, with collaborators from NYU and elsewhere, has devised an elegant way of obtaining fine-resolution, wide-area images of brain activity over time via high-density electronics annealed into

a stretchable, flexible medium. It is still in the testing phase, but in vivo animal studies are promising.

So, what is this device? If the image one gets is of an item that looks like a subdural yarmulke with wires attached, that’s not quite it. Viventi’s device is more ethereal, with the thickness and flexibility of thin cellophane sheets.

Comprising contact electrodes, low-power amplifiers and multiplexers, and wiring built using doped silicon nanoribbons on polyimide, Viventi’s device offers the great benefit of being conformable to the irregular convolutions of the brain's surface. Thus this device, an ultra-thin, ultra-flexible sheet of sensors and circuitry, can be slipped beneath the brain’s dura with less trauma, meaning that in vivo studies of such events as seizures are within reach.

A former Kirschstein-NRSA Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania in the Institute for Medicine and Engineering, Viventi joined the faculty of NYU-Poly last fall. He has been working with the material sciences group at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign on perfecting the flexible matrix. The bottom line, Viventi explains, is that the flexible matrix “allows us to get a lot more information out of the brain because we can combine signals using circuits directly on that piece of plastic on the surface of the brain. Usually such circuits are part of a rigid circuit board outside of the body, far away from the area from which you are recording.”

SEiZUrESresearch CAPTURING THE BRAIN’S ElECTRIC ACTIVITY


in FOCUSThese traditional devices, Viventi adds, are also “very limited in what they can

record because one can only have so many wires emerge from a patient’s head that are then connected to outside instruments. What this technology does is allow us to put thousands of sensors directly on the surface of the brain without needing thousands of wires. It solves what has really been the limiting factor.”

How big a reduction in wiring is Viventi talking about? The multiplexed, high-density flexible array he has developed effectively reduces required wiring from an unfeasible 1,024 electrodes to approximately 60 wires or less.

The end result, vis a` vis diagnostic results is much greater perspicuity: Viventi says in vivo tests on laboratory animals have revealed unique electrical patterns that appear to initiate seizures. And he says studies garnered from the use of his device as a sensor platform reveal that the electrical “storm” patterns of seizures move across the brain in ways people haven't been able to see before because researchers have not, till now, had the kind of detailed measurements afforded by the device.

The goal, of course, would be the discovery and application of treatment protocols that are far less invasive than the varieties of neurosurgical electrode implants that are typically performed today. “We think it may lead to new ways of treating epilepsy through electrical stimulation to shutdown these waves as we observe them,” says Viventi, who has filed five patents and several licensing agreements already. He and his collaborators at NYU Langone Medical Center, NYU’s Center for Neural Science (where he has a joint appointment), the University of Pennsylvania and the materials science group at the University of Illinois have found that seizures are book-ended by electrical patterns. And he says these patterns appear to naturally end seizures.

“So we are trying to reproduce those patterns by stimulation through hundreds of electrodes, creating the same kinds of waves to see if we can shut down seizures earlier or prevent them completely,” he says. “The end goal is to take this device and develop it into a fully implantable system that's essentially a pacemaker for the brain. It would detect abnormal rhythms and stimulate them to prevent them from developing into a full seizure.”

thickness and flexibility of thin cellophane sheets

conforms to the irregular convolutions

of the brain's surface

can obtain fine- resolution, wide-area images of brain activity


JONATHAN VIVENTI

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18.2 manufacturing & construction

15.9 road transportation

12.2 fuel combustion (other)

9.8 non-road transport


research TURNING WASTE TO GOOD USE

CO2CrEaTing USEFUL MaTEriaLS FrOM WaSTE ByPrODUCTSIf some NYU-Poly researchers have their way, they will be cutting back on disposal of industrial solid waste and emission of carbon dioxide, while turning the waste to good use.

CO2 emissions, a significant byproduct of the coal burning process (the primary source of generating electricity in the U.S.), are a huge contributor to global warming, environmental health and public well-being. At the same time, every year 130 million tons of solid waste known as fly ash is created in this country as a byproduct of coal-fired power plants. What to do about it?

“We’re trying to see how we would combine solid waste from the industry with carbon dioxide [CO2] from the same or other industrial emissions in order to create a useful material—paving bricks, for example—rather than emitting the CO2 into the air as pollution, and dumping the industrial solid waste in landfills,” explains Masoud Ghandehari, associate professor of civil and environmental engineering, who is the co-principal investigator along with NYU-Poly civil engineering adjunct professor Weihua Jin and Professor Racquel LeGeros of the NYU Department of Biomaterials and Biomimetics.

Their work is a major undertaking in basic research and engineering, according to Michael Hailemariam, a graduate student in the NYU-Poly chemical engineering department who is a member of the research team. Other team members include doctoral students Engui Liu and Anupama Kulkarni. Efficient carbon sequestration—that is, capturing

“we’re trying to see how we would combine solid waste from the industry with carbon dioxide [cO2] from the same or other industrial emissions in order to create a useful material.”

- Masoud Ghandehari

and storing CO2 from power plants—is the challenge. “Our goal,” Hailemariam says, “is to make the system financially viable. That is, the team hopes the cost of the process will be offset by its producing a salable product.”

Fly ash, the industrial solid waste contains significant amounts of calcium, Ghandehari explains, and the basic science will involve working with that calcium to capture the CO2 thereby forming synthetic limestone, a process that took place in nature in geologic times.

The NYU-Poly researchers are working with the NYU School of Dentistry’s Department of Biomaterials and Biomimetics. “The dental school is involved because the science of carbonates and phosphates is related to what goes into human teeth and bones,” says Ghandehari. “Our partners at NYU contribute the understanding of the microstructure of these materials, which will help us understand how to develop this challenging synthesis. Together, perhaps, we can figure out what to do.”

The unique thing is not only the collaboration between NYU and Poly, Hailemariam adds, but also that the work is cross-departmental at NYU-Poly and NYU, with the chemical, biomaterials and civil engineering departments working together. “I’m going between labs that are completely different, which is a highlight for me,” he says.

While their work is still early-stage research, he continues, the potential is huge. Over the next few months, the researchers expect to build a model and hope to understand better the possibilities of their work.

“It’s pretty tremendous!” Ghandehari adds. “Cement manu-facturing itself causes about 5 percent of pollution worldwide. This is due to the decomposition of limestone, the primary raw ingredient, and also from burning the fuel needed for the process to 1300°C: it takes a lot of fuel to heat materials that hot, which creates yet more CO2. So if we can save on the fuel to make conventional Portland cement and use up the solid waste and capture carbon dioxide—it would be a triple savings.”


From the left: Racquel leGeros, Weihua Jin and Masoud Ghandehari

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SEE THE

Data visualization is ubiquitous nowadays, as computer graphics technology has reached parity with the massive capacity of computers to capture and manage data. Visualization platforms are in constant use by engineers, marketers, meteorologists, clinicians, theoretical physicists (who are quite likely building interactive visual models to analyze recent potential sightings of Higgs Boson particles) and, in a recent and tragic example, catastrophe risk assessors who are creating geographic/fiscal models of tornado damage in the south. When it comes to highly complex data from multiple sources, there’s really no better way than visual models for making it comprehensible.

CHANGING THE CULTUREOF DATA PROVENANCE

A custom version of VisTrails is part of Ultrascale Visualization Climate Data Analysis Tool (UV-CDAT), a joint U.S. Department of Energy and NASA project.

A powerful data visualization system allows you to understand and comprehend data faster, find it better, and correlate things that weren't obvious.

- Claudio Silva

Claudio Silva offers a concise statement on the importance of data visualization, a tool that–if you consider charts and graphs –has actually been around for a long time. “A powerful data visualization system allows you to understand and comprehend data faster, find it better, and correlate things that weren't obvious,” he says.

Designing better data visualization tech-nology is the work of Silva, an NYU-Poly computer sciences professor and leading researcher in the field of geometric, inter-active data analysis and visualization. He would be the first to assert that, like well-designed sports cars, visual models require a powerful engine under the hood to go fast, regardless of how they look. The en-gine beneath the hood of data visualization programs is data management.

That is the purview of Silva’s collaborator, NYU-Poly computer sciences professor (and spouse) Juliana Freire. Her expertise is understanding, integrating and managing large-scale data, a pursuit that has put her at the forefront of such projects as the specialized web crawler DeepPeep.org.

While the two researchers are on the avant garde in their respective fields, both assert it is their collaborative work that has the potential to change the very culture of data management and analysis. The two have combined their expertise to create a visual data-provenance platform, VisTrails,

that lets researchers easily track and document complicated workflows over time and involving multiple participants.

Freire says VisTrails (in the argot, an open-source, workflow-based data exploration and visualization tool) is kind of like document-tracking functionality within Microsoft Word and Google Docs that “remembers” what changes were made when, and by whom. Similarly, VisTrails tracks what various people contributed to a big data project, and when, but demonstrates it as a visual, interactive structure that can be manipulated and works automatically when scientists advance, change, or alter their work on computer-based projects. As it is itself a data visualization platform, it makes it easy for

users to track the “who-did-what-when” of major projects. “You need that kind of system; VisTrails is a bit like a big brother watching over your shoulder unobtrusively,” she says.

The seed for the VisTrails collabora-tive project between the researchers was Freire’s work with an environmental scien-tist to create temporal visualizations of the Columbia River watershed in Washington State. “The biggest problem for the sci-entist was not lack of visualization but the fact that he was drowning in data,” says Silva. “To create one visualization took the scientist’s group a week because one guy might know simulation code, another might know where the sensor data was, but the ‘plumbing’ to do these simulations was not there; everything was ad hoc.”

In essence, the scientist’s problem, which Silva and Freire say is actually endemic in the research world on big projects, is that there is frequently too little organization in the process, too many people manipulating the data, and no formal, or automatic way to track the changes.

Silva grabs the first study from a prestigious journal as an example. Here is an elegant-looking visualization on how crowds of people behave. But how did the researchers arrive at the visual? Where is the code beneath the hood? Silva says such studies are really “advertisements for

data visualization is ubiquitous nowadays, as computer graphics technology has reached parity with the massive capacity of computers to capture and manage data.


�vistrails interfaceExploratory visualization for studying celestial structures derived from cosmological simulations using VisTrails. Complete provenance of the exploration process is displayed as a vistrail (history tree), where each node represents a workflow that generates a unique visualization. Detailed meta-data is also stored including free-text notes made by the scientist, the date and time the workflow was created or modified, optional descriptive tags, and the user that created it. Visualizations generated by Dr. Erik Anderson while on an internship at los Alamos National labs.

CLAUdIO SILVA & JULIANA FREIRE

scholarship” precisely because there is no data provenance. “The code is not available; the data is not available. And unfortunately, the actual scholarship is in that data,” he says. “It’s in the code, it’s in the software. So what you have in many published studies are different results and no way of reproducing them because nothing is provided.”

After toiling on VisTrails for eight years, the two are now finding more and more acceptance of the idea of published studies packaged with provenance. VisTrails has been downloaded worldwide thousands of times, according to Silva, and is used in areas like environmental sciences, high-energy physics, molecular modeling and engineering.

A custom version of VisTrails is part of Ultrascale Visualization Climate Data Analysis Tool (UV-CDAT), a joint U.S. Department of Energy and NASA project. And though she doesn’t attribute to VisTrails the power to change the culture of published research, Freire says journals like Signal Processing, Science and Nature

have announced in recent months that from now on they will require submissions to include the coding that the authors used to create the visual models of their work.

The two scientists have recently been working on building out elements of VisTrails designed to be used with tools like Adobe Photoshop and AutoDesk Maya 3D that can’t usually be integrated with secondary software. “With programs like Adobe Photoshop, you can’t really use VisTrails,” says Freire. “To address that we extracted the provenance subset system from VisTrails and created a software development kit that allows third party developers to add provenance to their own tools.”

Says Silva “Our idea, ultimately, is that every tool should be able to maintain the user history. We need to have provenance for computational artifacts. We need to be able to accurately describe the whole process from start to end. And only then can you actually trust the results.”

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polyBuzz

Rose Emma, executive assistant to the late President Emeritus George Bugliarello, was given a grand send off by members of the NYU-Poly community at her retirement party in January. A notable fixture at the Institute, Rose left NYU-Poly after 22 years of loyal service. Staff from many departments on campus stopped by to extend their best wishes and enjoy the refreshments. Rose will be returning to campus to help launch the inaugural lecture of George Bugliarello Symposium: Livable Cities of the Future scheduled for fall 2012.

Teresina Tam, director of the HEOP program, bid farewell to her NYU-Poly family at a luncheon in December after more than 27 years with the Institute. Tam’s unwavering dedication to the success of her students is well-known throughout the Institute. In a show of heartfelt thanks, the NYU-Poly community—staff, faculty and students—turned out to offer their best wishes and share remembrances.

SAY IT ISN’T SO…rose Emma and Teresina Tam retire

Valerie Cabral has been named Director of Alumni Relations at NYU-Poly effective April 16. Prior to assuming this position, she was assistant director for the New York University Opportunity Programs with 25 years of experience working with

undergraduate and graduate students from low-income, minority, and immigrant backgrounds.

Her career with the Opportunity Programs focused on developing initiatives that provided academic, financial, and cultural support to first-generation college students and their families. For the last several years, she also directed the

programs’ efforts to identify, locate, and re-engage alumni.

Valerie earned a BA in journalism from NYU and worked as a commodities and insurance reporter for the Journal of

Commerce newspaper. She holds a certificate in cross-cultural training from NYU’s the Center for Multicultural Education & Programs and a certificate in fundraising from NYU’s George H. Heyman, Jr. Center for Philanthropy and Fundraising.

vALErIE cAbrAL jOINS NYU-POLY AS dIrEcTOr Of ALUMNI rELATIONS

You can feel the love of her friends at NYU-Poly! From left to right, Meagan Watson, coordinator of academic advising, Undergraduate Academics, Teresina Tam, Alison Mann, director, Polytechnic Tutoring Center, lexie Bryan, instructional designer, Faculty Innovations in Teaching and learning Center.

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Rose Emma

Stephanie Mitchko and Dean Anita Farrington.

Dr. Irving Pressley McPhail Hon’10, president and CEO of the National Action Council for Minorities in Engineering (NAC-ME), was the guest speaker for the National Society of Black Engineers’ (NSBE) annual dinner sponsored by the organization’s NYU-Poly chapter.

NSBE’s mission is to increase the number of culturally responsible Black engineers who excel academically, succeed professionally and positively impact the community. “Our chap-ter seeks to provide a support network for students of color on campus,” says NSBE Chapter President Sukari Brown ’13CE. “We assist in the professional and academic growth of our members and provide social support as well.” This kind of academic mentoring and socialization can provide minority engineering students with the tools that can make the differ-ence between success and failure. Incorporating underrepre-sented populations into the mainstream of the STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) professions could ultimately change the technology-driven workforce and firmly establish this country as a technology leader.

The chapter presented appreciation awards to McPhail for delivering the keynote address during the Black History Month celebration and for his continuing support of the chapter’s work, as well as, to NSBE Past President Calvin Young III ’10ME for his dedication to the organization’s mission and the NYU-Poly NSBE chapter.

The NYU-Poly chapter was established in 1979.


NSBE HoStS ANNUAL REcEptioN DURiNg NAtioNAL ENgiNEERiNg WEEk

Stephanie Mitchko ’87EE, vice president, Interactive Platform Development at Cablevision Systems Corporation, was the first guest speaker in the i2e Spotlight Series in February, sponsored by the Office of Student Affairs. The series’ format mirrors the popular cable series, “Inside the Actors’ Studio” where the conversation is facilitated by a moderator—in this case, Anita Farrington, dean of student affairs. Mitchko discussed her career successes and challenges and students had an opportunity to ask questions and receive insight into how they can prepare for their careers. Guests are successful leaders and entrepreneurs in science, engineering and technology.

SPOTLIgHTSERIES

The NYU-Poly members of NSBE join the evening's honored guest, Dr. Irving P. McPhail Hon’10, president and CEO of the National Action Council for Minorities in Engineering (NACME).

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Myles Jackson, a professor at NYU’s

Gallatin School of Individualized Study and

Polytechnic Institute of NYU, has been

elected as a foreign member of the German

National Academy of Sciences, the nation’s

equivalent of the U.S. National Academy

of Sciences.

Established in 1652 and also known as

the leopoldina zu Halle, it is one of the oldest

academies of sciences in the world and

the oldest continuously existing academy.

Its members have included Johann

Wolfgang v. Goethe, Charles Darwin and

more than 100 Nobel laureates, among

them Marie Curie, Ernest Rutherford, Max

Planck and Albert Einstein.

The Dibner Family Professor of the History

and Philosophy of Science and Technology

at NYU-Poly, Jackson’s works include

Harmonious Triads: Physicists, Musicians,

and Instrument Makers in Nineteenth-

Century Germany (MIT Press) and Spectrum

of Belief: Joseph von Fraunhofer and the

Craft of Precision Optics (MIT Press). He is

working on a book manuscript tentatively

entitled: Patents, Race, and HIV/AIDS: A

History of the CCR5 Gene Patent. Jackson

is a member of the Erfurt Academy of

Sciences in Germany.

Myles Jackson elected to German national academy of sciencesphilip maymin, assistant professor, Finance and Risk

Engineering, launched the inaugural edition of the online journal, Algorithmic Finance in January. Maymin serves as the publication’s managing editor. To submit papers and for more information visit: http://algorithmicfinance.org.

Jin kim montclare, assistant professor, Chemical and Biological Science, authored an article, “Effects of Divalent Metals on Nanoscopic Fiber Formation and Small Molecule Recognition of Helial Proteins,” which has been accepted for publication by Advanced Functional Materials. The article investigates the ability to generate nanofibers made of proteins and how to control their

assemblies, morphologies and their abilities to bind small molecules by using an external trigger like metal ions. This is important because: (1) protein nanofibers that can encapsulate small molecules can be reproducibly created (something that hasn’t been done before), (2) these nanofibers can be triggered to change their shapes by adding different types of metal ions, (3) the ability to trigger fiber dis-assembly as well as the delivery of small molecules for therapeutic delivery that is totally protein based, and (4) it has implications in nanoelectronics as the protein fibers can be employed for fabricating metal nanowires useful in circuits.

Jonathan soffer, associate professor, Technology, Culture and Society, has been elected a fellow of the New York Academy of History.

frederick novometsky, industry professor, Finance and Risk Engineering, published a new package called rportfolios written in R, a free open source software environment for statistical computing and graphics. The package is a collection of functions used to generate various types of random investment portfolios. They include portfolios with constrained cardinality, long-only and

short-only portfolios, long-short portfolios and active portfolios relative to benchmark portfolios. The package is intended for portfolio selection, analysis and simulation.

Novomestky is a member of the Community Chamber Music Program sponsored by the Department of Music of Stony Brook University. As a player of the acoustic double bass, he performed the Dvorak String Quintet, Op. 77, on Sunday January 22.

ilan Juran, professor, Civil Engineering, delivered an address to the International Water Forum Entrepreneurial Club at the United Nations in September. Text served as the welcoming address to 2012 undergraduates enrolled in a course on sustainable cities.

edward wolf, professor, Applied Physics, co-authored a book with his student Manasa Medikonda titled “Understanding the Nanotechnology Revolution”, which will be published in May.

FACULTYnotes


alumninews

Dear Fellow Alumni,

As the first signs of spring are appearing on campus around “Innovation Square,” there is much happening that I would like to share with you regarding new alumni benefits and inspiring new spaces on campus.

While a comprehensive alumni benefits program is in the works, two recent additions have been made to our current offerings. The Polytechnic Institute Alumni Association (PIAA) entered into a partnership with the Grand Summit Resort in Mount Snow, Vermont. We are now able to take part in the Getaway Program, an advantage that will make it much easier to plan mid-week escapes year round.

Informative and relevant webinars are also being offered to help members of our alumni community connect with one another and discuss our wide-ranging interests. The Alumni Webinar Series will feature different topics every month, with a different alumnus leading each session. Topics include “Increasing Your Value in Your Current Job” and “Entrepreneurship & Innovation.” For more information, please visit http://www.poly.edu/node/6811.

In addition to expanding our benefits, our campus is growing!

The Office of Alumni Relations moved into a new, larger space in 15 MetroTech Center. In mid-January, two academic departments have also expanded, moving into newly renovated space in 2 MetroTech Center. The space is now the new hub of NYU-Poly’s Department of Computer Science and Engineering and is home to a portion of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering.

I hope you will also join us on campus for a few of the NYU-Poly events and celebrations I look forward to attending during this time of year.

toast ’12 Thursday, May 17thToast ’12 will celebrate the achievements of this year’s graduating class by toasting their future and welcoming them as the newest members of the PIAA.

piaa annual meetingSunday, June 3rd We will vote for our selection of new members to the PIAA International Board of Directors and take part in the Bern Dibner Library’s 20th Anniversary celebration.

It has been almost a year since I began serving as the president of the PIAA, and during this time I have felt overwhelmingly grateful toward our alumni family. Whether it is through personal advancements in their respective fields or by pledging time and financial support to their alma mater, members of our alumni community continue to inspire current students and one another. I encourage you to come back to campus and participate in our Annual Meeting to see the transformations illuminating the NYU-Poly Brooklyn campus.

In the spirit of i2e,

Josiane Arbouet ’96JT ’99IYPIAA President

LETTER FROM THE ALUMNI PRESIDENT

Josiane Arbouet

Staecker, who retired in 1998 as director of research and development from the Massachusetts Technology Corporation AMP M/A-COM, will take office in January 2013.

Staecker, an IEEE Life Fellow, said his interest in engineering started early: “As a young boy I enjoyed building things, and had some aptitude for math and science.” After earning his BS in electrical engineering in 1964 from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), he joined MIT’s Lincoln Laboratory in 1972. He designed microwave devices and circuits and developed measurement techniques for their application to satellite communications. He made a major contribution to the field when he developed the first test systems that allowed engineers to ac-curately measure the reflection of high-frequency waves traveling on microwave circuits.

In 1986, Staecker joined M/A-COM, a supplier of high-powered vac-uum tubes to the U.S. Army Signal Corps, and developed programs and products in microwave and millimeter-wave technology. He also designed a series of high-efficiency, high-power frequency multipliers that convert signal frequencies and are often used in communications circuits. “The trick was to make this conversion with as little power loss as possible,” he said, “either because not much power is available, as in the case of satellite-communications receivers, or because large amounts of power are required, as with radar transmitters.” Staecker was able to achieve record power levels for M/A-COM radar transmit-ters by using these multipliers.

Staecker, who has been an active IEEE volunteer for 28 years, says IEEE is important to the profession because “members are always

When louis J. Alpinieri was a high school student in Brooklyn in

the early 1950s, a good friend who lived across the street was in

college. “I thought high school would be enough,” Alpinieri told

his friend. After all, only one of his four older sisters had even

graduated from high school, and no one in his Italian immigrant

family had gone to college.

The friend replied that it was possible to keep going to

school—even after college.

“It was a revelation,” Alpinieri says now. “I remember going

home and telling this to my dad, and we looked into it. In 1953,

Brooklyn Poly cost $290 a semester. That was a big bite! My

dad said, ‘Wow! But don’t worry about it.’”

Alpinieri became the first person in his family to attend a

university. By the time he got to Brooklyn Polytechnic, he was

exploring possible career paths. “Engineering sounded like

fun,” he recalls. “I had an Erector set, and kept buying ad-

ditional pieces and making ever-bigger constructions. It was

really quite impressive that you could build these things that

LOUIS ALPINIErI: paYinG iT ForwarD

ieee eleCTs researCh pioneer presiDenT

PETEr STAEckEr ’66 ’70EE, whOSE wOrk hAS vASTLY IMPrOvEd SEvErAL ENGINEErING rELIAbILITY ANd MEASUrEMENT PrOcESSES, hAS bEEN chOSEN PrESIdENT-ELEcT Of IEEE, ThE wOrLd’S LArGEST TEchNIcAL PrOfESSIONAL ASSOcIATION.

LOUIS ALPINIERI


looking for new ways to collaborate and to create. We not only want to move our profession forward, but also to create an environment in which technical professionals can improve the quality of life for our fel-low humans.” He is particularly proud of one aspect of IEEE work, im-proving the quality of life for underserved populations through the use of technology. “I find being a member of the humanitarian technology activities committee to be a challenging but very gratifying way to use my skills to help others.”

Among his other professional activities, Staecker worked on the National Electronics Manufacturing Initiative (1996-1999) and serves on the editorial advisory review boards of Microwave Journal and of Artech

House, which publishes high-tech books and engineering software. He is past-president of the IEEE Microwave Theory and Techniques Society.

When Staecker began graduate studies at Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn, he found the faculty “tough and encouraging.” He also found “dedicated teachers and researchers” who were helpful and influential. NYU-Poly today, he said, is “vibrant.” At a recent IEEE event on cam-pus, he met faculty “who showed a spirit of entrepreneurship, energy and pride that is producing the same in each new student class. It’s a great time to pursue an engineering career, period. Being at NYU-Poly makes the experience that much more memorable.”

Staecker’s advice for young people considering engineering: “Do it! It’s a great time to be a part of the profession—from the cell phones you use to the wireless connection you’re using in your dorm to the solar panels popping up everywhere. They’re created by engineers, the people that will help build tomorrow.”

“Engineering today is also leading efforts to create solutions that ben-efit humanity,” he said, “from America’s inner cities to the developing countries of the world—in clean water, health care in remote areas, pre-college and continuing education, and in the creation of clean, renew-able and sustainable sources of energy. Trust me, that’s something that you want to be a part of.”

had counterparts in the real world. My fa-

ther was a construction worker, and was

exposed to engineers. He—and I—were

fascinated by how things went together.”

Alpinieri ended up studying aeronauti-

cal engineering at Polytechnic, receiving

a bachelor’s degree in 1957 and a PhD

in Aeronautics and Physics in 1963, as a

student of Professor Antonio Ferri, who

Alpinieri calls “the greatest mentor and

challenge I’ve ever had in my life.”

Even more, Polytechnic opened up the

world for him. “Not just the training but how

the world operated,” he says. “I began to

interact with people who were doing, not

just being theoretical. While I learned to be

an engineer, mostly I’ve been a problem

solver.”

Alpinieri spent most of his ca-

reer in California, where he now

lives, with Brenda, his wife of

50 years. They have a son and

daughter and three grandchildren.

He sold his founder’s stock last

year in Vantage Associates Inc.,

a company he founded 30 years

ago that manufactures composite

structural components for aero-

space and military systems. Prior to that, he,

along with two partners, started what be-

came a key component of l-1 Identity Solu-

tions, which in turn was bought in 2010 by

Safran, the French aerospace and defense

systems company. “I founded a company

traded on the New York Stock Exchange,”

he notes proudly, since l-1 was by then

listed on the Exchange. “It’s my single larg-

est success.”

Alpinieri has made a point of giving back

to NYU-Poly, donating consistently and

generously. “I’ve had more success than I

deserved,” he says. “It’s a privilege to have

the surplus.

“I’ve always had a warm spot for Brook-

lyn Poly,” he adds. “It provided an enormous

opportunity for a fellow who didn’t know

what college even was till he was well on his

way through high school. When I discovered

Brooklyn Poly and Brooklyn Poly discovered

me, I learned so much beyond engineering.

It was a lucky break. I hope that a few dol-

lars from me will enable them to help a few

lou Alpinieris over the years.”

LOUIS ALPINIErI: paYinG iT ForwarD

“ Engineering today is also leading efforts to create solutions that benefit humanity.�

Alpinieri has made a point of giving back to NYU-Poly, donating consistently and generously.

PETER STAECKER

- Peter Staecker


alumninews

alumninews

Judea Pearl ’65EE, professor in the Computer Science Department of UCLA and recognized expert in artificial intelligence, was the recipient of the 2011 Harvey Prize in Science and Technology from the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology on March 29. Pearl was honored for his research, which serves as a foundation for knowledge representation and reasoning in computer science and has profoundly influenced modern life. His Bayesian network, which mimics the activities of the human brain, has had a profound influence on diverse fields such as artificial intelligence, statistics, philosophy, health, economics and cognitive sciences.

When he is not teaching or advising doctoral students at UCLA, Pearl leads the Daniel Pearl Foundation, established with his wife, Ruth, in memory of their son, Daniel, a reporter for the Wall Street Journal, who was murdered in 2002 by Pakistani extremists.

Since the inaugural presentation in 1972, the Harvey Prize has gone on to become the barometer for identifying future Nobel Prize recipients. Thirteen Harvey laureates have received the Nobel Prize.

As Cable was going to press, Pearl was named winner of

The Annual Association for Computing Machinery (ACM)

A.M. Turing Award, sometimes called the “Nobel Prize in

Computing,” recognizing him for his advances in probabilistic

and causal reasoning.

judea Pearl receives Prestigious harvey Prize in Science and Technology

ONE IN A THOUSAND AND ONE

Mario Cardullo’s invention of the RFID—the radio frequency iden-tification device—has earned him a page in history. “1001 Inven-tions that Changed the World,” a chronological compendium of groundbreaking inventions lists

Cardullo among the “greats” who have shaped our world. Cardullo ’57 ’59ME, chairman of Cardullo Innovations Group ltd., and managing director of The Bellfield Group, Inc., invented RFID in 1970, the wireless tracking system, while at ComServ, a firm he founded.

One of the elements in the invention was widely used by the military to identify friendly or enemy aircraft. A less sophisticat-ed application was also used in the security industry. Cardullo advanced the concept after an engineer shared his difficulties with using bar codes to track railroad cars. His concept used tags that could be electronically identified by a reader. New York Port Authority was one of the first industries to use the practical application of this advanced concept in its unmanned tollbooths.

Although many other companies refined the con-cept, Cardullo was the first to receive a generic patent in 1973. Cardullo received a patent recently for a new tracking invention that will form the basis for ArcTrak and RFID2 companies he is establishing for data and physical tracking without need for a central database or expensive infrastructure.



“Growing up, I enjoyed building things and seeing the outcomes,” he said. “I discovered I enjoyed planning, designing and detailing projects almost more than actually building them. Civil engineering allows you to envision, plan and detail large civil works–in my case, bridges–and you get to see the real-life results of your work.”

Herrmann, a principal of Hardesty & Hanover Consulting Engineers in New York City, was sworn in as the 143rd president of the ASCE at its recent annual convention in Memphis, TN. Before beginning graduate studies at Poly, he earned a BS in civil engineering in 1973 from Valparaiso University. Herrmann has held many ASCE posts, including service as a national director, past president of its Metropolitan New York City section, and member of ASCE’s infrastructure advisory council, which produced several Report Cards for America’s Infrastructure.

Hardesty & Hanover, founded in 1887, is based in Manhattan with re-gional offices in eight states. Herrmann has been the partner-in-charge or project manager for many of his firm’s major bridge projects. These in-clude bridge studies, major rehabilitation projects, in-depth bridge inspec-tions, and preliminary-to-final design on new fixed and movable bridges of all sizes.

Herrmann believes the public does not know enough about civil engi-neering or what engineers do. “So many aspects of daily life simply would not exist or would not work without the knowledge and skills of civil en-gineers.” Civil engineers do their jobs “too well,” he said. “The only time we are recognized for what we do is when there is a system failure. Civil engineers not only design infrastructure, but also maintain, repair, rehabili-tate and keep it operational to protect the public safety.”

These wide-ranging skills enable the ASCE to play a crucial leader-ship role in infrastructure advocacy: “We educate the public and leg-islators on the importance of infrastructure in our daily lives, its aging condition, and the need to invest as our grandparents did to maintain

LEAdING ThE NATION’S cIvIL ENGINEErS

our standard of living and our place in the world economy.”

Recognized for his expertise, Herrmann has been invited to speak before Con-gress on the need for infrastructure invest-ment and was featured in a recent History Channel documentary, The Crumbling of

America. “We need to recognize that we are falling behind in our infrastructure investments,” he said. “I say ‘investments’ because it is a real investment with a real return.”

ASCE has just finished two infrastructure-economics studies, on transportation and on water and wastewater, Herrmann said. The stud-ies explore what will happen if the country continues to invest in infra-structure at the same rate as in recent years. “The cost to businesses and to America’s gross domestic product—the loss of jobs and Ameri-can global competitiveness—will be dramatic,” he said. “We must invest to maintain our standard of living, our health and our place in the world.”

Herrmann is a proud alumnus and excited about Polytechnic’s af-filiation with New York University: “It will advance engineering educa-tion and its importance in New York.” That pride shapes the advice he gives to students who think about careers in engineering. “Engineers get a lot of personal satisfaction from solving problems that help so-ciety,” he said. “If you want work that positively affects people’s lives, become a civil engineer.”

ANdrEw hErrMANN ’80cE, ThE NEw PrESIdENT Of ThE AMErIcAN SOcIETY Of cIvIL ENGINEErS (AScE), bEcAME INTErESTEd IN hIS chOSEN fIELd AfTEr bUILdING PrOjEcTS AS A bOY ANd TrYING TO fIGUrE OUT hOw ThINGS wOrkEd.

“ So many aspects of daily life simply would not exist or would not work without the knowledge and skills of civil engineers.”

ANdREW HERRMANN

- Andrew Herrmann

When Zvi Bar-On ’76ME’ 81MBA (NYU) first came to the United States from his native Israel in the 1970s, he claims he “barely spoke English, but I definitely spoke engineering.” After four years working in engineering lo-gistics in the Israeli Army, Bar-On came to New York specifically to attend NYU-Poly, or Brooklyn Polytechnic, as it was then known. He was considering schools in California and Michigan when Poly Professor Philip Chakin visited Israel to promote the univer-sity and struck the right chord with Bar-On. With barely $1,200 in the bank, he en-rolled at Poly, working nights in security at JFK airport and scraping by on an income that barely covered the $80 monthly rent on his shared apartment.

If someone had told him back then that he’d have saved enough money to start his own company just eight years later, he claims he wouldn’t have believed it. Which raises the question—what if they told him he would sell that same company for millions of dollars a decade later?

Bar-On is an early example of the entre-preneurial spirit that has come to embody NYU-Poly. He credits the combination of his mechanical engineering degree and the MBA he earned from NYU—along with a hearty dose of ambition—with starting him on the path to success.

“My first day of class at NYU was a market-ing lecture, and the professor asked if there were any engineers in the room,” Bar-On re-called, noting that he, along with a handful of others in the packed hall, raised their hands. “The professor told us that engineer-ing and marketing didn’t mix, but I didn’t pay attention to that.” On the contrary, Bar-On believes that the synergy between his engineering roots and business and manage-ment education helped him make many of the leaps that constitute his extraordinary career.

After earning his MBA, Bar-On began work-ing in aviation-industry sales at a company in Connecticut, rising fast to lead his department in just four years. Behind the scenes, however, a bigger plan was taking shape. “I wanted to start my own business, and I was saving to-ward that goal,” Bar-On recalls. “Soon I had $40,000, and I’ll never forget going to Chase Manhattan Bank and getting approved for a business loan for that same amount.”

In 1984, Bar-On started Aero Support USA, an aircraft parts and jet engine after-market services com-pany. A little more than a decade later, the sale of that highly success-ful company made Bar-

On a millionaire, but he barely slowed down long enough to enjoy his success.

Bar-On moved to California in 1998 and, as a cure for what he describes as “boredom,” got involved with a software company that catered

alumninews

PILOT Of hIS OwN SUccESS

“ The opportunities of the future are in startups—creating a business around a great idea.�

- Zvi bar-On


In 1984, Bar-On started Aero Support USA, an aircraft parts and jet engine after-market services company.

The annual election of the International Board of Directors of the Polytechnic Institute Alumni Association will take place at the Annual Meeting:

sunday, June 3, 20122:30 p.m. bern dibner library building at5 metrotech center in brooklyn, ny

All alumni are invited to attend and vote. The Annual Meeting will also be an opportunity for alumni to visit campus and celebrate the 20th Anniversary of the opening of the Bern Dibner library. There will be a reception following the Annual Meeting at 3:30 p.m. to give alumni the chance to reconnect with one another and tour the library.

The Alumni Association’s Nominating Committee has presented the following candidates to join the International Board of Directors (IBOD). One candidate will be chosen for each respective seat.

For full details on the Annual Meeting, bios of each IBOD candidate, and to

confirm your attendance, please visit www.poly.edu/piaa/annualmeeting/2012

or call (718) 260-3885 to request additional information or a hard copy of the

agenda and meeting documents.

If you are unable to attend in person, we encourage you to vote by proxy. Details

regarding proxy voting can be found on the Annual Meeting page of poly.edu.

to the same industry in which he made his name, aviation. Today, Bar-On is the founder and chief executive officer of Component Control, a San Diego-based company that is the industry’s leading provider of after-market services for the aviation industry. Bar-On de-scribes Component Control as the “amazon.com for aircraft materials,” with an e-com-merce division for aircraft parts, and a suite of software products that provide enterprise resource planning for the aviation marketplace.

When asked what advice he’d give to college graduates just beginning their careers, Bar-On doesn’t hesitate to endorse entrepre-neurship. “There’s so much more opportunity in the free market and in creating small busi-nesses than in working for a large company,” he says. “The opportunities of the future are in startups—creating a business around a great idea.”

In a nearly 30-year career of taking risks and finding success, Bar-On has but a single regret. “I didn’t believe the time would go so fast,” he said, “But I’ve had so much fun.”

� Part of the management team of Component Control, from left, Zvi Bar-On, CEO, Jocelyn Scott, executive VP, Customer Services, Andrew Valley, VP, Sales and Todd lewis, president.

POLYTEchNIc INSTITUTE ALUMNI ASSOcIATION

ANNUAL MEETING & NOMINATIONS

philip furgang/’60

steve garone/’73

cheryl mcnear/’92

robert migliore/’87

1

2

3

4

gil zweig/’60

dele oladapo/’93

patrick xantus/’93

Joel fernandez/’11

first nominee ibod seat # second nominee


IN MEMORIAM

Herbert Aschkenasy ’60CM

John P. Audesirk ’70EE

Philip Balaban ’67EE

Bernard Basse ’48CH

Edwin W. Bauer ’49 ’52EE

Stanley K. Bentzen ’49CE

Emory P. Berman ’60PH

Anthony J. Bianculli ’49ME

Hendrik G. Bos ’69MA

Egon Brenner ’49 ’55EE

Donald R. Cannon ’53CH

Ramiro Careaga ’52CH

Matthew J. Costello ’59ME

Conrad J. Cultraro ’52ME

G. C. Dalman ’47 ’49EE

Salvatore F. D’Amato ’56ME

Peter M. Dollard ’55 ’59 ’63EE

Herman Fialkov ’51AE/NYU

Ross Fleisig ’42AE ’55AM

Harvey M. Fox ’58 ’61MT

Paul R. Freeman ’48EE

Milton J. Gersten ’50ME

Roy V. Harrington ’49CM

David l. Hawke ’52CM

Clement M. Healy ’62EE

Jerome T. Helfgott ’43CM

William T. Higgins ’57EE

leonard Indyk ’68PH

Eugene l. Jordan ’53CH

Peter Katz ’45 ’48ME

H. H. Kern ’56AE ’65MG

Robert l. Kopera ’63CE

Irving Kuntz ’50 ’55CM

Melvin E. lawson ’54CH

Morton W. leeds ’38 ’39 ’44CM

Isadore lieberman ’54EE

Ross F. lohr Jr. ’60 ’64EE

Herman Fialkov ’51AE/NYU, a pioneering force in the microchip industry and successful venture capitalist, died on February 21 in Boca Raton, Florida. He was 89. During his stellar career, Fialkov played an integral role in the financing and creation of over 40 technology companies.

After being discharged from the Army in 1946, Fialkov held engineering positions at Emerson Radio—where he received his first patent for a television

antenna—Mutual Broadcasting and Radio Receptor. Believing there was a lucrative and untapped market in transistors, Fialkov co-founded and became president of General Transistor Corporation in 1954. Six years later, the company merged with General Instrument Corporation, manufacturing integrated circuits. During this time, he established a microelectronics division within the company, which later became Microchip Technology Inc. His sojourn into cable television led to the company’s acquisition of Jerrold Electronics, which after several incarnations, became Comcast.

In 1968, Fialkov and the late Richard Geiger ’51 founded the venture capital firm Geiger and Fialkov, which earned a reputation for identifying viable startups and companies in early development that later became very lucrative. Among the firm’s successes are Intel, Teledyne, Electroglas, Inc., Standard Microsystems, General Signal, Globecomm Systems and several companies in Israel. He subsequently established the Aleph Null Fund in 1978 and Newlight Associates in 1997.

In 1987, Fialkov also led the creation of Poly Ventures, a multi-million dollar venture fund in which Polytechnic University was a partner, that provided portfolio companies access to the University’s proprietary technology, royalty-free.

Fialkov served as a dedicated and loyal trustee of Polytechnic University for 19 years before retiring from the University’s Board in 2001. He also served on the boards of Globecomm Systems, Inc., Primus Telecommunications, the LI Venture Group, the Heinish Foundation, the American Society for the Technion and Adelphi College and was a member of the advisory committee to the Center for Advanced Biotechnology at SUNY Stony Brook.

Along with Richard Geiger, he established the Geiger and Fialkov Scholarship Fund at Polytechnic. He was the recipient of the President’s Award, the Distinguished Alumnus Award, and Outstanding Mechanical Engineering Alumnus of the Century from Polytechnic; the Builder of Technion; Long Island Distinguished Leadership Award; the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Lifetime Achievement Award; and the Alex Grunwald Award for Enhancing Long Island’s Technology from IEEE.

Fialkov is survived by his wife, Ruth; his children, Carol and Jay; and four grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

HERMAN FIALKOV

Merven Mandel, 90, renowned aeronautical engineer died on August 23, 2011. He is survived by his loving wife of 63 years, Yvette, three children and five grandchildren.

While working for General Applied Science Lab from 1959 to 1967, he designed the mission and trajectory analysis on supersonic

MERVEN MANdEL ’42 ’48


Obituaries

IN MEMORIAM

Harry H. london ’37ME

Charles F. Mai ’50ME

Mervin Mandel ’42 ’48AE

Norman P. Marshall ’57EE

George J. Maytrott ’42CH

Sidney Metzger ’50EE

Barnett S. Miller ’56CH

Neil Mosesson ’80ME

Stephen D. Nemeth ’56EE

Herbert W. Newkirk Jr. ’51CM

Edward Pagan ’64EE

Olev Paul ’56MT

Mario A. Pinto ’54EE

Joseph A. Pirraglia ’71EP

Ferdinand W. Raffo ’50ME

Francis M. Reid ’55EE

Arnold Reisman ’58CM

Donald F. Rogers ’50ME

Robert F. Sabellico ’72AE

Robert Sanekoff ’49EE

Frank Schrey ’57CH

Andre H. Sigal ’53CE

George J. Siganos ’56ME

John T. Slattery ’54ME

John D. Sposito ’52AE ’67AM

Andrew J. Staiano ’51EE

lawrence H. Stone ’54CH

lee J. Sullivan ’73MG

Norbert E. Talbert ’53CM

Eugene C. Thompson III ’47EE

Manjit S. Uberoi ’68 ’80CE

Pasquale J. Villani ’76 ’82EE

Martin Weis ’48EE

Howard W. Wohltjen ’50CE

Arnold J. Wulfken ’36EE

Frederick C. Zimmer ’69MG

Michael S. Zunno ’68EE

Irving Kuntz, 86, of Boca Raton, Fla., died Dec. 27, 2011. He had a 30-year career as a research chemist at Esso, now Exxon, in Linden, NJ. He received a PhD in chemistry in 1955 from Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn, now NYU-Poly. He held over 30 U.S. patents and was the author of over 30 technical publications.

He was a U.S. Army veteran and earned a Purple Heart during the Battle of the Bulge, Dec. 25, 1944. He is survived by his wife, Pauli Salant-Kuntz; his daughter, Laura of Westfield; his son, Jeffrey Saunders of Massachusetts; a sister, Nesha Schor; and five grandchildren.

Edwin W. Bauer, 87, a resident of Poughkeepsie, NY for over 60 years died on December 3, 2011. He served in the Army and Air Force of the United States and received the Asiatic Pacific Ser-vice Medal; Good Conduct Medal; WWII Victory Medal and American Service Medal. He received a graduate degree from Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn and belonged to Sigma Xi and Etz Kappa Nu.

Bauer worked as an engineer at IBM for 38 years until his retirement in 1990. He was a member of the Germania Club, the American Institute of Electrical and Radio Engineers, the U.S. Power Squadron and the Arlington School Board.

He loved gardening and fishing. He is survived by his wife, Marion; children; David of Texas; Paul of New Mexico; Nancy of North Carolina; Thomas of Staatsburg; James of Purchase, NY; Michael of North Carolina; Daniel of NYC; John of Georgia; his stepchildren, David Weeks of Florida; Sherry Weeks of California; and eight grandchildren. Edwin was predeceased by a son, Andrew.

EdWIN W. BAUER ’49 ’52

IRVING KUNTz

combustion-powered hypersonic planes (SCRAMJET). As an engineer with Sperry Gyroscope from 1957 to 1959, he worked on missile aerodynamic design and performance and, from 1967 to 1984, on submarine design and weapons system engineering. He also worked for Lockheed from 1948 to 1953.

Merven earned BS and MS degrees in aeronautical engineering from Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute, where he won many awards, including Tau Beta Pi and Sigma Xi honor society memberships. He served in the Navy from 1942 to 1946. He was later a volunteer at the Cradle of Aviation Museum, where he restored aircraft of significance to Long Island and served as a docent. Merven also had a great passion for many personal pursuits. He flew planes and gliders, sky dived, drove race cars, was an ace rifle and pistol marksman and was an expert at crossword puzzles. But most importantly, he was a compassionate, loving man and a great role model and friend to all who had the privilege of knowing him.


Obituaries

classnotes


HOWARd R. ENGELSON ’41ME retired from MIT on his 80th birthday in 1999, which is also when he and his late wife moved to Half Moon Bay, CA. Engelson describes Half Moon Bay as a great place that is close to his children. He still plays tennis, swims, and takes long walks. Engelson’s wife passed away in 2009, after a happy marriage of 67 years. Engelson’s fourth great grandchild arrived on June 30, 2011.

SIdNEy BLANK ’49CE (NYU) has been working for 65 years at his real estate and construction business. He is 85 years old.

J. LAWRENCE KATz ’50PH ’51PH ’57PH celebrated his 84th birthday on December 18, 2011. He is still publish-ing with colleagues at the University of Kansas.

JOSEPH dIMAURO ’50ME retired from General Electric in 1988.

RICHARd KATUCKI ’51PH resides in West Chester, PA. His time is oc-cupied by travelling the United States and around the world. His next trip is to Cyprus.

ByRON H. ARISON ’52 ’67CM is still active as an HMR consultant. He was invited to give a talk on his experiences on the Manhattan Project (1944-1945) by the Westfield, NJ Historical Society.

WILLIAM W. CHANG ’52CE retired from Hardesty & Hanover, Consulting Engineers in January with more than 59 years with this great firm, established in 1887.

MARVIN TETENBAUM ’54CH is an emeritus scientist still working at Argonne National Laboratory.

RAyMONd KRASNICK ’55EE left a career in the engineering profession to become a schoolteacher. He started teaching special education in 1966 and retired in 1998.

ROBERT E. BAUMAN ’56AE retired from Lockheed Missiles & Space Com-pany after 50 years.

MARTIN M. LIGORNER ’56EE lives in Amagansett, NY and is a licensed salesperson for Elliman Real Estate. He has also been the President of his homeowner’s association for 20 years.

CLIFFORd G. SALVESEN ’56CH is enjoying retirement from Mobil Oil Co. He and his wife are busy doing volunteer work, aqua-aerobics, line dancing, sing-ing in various groups, travelling to see family and going on vacations.

STANLEy WALd ’57CE is still practic-ing as a professional engineer in NYC.

CONSTANTINO ECONOMOS ’58AE ’60AM ’68TP organized an Aero gath-ering for Poly graduates who were influenced by and worked with Antonio Ferri, former department chairman at Poly and NYU and president of General Applied Science lab.

JOHN E. LA SCALA ’59 ’73MG is retired from Grumman Corp. He and his wife, Lily, have been on more than 39 Caribbean cruises. John also enjoys golfing.

CHARLES R. ORTLOFF ’59 ’61AE presented the paper, Water Engi-neering in Pre-Columbian Peru and Bolivia: Comparison to Roman/Greek/Levantine Water Engineering Tech-nologies at the Ancient Water Systems Conference in Vienna, Austria.

THOMAS M. MILLS ’61CH is cur-rently recovering from rotator-cuff surgery on both right and left shoulders.

PASqUALE M. SFORzA’S ’61 ’62 ’65AE new textbook, “Theory of Aero-space Propulsion” was published in Oc-tober 2011 by Elsevier.

EdWARd W. HAMMERSLEy ’62CH retired and is living on Lake Livingston in Texas.

PHILIP SHAPIRO-STEELE ’62CM wrote and published eight technical books related to dBase.

dAVId ALVARO VICTOR SIMON ’63ME is director of the Division of Environmental Protection, in the U.S. Virgin Islands.

CLIVE dyM ’64AM is one of three recipients of the nation’s most pres-tigious engineering education award, the National Academy of Engineering’s Bernard M. Gordon Prize for Innovation in Engineering and Technology Educa-tion. He is the Fletcher Jones Professor of Engineering Design and director of the Center for Design Education at the Harvey Mudd College. Dym and the other recipients were recognized “for creating and disseminating innova-tions in undergraduate engineering design education to develop engineering leaders”.

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RICHARd I. LEWIS ’64EE was named to the Board of Directors for the San Fernando Valley Symphony Orchestra.

STEPHEN NICHOLS ’65EE retired after 25 years of government service and 17 years in the private sector.

JOSEPH RITACCO ’65MA retired af-ter a long career at AT&T Bell Labs. He is focusing his energy on peace- building and interfaith dialogue, includ-ing serving on the Board of Directors for the Monmouth Center for World Reli-gions and Ethical Thought and the WWII and Conflict Resolution Center at Brook-dale College.

zINdEL HELLER ’67EP was issued a patent for an instrument and method for simultaneous measurement of glucose and at least one other component in a finger-stick, human blood sample.

HARRy HERTz ’67CM was named an Honorary Fellow of the American College of Healthcare Executives in recognition of the contributions of the Baldrige Program to improve healthcare quality in the U.S.

CHARLES SETTGAST ’67MG is retired and leads the Economic Development Committee of the city of West Melbourne, FL. He developed an Economic Opportu-nities brochure for the city.

ROBERT SCHLEGEL ’67EE is com-mander-in-chief of the Rockville Cen-tre, NY Valley of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasons.

dAVId J. THOMSON ’67EE ’71EE is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Cana-da (FRSC) and a professor at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario.

ANTONIO JEAN ’68EE was respon-sible for the design and construction of nuclear power plants: Tsruga in Japan, Fort Calhoun in Nebraska, and Angra Dos Rios in Brazil. Jean also worked for Grumman and Con Edison. He attributes his successful career to his Poly education.

EVELyN ROMAN dICKSON ’69CE, who taught computer science at Poly from 1982-87, is working as a software engineer, programming iPhone apps for Partners Healthcare in Massachusetts.

CHARLES dIMARCO ’69CE ’72TP is the regional director for Tectonic Engi-neering and Surveying Consultants P.C. in its new Saddle Brook, NJ facilities.

ETHAN HORWITz ’72MA was named one of the “Annual Super Lawyers” in the Sunday, October 2 issue of the New York Times Magazine.

JOHN ROdOLICO ’72AE is mayor of Ledyard, Connecticut. John retired from General Dynamics after 39 years of ser-vice last December to assume his duties as mayor.

JAMES MCTIGUE ’73US received the Governor’s Award from the Audio Engi-neering Society at the New York Conven-tion last October.

MARIANNE A. MUSELLA ’73CH is an adjunct professor at Nichols College teaching creative decision-making to MBA students.

SIdNEy J. STERLING ’70OR ’76IE retired from L-3 Communications as a senior software engineering architect.

GLENN MATTSSON ’77ME is presi-dent of Nussivo Engineering Consul-tants and founder and past chair of the Society of Manufacturing Engineers (SME) North Bay #431. SME North Bay recently achieved full senior chapter status.

FREd STRAUSS ’77CS, industry associate professor at Polytechnic Institute of NYU was named as the Mel-ville Chamber of Commerce Person-of-the-Month for January.

ROBIN WyNTER-STONER ’79EE and her husband, Tim, are the proud parents of 2 sons: Iain, recent graduate of Pace University, now doing graduate studies at Rutgers University; and Kyle, a junior at Brown University.

KAREN KOSLO BINGHAM ’80CE worked in investment banking for 10 years. She is retired and living with her husband of 23 years in Garden City, NY. Her son, Liam, attends NYU. He is studying music. Karen’s other son, Sean, will attend MIT next year.

PAUL PELLICANO ’81 ’87AE works for the Federal Aviation Administration in Atlanta, GA where he is responsible for icing regulations and policy of small- and commuter- category airplanes.

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PEdRO SANTALIz ’83AE is a structural engineer for Qinetiq North America support-ing Army Aviation units.

JOHN M. dIMATTEO ’84EE was named one of the “Annual Super Lawyers” in the Sunday, October 2 issue of the New York Times Magazine.

SAMUEL M. MIzRAHI ’85CompE is spe-cial counsel at Windels Marx. Resident in the New Brunswick, NJ office, Sam counsels clients in both New Jersey and New York on real estate acquisitions and sales, leasing, financing, litigation, workouts, restructurings and foreclosures.

GEORGE ESCOWITz ’86CS is an ac-count support manager in the technology services department at Hewlett-Packard.

W. STUART LEWIS ’05CE is a project-engineer diver for Ocean & Coastal Consul-tants. He is also a registered professional engineer in New York and Connecticut. He completed the East River ferry service project, providing Brooklyn and Queens residents with additional options for trans-portation in and out of Manhattan.

BALAL KOHKHAR ’07CE was com-missioned as an ensign in the Unit-ed States Navy in the Civil Engineer-ing Corps after completing Officer Candidate School in September. His first duty station is in Bahrain as a public works officer.

Md. BORHAN UddIN ’10CS is a full-time Member of Technical Staff at VMware in Palo Alto, CA.

EdWIN XIAO ’10CN supervised the construction of 18 houses in Queens at 183rd St. & Horace Harding and the 173-room Marriott Springhill Suites in Corona, NY. He also managed the demolition of OTB in Flushing, NY. Xiao is currently overseeing the building of 95 Henry Street, the Manhattan Marriott Fairfield Inn.

JOEL FERNANdEz ’11C was awarded the 2011 Department of Homeland Security Cybersecurity Fellowship.

AdRAIN GORdON ’11BMS will be playing the game he loves, cricket, in England this summer. Gordon accept-ed an offer to play in the Lincolnshire County Board Premier Cricket League by Skegness Cricket Club and plans to pursue his master’s in the future.

MIRzA KOKIC ’11IE is a supplier quality engineer for Bayer Healthcare, Diabetes Care in Tarrytown, NY.

8os continued... Major Codes:

AE Aerospace Engineering

AM Applied Mechanics

BMS Biomolecular Science

CE Civil Engineering

CH Chemical Engineering

CM Chemistry

CN Construction Management

CS Computer Science

CY Cybersecurity

EE Electrical Engineering

EP Electrophysics

IE Industrial Engineering

MA Mathematics

ME Mechanical Engineering

MG Management

MN Manufacturing Engineering

MT Metallurgical Engineering

PH Physics

TP Transportation Planning

US Urban Systems Engineering and Management

SCORE: 83.4

SCORE: 82

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endNote

e-learninG aT nYU-polY is

in hiGh Gear!Fresh on the heels of being awarded the Sloan Consortium’s Outstanding Online Program, NYU-Poly’s e-Learning graduate program received an impressive nod from U.S. News and World Report’s first-time ranking of the nation’s best online graduate engineering programs. Of the four selection criteria, NYU-Poly ranked 3rd in Student Services and Technology and 5th in Student Engagement and Accreditation—beating out Johns Hopkins, USC, Cornell and UCLA, to name a few.

ranked among all online graduate

engineering programs

STUDEnT EngagEMEnT anD aCCrEDiTaTiOn

th

35

rdSTUDEnT SErViCES anD TECHnOLOgy

Cable NYU-Poly’s Alumni Magazine 43

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SCORE: 83.4

SCORE: 82

$1 23,000 $1 21,000

$1 13 ,000

SCORE: 88

SCORE: 96 SCORE: 92

SCORE: 88

SCORE: 87.2

SCORE: 86SCORE: 83

$1 09,000$1 07,000

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$1 03,000

SCORE: 82

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the alumni magazine of polytechnic institute of new york university

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