December 18, 2008

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. - An undergraduate and Ph.D. student from the Department of Computer and Information Sciences were both recognized for their UAB based research at the annual conference of the Mid-Southeast Chapter of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) on Nov. 21, in Gatlinburg, Tenn.

Lin Yang, a third-year Ph.D. student, and Eric Frees, an undergraduate entering his senior year in 2009, both received 2nd place awards in their respective categories at the event, which included more than two dozen competitors. Participants were asked to give 20-minute oral presentations on their current research track, and awards were presented based on the success of their presentations and the nature of their studies.

More on Lin Yang: Yang participated in the graduate level Ph.D. category at the ACM conference. His presented research was titled, "Visual Summary for Tourist Attractions." The work seeks out techniques for improving image searches on the Internet. Lang earned a coveted internship with Google in the summer of 2008, and that experience is helping drive his UAB research. Lang is a native of Beijing, China.

More on Eric Frees: Frees participated in the undergraduate at a four year institution category at the ACM conference. His presented research was titled, "On the Implementation of a Novel Boundary Representation for a Triangle Mesh." The work, in part, seeks more efficient representations of shapes in computer graphics. Frees is a member of the UAB ACM chapter's executive committee. He is a native of Pell City.