This project develops a new Research Experience for Undergraduates site focused on sensor networks and data security at the University of Missouri - Rolla. The research is in areas of national need and importance and of interest to undergraduates. The project plans to recruit students from under-represented groups through partnership with a diverse set of academic institutions. Undergraduate students participate in a ten-week summer research program at the host institution. The project includes mentorship by faculty and graduate students, collaborative and individual research experiences, seminar and guest speakers, training in ethics, and other professional development opportunities for the participating students.
The intellectual merit of this project lies in strong research basis and the expertise of the project team. The projects are in major current research areas that are of interest to the community at large and that have clear practical applications that could result in advances to the current research in these important areas.
The broader impacts of the project include providing a quality research experience to undergraduate students, particularly students from underrepresented groups. The relationships developed during the project could lead to future collaborations among the institutions of the participating students that may enable the students to continue their research and professional growth after the summer experience. Thus this project has the potential to produce new computer science graduate students and faculty members and to advance discovery and understanding while promoting learning.
Missouri S&T’s Computer Science Department has participated in the NSF REU site on sensor networksbetween 2008 to 2011. The PI and his team was involved in supervising undergraduate students in their research experiences in the area of sensor computing. In last three years, 9 underrepresented students out of 35 have been hired from institutions such as the University of Puerto Rico at Arecibo & Mayagüez campuses, and the University of Hawaii at Manoa. Three students came from colleges and universities where there are no master’s degree programs, including EPSCoR institutions such as Morehead State University. In addition, three women students have also been trained under this REU site. Some students who went thrugh this program have joined PhD and MS degree programs in Missouri S & T as well as in other universities. Initially, the participants spent six to eight hours each day learning TOSSIM, NesC, sensor networks and wireless computing in general. They are given 2-3 hours regular laboratory exercises on sensor network, use of the test-bed, some basic experiments as explained earlier, some lesions on TOSSIM simulator and latex to write their reports. After they had gained fair proficiency with the sensor network programming environment, they were progressively directed through each phases of doing research. The participants were able to work six weeks full time on their research projects after getting necessary expertise to pursue research. The participants primarily worked in groups of two or three during most of this phase. They spent time in the library reviewing the literature in the area of their interest. The participants on each team are encouraged to divide the work so that each person can work independently on a specific part of the project, but at the same time stay-in close contact with others. The efforts of each team was monitored by the principal investigators who provided guidance to keep the project progressing and on track. The entire phase encouraged independent thinking but also permitted participants to gain valuable experience in working as a team. It also assured good student-faculty and student-student interaction. Once the algorithms are validated and the efficiency level determined, each team wrote a paper describing its overall project experience. All of the participants were able to get preliminary results and presented their results. Each of the participants was encouraged to apply for graduate school. They were informed that at Missouri S & T, they would be given special preference in the selection of graduate assistants. Several NSF REU undergraduate students have published papers in well-known IEEE International conferences in last 3 years and presented their work in undergraduate conferences and at other places (they are listed under publications later in the proposal) and won awards as well. Three of them (one woman and two under-represented students) went to Japan with the PI and presented their results in Osaka University, Japan.
