A readability analysis of presidential candidate speeches by researchers in Carnegie Mellon University's Language Technologies Institute (LTI) finds most candidates using words and grammar typical of students in grades 6-8, though Donald Trump tends to lag behind the others.

A historical review of their word and grammar use suggests all of the five candidates in the analysis — Republicans Trump, Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio (who has since suspended his campaign), and Democrats Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders — have been using simpler language as the campaigns have progressed. Again, Trump is an outlier, with his grammar use spiking in his Iowa Caucus concession speeches  and his word and grammar use plummeting again during his Nevada Caucus victory speech.

"Win," after all, is more likely to appear in 3^rd grade texts than "regrettably."

A comparison of the candidates with previous presidents show President Lincoln outpacing them all, boasting grammar at the 11^th grade level, while President George W. Bush's 5^th grade grammar was below even that of Trump.

"Assessing the readability of campaign speeches is a little tricky because most measures are geared to the written word, yet text is very different from the spoken word," said Maxine Eskenazi, LTI principal systems scientist who performed the analysis with Elliot Schumacher, a graduate student in language technologies. "When we speak, we usually use less structured language with shorter sentences."

An earlier analysis by the Boston Globe used the Flesch-Kincaid readability test, which is based on average sentence length and average number of syllables per word, and found Trump speaking at a 4^th grade level, two grade levels below his peers. Eskenazi and Schumacher used a readability model called REAP, which looks at how often words and grammatical constructs are used at each grade level and thus corresponds better to analysis of spoken language.

Based on vocabulary, campaign trail speeches by past and present presidents — Lincoln, Reagan, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Barack Obama — were at least on the 8^th grade level, while the current candidates ranged from Trump's 7^th grade level to Sanders' 10^th grade level. Trump and Hillary Clinton's speeches showed the greatest variation, suggesting they may work harder than the others in tailoring speeches to particular audiences, Schumacher said.

In terms of grammar, none of the presidents and presidential candidates could compare with Lincoln's Gettysburg Address — an admittedly high standard, with grammar well above the 10^th grade level. The current candidates generally had scores between 6^th and 7^th grades, with Trump just below 6^th grade level. President Bush scored at a 5^th grade level.

Analyzing campaign speeches is difficult because it often is hard to obtain transcripts of speeches, Schumacher said. It is possible to generate reliable transcripts from video using automatic speech recognition (ASR) systems, such as those developed at LTI when the speech took place in a quiet environment, but he and Eskenazi opted not to use today's automated methods because they were likely to introduce errors in the noisy environment of campaign rallies.

Carnegie Mellon University senior Kaytie Nielsen has won a nationally competitive fellowship from the Henry Luce Foundation. A Bachelor of Humanities and Arts (BHA) student with concentrations in creative writing and directing, Nielsen is one of 18 students and young professionals selected to participate in the prestigious Luce Scholars Program. The award provides stipends, language training and individualized professional placement in Asia for individuals from various fields and backgrounds who have limited exposure to Asian culture.

According to Stephanie Wallach, assistant vice provost for undergraduate education, Nielsen always has embraced opportunities for travel and new learning experiences.

"Kaytie is an adventurer, an intellectual seeker and a relationship builder. At every turn, she has sought out unique experiences and personal connections to make her a better, more skillful and deeply thoughtful documentary filmmaker," Wallach said. "The Luce Scholars Program allows Kaytie to use these very same qualities in Asia as she sets out on her post-graduate journey that will reshape her personal narrative and her professional contributions in the future."

Timothy J. Haggerty has worked closely with Nielsen as director of the Dietrich College of Humanities and Social Sciences' Humanities Scholars Program, which Nielsen has been a part of since her first year at CMU. Haggerty also helped prepare Nielsen for the Luce Scholars interview process. He believes that the Luce Scholarship is a natural extension of Nielsen's accomplishments at CMU, including a Fulbright Award she received as a freshman.

"Kaytie has always been a phenomenal student and is in the BHA program as well as being a humanities scholar. She is terrifically self-motivated, and the Luce Scholarship — along with the student Fulbright Award she won after her first year — are rewards for her hard work, keen insights and creative abilities," Haggerty said.

According to Sharon Dilworth, associate professor of English, the Luce Scholars Program is a powerful experience with lasting impact on fellows' lives.  

"Kaytie's zeal for discovering the new and different will serve her well," Dilworth said. "I know Kaytie will be impacted profoundly as she moves from listening to others tell their stories to making their stories an integral part of their own life."

Dilworth is certain that Nielsen’s independence, passion for travel and storytelling abilities will make her year in Asia a rewarding experience.

"She has a fearless energy that allows her to find people and stories that others might not," she said.

This will not be Nielsen's first cross-cultural film project. She has spent the past year participating in the Dietrich Honors Fellowship Program, which is designed to give students a head start on their senior thesis development. Her documentary combines her concentrations in creative writing and directing with her minor in French and Francophone Studies and aims to showcase the narratives of young black women from the disenfranchised suburbs of Paris known as the "banlieues."

Currently, Nielsen is determining the country and type of organization that best suits her goals and talents. She hopes to work hands-on with filmmakers who promote social change through their craft, or as part of an educational initiative that makes filmmaking more accessible to underprivileged populations.

"I was attracted to the Luce [program] because it was very much grounded in experiential learning, which is how I gained skills as a filmmaker in the first place — I learned by hands-on doing and making," Nielsen said. 

She is looking forward to the challenges and possibilities of living and working abroad, learning a new language and making lasting connections with international filmmakers.

Related Articles:

Six Recent Carnegie Mellon Graduates, Rising Sophomore Earn Fulbright Awards to Asia, Europe and South America

Eight Juniors Named Dietrich College Honors Fellows

The Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Environmental Management has selected Carnegie Mellon University to provide specialized training for graduate students in robotics to support environmental remediation of nuclear sites.

Nathan Michael and Elizabeth Sherwood-Randall

Deputy DOE Secretary Elizabeth Sherwood-Randall announced the selection during an appearance at Carnegie Mellon today (March 16).

The five-year agreement for the Robotics Traineeship program is valued at up to $3 million and will provide full or partial support for as many as 20 Ph.D. and master’s degree students in robotics, said Martial Hebert, director of Carnegie Mellon’s Robotics Institute. To carry out the program, CMU will team with two DOE laboratories, Savannah River National Laboratory in Aiken, S.C., and Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in Richland, Wash.

Like a fellowship, the traineeship will provide financial support for the students’ education, said Nathan Michael, assistant research professor of robotics. But it also will support the Robotics Institute’s development of specialized courses and will provide research opportunities in association with the partner labs that will help extend the use of autonomous systems in remediation efforts.

The traineeship is available to students who have been admitted to an existing robotics graduate program and have expressed an interest in environmental remediation. Michael said the program is expected to begin in the fall.

The new program will address DOE’s workforce needs in environmental remediation.

Those needs include: radioactive waste retrieval, treatment, processing, storage, transportation and disposal; stewardship of spent nuclear fuel and special nuclear materials; nuclear facility and infrastructure operations, maintenance and sustainment; facility/infrastructure deactivation and decommissioning; worker safety; industrial and nuclear facility safety; and other activities related to the handling and management of high-hazard, high-consequence materials and waste.                

Leigh Ann DeLyster with teacher Brian Schott and students at the Bronx Academy for Software Engineering.

An alumna's passion and research in computer science education is making an impact.

Computer science needs K-12 educators, especially ones like Leigh Ann DeLyser (CS 2010, 2014), a former high school teacher and now director of education and research for CSNYC - NYC Foundation for Computer Science Education.

In an announcement this past fall, Mayor Bill de Blasio said the city's public schools would offer computer science to all students. DeLyser helps coordinate with funded programs to ensure strong implementation within the city, which has reached more than 20,000 students in the past three years and plans to reach all 1.1 million students in the next 10 years.

DeLyser has spent most of her career focused on how to teach computer science in K-12 schools. Currently, without teacher certification requirements in place, a large hurdle is getting a pipeline of instructors prepared to teach the subject.

New York City, Chicago and San Francisco are among the few American cities that have taken steps to mandate computer science education, but they may be at the start of a trend. The White House requested $4 billion for states to expand computer science education in its February 2016 budget request and directed the National Science Foundation to spend $125 million to advance research in computer science education and train teachers.

"In New York City, we are riding the forefront of a tidal wave," DeLyser said.

For the job ahead of her, DeLyser gained unique preparation in an interdisciplinary self-directed doctoral degree from 2008-2014 she pursued with a fellowship through Carnegie Mellon's Program in Interdisciplinary Education Research (PIER) that was funded by a $5 million grant from the U.S Department of Education. She explored topics in psychology, computer science, human computer interaction, statistics, physics, economics, public policy, and applied them to education research. PIER requires dissertation research to have clear implications for educational practice. It is an affiliated project of the university's Simon Initiative, which harnesses a cross-disciplinary learning ecosystem to improve learning outcomes.

"PIER provides students with an intense exposure to the opportunities, challenges, and research topics that are at the intersection between their basic discipline and educational practice in the real world," said David Klahr, the Walter van Dyke Bingham Professor of Cognitive Development and Education Sciences and PIER director.

DeLyser was the first PIER student to bridge the two disciplines of computer science and psychology.

"Leigh Ann's psychology focus was broadly in the learning sciences, and she incorporated multiple levels of analysis," said Sharon Carver, associate training director in PIER and a teaching professor in the Department of Psychology.

Associate Dean for Outreach in the School of Computer Science Mark Stehlik first became acquainted with DeLyser in 2000 when she was a teacher for an advanced placement program in computer science for high school students.

"Through our communications, Leigh Ann stood out immediately as someone with a learned and passionate voice, especially about teaching computer science at the high school level," said Stehlik, who was one of her faculty advisors.

These days, DeLyser meets face to face with school leaders, teachers, policymakers and practitioners in technology fields. She consults on curriculum direction and development, professional development for teachers, and arranges collaborations with industry to bring real-world needs into the classroom and give students industry experiences.

We want every child to have a meaningful experience in computer science," she said.

At CSNYC, she leads with a strong belief that the implementation of computer science education in schools must be grounded in theory.

She was definitely one of those people who had a vision of what she wanted to do, and CMU enabled it to become a reality," Stehlik said. "We are extremely proud of her as an alumna."

Related Links:

• School of Computer Science
• Outreach programs at SCS
• Dietrich College of Humanities and Social Sciences
• Department of Psychology
• PIER Program
• CSNYC
• DeLyser's Thesis: AbstractTutor: Increasing Algorithm Implementation Expertise for Novices Through Algorithmic Feedback

By Daniel Tkacik / 412-268-1187

To date, scientists' understanding of how cells communicate with each other has been limited, in large part because the electrical activity of cells has been limited to simple, 2-D measurements. However, that may change soon, thanks to research being led by Carnegie Mellon University faculty.

Tzahi Cohen-Karni, an assistant professor of biomedical engineering and materials science and engineering at Carnegie Mellon, is developing nanosensors to monitor the electrical activity of cells in three dimensions — a feat that until now has not been possible. Cohen-Karni recently received an NSF CAREER award for his project, which aims to understand how cells talk to each other in three dimensions.  

"We, as humans, are not two-dimensional," Cohen-Karni said. "When you culture cells in a dish, it is not as they are organized in nature. We are trying to measure the electrophysiology of a cellular arrangement that is closer to the way it is in nature."

Traditionally, cells are cultured in two dimensions, on a 2-D flat surface where researchers cannot get a full sense of the electrical activity happening in a close to natural 3-D geometry. Current techniques that measure in 3-D only monitor the surface of one side of the cellular arrangement. However, Cohen-Karni's technique surrounds the 3-D cell construct with sensors and monitors it from all sides.

This project has huge long-term implications. In the biological field, heart cells, or cardiomyocytes, serve as a potential therapy for heart defects and conditions. Monitoring these cells in 3-D will provide more insight into the way cells really communicate.

"When it comes to the heart and the brain," Cohen-Karni said, "whatever we do is due to this intracellular communication. To some extent, we know what is happening inside. But having the tools to explore it in a quasi-controlled manner will help us to understand exactly how they talk to each other."

Cohen-Karni's sensors are made of nanowires that are 1,000 times smaller than the diameter of a human hair and will measure the electrophysiology of 3-D cell constructs that are a few times larger than a human hair diameter. The nanomaterial that makes up the devices is synthesized within Cohen-Karni's lab and then assembled into sensors in the form of field effect transistors.

Cohen-Karni's nanosensors surround the cells in a series of steps. First, the nanosensors are attached to a strip of polymer only a few hundred microns long, on a chip lined with thin strips of metal, which serve as leads to the nanosensors and lift the polymer from the surface of the chip. When the polymer is released from the surface of the chip, it self-rolls around the cells into a three-dimensional barrel-like entity. The nanosensors on the polymer surround the cells and are able to take measurements from all sides.

Cohen-Karni's device will monitor the electrophysiology of induced pluripotent cells derived cardiomyocytes (iPS-CM). In the future, the platform will be able to compare the electrical activity of normal heart or brain cells with that of diseased cells.

"It's the idea of monitoring something that is not on a plane-that's the big idea," Cohen-Karni said. "You take something that was for years pinned on a surface, and kick it out."

Carnegie Mellon University mathematician Boris Bukh has received a Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) award from the National Science Foundation. One of the most prestigious awards for young faculty, CAREER awards recognize and support those who exemplify the role of teacher-scholars through their outstanding research and teaching.

Boris Bukh

Bukh, an assistant professor of mathematical sciences, received the five-year grant to support his research into developing a powerful and novel approach to establish connections between two fundamental mathematical fields: combinatorics and algebra.

Many problems in mathematics and physics involve finding the largest mathematical structure that can result from constraints put on the substructures. These largest structures, called extremal structures, have a remarkable number of applications to other areas of mathematics and science, including theoretical computer science, statistical physics and coding theory.

Under his CAREER grant, Bukh plans to investigate in depth the interplay between extremal structures common to both combinatorics and algebra. There are several problems currently known to be at the interface of these two fields, including explicit constructions of Ramsey graphs, constructions of large graphs not containing a specific subgraph, bounds on spherical codes, zero-error capacities of communication channels and set families with restricted intersections. Bukh is an expert in creating novel algebraic and geometric methods for application to such combinatorial problems.

Bukh will work closely with both undergraduate and graduate students on this research project. He also plans to prepare educational materials for both students and experts that cover the new techniques.

Carnegie Mellon's College of Engineering conducted a survey on falls among the elderly and discovered that Americans are very worried about an elderly parent falling — and that this worry leads to action.

Every 13 seconds, an older adult is treated in the emergency room for a fall. Every twenty minutes, an older adult dies from a fall-related trauma. Considering these statistics, it's understandable why the survey found that 54 percent of 1,900 U.S. adults are worried about an older parent falling, and why 81 percent of respondents expressed an interest in new sensor technology that can anticipate and prevent falls.

Pei Zhang, associate research professor of electrical and computer engineering, and Haeyoung Noh, assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering, are developing such active fall-prevention sensors for senior care facilities and private homes that can determine both who is in danger and where. Their technology monitors an individual’s gait and can send mobile alerts not only to nurses and caregivers but also to the individual themselves, if their gait changes threateningly. While the goal is to anticipate and prevent falls, the technology is programmed to immediately notify someone, which can include emergency responders should an individual experience a sudden fall — even if the person is unconscious.

"Many older adults in senior care facilities are restricted to wheelchairs when not under the direct care of a nurse, but this technology could allow them to regain some of their independence," said Noh, whose sensors are currently being tested at Vincentian Home in Pittsburgh and Lucas Physical Therapy and Fitness in Sunnyvale, Calif.

Of the 1,900 people surveyed, a little over 1,000 adults are concerned a parent may experience a fall, and 70 percent of these individuals worry at least every week, if not every day. The frequency and amount that people worry is not influenced by whether or not the parent lives alone, although they are slightly less troubled if the parent lives in an assisted living or senior care facility. Sixty-two percent of those with parents in assisted living or senior care facilities, however, still worry once a week or every day.

All of this anxiety explains why, according to the survey, people are very responsive about caring for their parents. They frequently visit their parents and also have neighbors or staff who look after them. Forty-four percent of respondents said they or a sibling check in on a parent daily, while 33 percent said they or a sibling check in every week. Another 12 percent said they stop by as needed. In addition, 56 percent of respondents reported that neighbors or staff physically check on their parent daily, while 27 percent said someone visits every week.

Although there was no difference among gender or age, the survey did find that those with higher education levels and higher incomes worry less. The survey does not suggest why this may be, but it does show that those with higher incomes are not more likely to have their parent in a senior care facility or assisted living facility, nor are they more likely to have a live-in caretaker for their parent. However, it does appear that more people with higher incomes have Life Alert^® for their parents — although only 15 percent of respondents have parents with Life Alert^®.

"Our sensors are designed to predict and anticipate falls so individuals can worry less about their parents with the knowledge that our technology will discover their parents are not walking the way they normally do, whether because of medication or because they’ve become fatigued," Zhang said.

Ian Asenjo and Joanna Dickert

Carnegie Mellon University sophomore Ian Asenjo has received a Critical Language Scholarship (CLS) from the U.S. Department of State. Over the past 10 years, the fully funded overseas cultural immersion program has sent over 5,000 American undergraduate and graduate students around the world to learn 14 critical languages.

Critical languages, including Arabic, Chinese and Punjabi, can be difficult to learn because they are radically different from English in grammatical structure and other features. As a result, the demand for proficiency in these languages outpaces the supply of fluent speakers.

A global studies major with an additional major in ethics, history and public policy, Asenjo was drawn to the CLS program because of its strong reputation for intensive language learning. He will be traveling to Chandigarh, India, this summer, where he hopes to gain proficiency in Punjabi and explore his passion for Bhangra — a folk dance with roots in the region. Though Asenjo has not yet begun Punjabi language training, he attends weekly services at a Sikh temple (“Gurdwara”) in Monroeville as a way to learn more about the language and culture.

According to Joanna Dickert, assistant director of undergraduate research and national fellowships, Asenjo is an ideal match for the CLS program.

“With a lifelong commitment to intercultural engagement and language learning, he has used these values as a foundation for his academic career at Carnegie Mellon,” Dickert said. “A true seeker, he embodies the intellectual curiosity that we aim to cultivate in our students.”

Associate Professor of History Nico Slate teaches “India Through Film,” which examines the history of India through a cinematic lens. Taking this course helped Asenjo deepen his longtime interest in Indian culture.

“Ian is an outstanding student with a profound commitment to South Asia. The CLS will allow Ian to deepen his language skills and to prepare for future research on South Asian history, culture and politics,” Slate said.

Asenjo is eager to take on the challenge of learning Punjabi and to experience Indian culture, which he understands primarily through books, films and dance, firsthand. A member of CMU’s Bhangra team, Asenjo looks forward to attending practice with some of Chandigarh’s collegiate groups and expects to pick up a few new steps along the way.

“I would like to fully immerse myself in a cultural environment that is very different from the one in which I was raised,” said Asenjo, who is of Spanish-Argentine heritage. “The CLS will serve as an exceptional introduction to India, not only as a cultural destination, but as a professional environment as well.”

For Asenjo, the CLS offers an opportunity to grow both as a student and a young adult. Learning Punjabi is the first step toward his long-term professional goals. He would like to spend some time after graduation living in India and working in foreign relations between South Asian countries and the U.S. government.

Slate is confident that Asenjo will flourish in Chandigarh.

“Ian is ideal for this award because he has a unique passion for South Asia and the drive and determination to make the most of this opportunity. He is also remarkably mature and culturally sensitive and will be an outstanding ambassador for CMU and the United States,” Slate said

Asenjo is not the first CMU student to receive the CLS. Dervla McDonnell, a 2015 graduate who majored in fine art and Japanese Studies, won back-to-back awards in 2013 and 2014.

The Carnegie Mellon University School of Drama is hosting Anne Bogart as a guest in the Steiner Speaker Series. Bogart will be giving a talk, open to the CMU community, from 4:30 – 5:30 p.m., March 30, in the Chosky Theater, sharing thoughts on her views and approaches to theater and storytelling.

Anne Bogart

“Anne Bogart is a towering figure in contemporary theater making,” said Peter Cooke, head of the School of Drama. “Her development of the 'Viewpoints' methodology has influenced acting practice and education across the global stage.”

The Steiner Speaker Series program was established through an endowment gift from David Steiner, a very successful real estate developer in New Jersey and an alumnus of the College of Engineering. Steiner has a deep interest in the arts and entertainment. He created (and owns) the Steiner Studios in Brooklyn, the largest and most sophisticated film/television production facility outside of Los Angeles. He provided the funds to support visits to campus by leaders in the arts and entertainment sectors. Recent speakers include Nelle Nugent (Broadway producer) and alumni Rob Marshall and Billy Porter.

Bogart is one of the three co-artistic directors of the SITI Company, which she founded with Japanese director Tadashi Suzuki in 1992. Productions with SITI include Persians, Steel Hammer, A Rite, Café Variations, Trojan Women (After Euripides), American Document, Antigone, Under Construction, Freshwater, Radio Macbeth, Hotel Cassiopeia, Intimations for Saxophone, Death and the Ploughman, A Midsummer Night's Dream, La Dispute, Score, Hay Fever, bobrauschenbergamerica, Room, War of the Worlds, Cabin Pressure, The Radio Play, Bob, Culture of Desire, Private Lives, Miss Julie, Alice's Adventures, Small Lives/Big Dreams, Going, Going, Gone, The Medium, and Orestes.

Since completing her studies — Bard College (B.A.) and New York University (M.A.) — Bogart has participated in the American theater as a director, playwright, essayist, teacher, and is the recipient of numerous accolades: Doris Duke Performing Artist Award (2012), Jesse L. Rosenberger Medal for Outstanding Achievement in Creative & Performing Arts, University of Chicago (2012), Honorary Degree from Skidmore College (2011), the Pat Miller Playmaker Award from Emory University (2011), Rockefeller Fellow USA Artists Foundation (2006), Distinguished Career Award – South East Theatre Conference (2006), the Elliott Norton Award for Outstanding Direction (2003), Distinguished Chancellorship Award (2002), the Edwin Booth Award (2001), the Charles Flint Kellogg Award (2001), a Guggenheim Fellowship (2000/2001), an ATHE Career Achievement Award (1999), designation by the Actors Theatre of Louisville as Modern Master (1995), two Obies (1990 & 1988), a Bessie Award (1984), a Villager Award (1980). She has served as President of the Theatre Communications Group (TCG) from 1990 to 1992.

In addition to her talk, Bogart will be spending three days (March 30-April 1) at the School of Drama interacting with drama students.

Media Contact:
Pam Wigley / 412-268-1047 / pwigley@andrew.cmu.edu

Manuela Veloso, a computer scientist renowned for her work in artificial intelligence and robotics, is the new head of Carnegie Mellon University’s Machine Learning Department, Andrew Moore, dean of the School of Computer Science, announced today.

Manuela Veloso

She succeeds Tom Mitchell, the E. Fredkin University Professor and founding head of the Machine Learning Department (MLD), who remains part of the faculty.

Veloso, the Herbert A. Simon University Professor of Computer Science, has been a faculty member since earning her Ph.D. in computer science at Carnegie Mellon in 1992.

“Carnegie Mellon’s AI community has long nurtured the field of machine learning — software that acquires knowledge and improves its performance with experience — culminating in the creation of the world’s first Machine Learning Department 10 years ago,” Moore said. “Manuela is the embodiment of this legacy. Her knowledge of all aspects of AI and her dedication make her the perfect person to lead MLD now that machine learning has emerged as a major component of the world’s economy.”

Veloso’s thesis work involved automated planning and learning by analogy, which led to her longstanding quest for full autonomy, with agents capable of planning, execution, learning and cooperation, particularly in complex, uncertain and adversarial environments.

With her students, she conducts research on a variety of autonomous robots, including pioneering work on robot soccer. Last year, her CMU robot soccer team won its fifth world championship in the RoboCup small-size league.

Using her CoBot service robots, she has developed the concept of symbiotic autonomy, in which intelligent mobile robots are autonomous, but also aware of their physical, cognitive and perceptual limitations and able to ask for help when necessary. Using this approach, her CoBot robots have been running errands and doing other tasks in CMU’s Gates and Hillman centers since 2011.

A mentor and advocate for increasing the number of women in the discipline of computer science, Veloso presented a keynote address last fall to the annual Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing in Houston, Texas.

Veloso was named a University Professor, the highest academic accolade bestowed by CMU, in 2014, and was honored as an Einstein Chair Professor by the Chinese Academy of Sciences in 2012. She is the past president of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI), as well as co-founder and past president of the International RoboCup Federation.

She is Fellow of AAAI, IEEE and AAAS. She is a recipient of the Association for Computing Machinery’s Special Interest Group on Artificial Intelligence, as well as a National Science Foundation Career Award and the university’s Allen Newell Medal for Excellence in Research.

“Fastball,” the baseball documentary that celebrates the sport’s signature pitch and aims to answer the question of who threw the fastest fastball of all-time, will premiere in Pittsburgh with several screenings scheduled.

Narrated by Kevin Costner and directed by nine-time Emmy-Award winner Jonathan Hock, the film includes interviews with more than 20 Hall of Fame players, including Hank Aaron, Johnny Bench, Goose Gossage and Bob Gibson.

It also has several connections to Pittsburgh, a.k.a The City of Champions. Three Carnegie Mellon scientists — physicist Gregg Franklin and neuroscientists Michael J. Tarr and Timothy Verstynen — are prominently featured; CMU Trustee and Steelers minority owner Thomas Tull produced the documentary; and the Pittsburgh Pirates’ superstar centerfielder Andrew McCutcheon appears in it.

Fastball speeds can reach close to — and sometimes over — 100 miles per hour, requiring baseball players to make split-second decisions. Tarr and Verstynen talk about how a batter’s brain races to process an incoming fastball.

“Baseball is perhaps the ultimate test of neural abilities,” said Verstynen, assistant professor of psychology and member of CMU’s BrainHub neuroscience initiative. “A fastball can travel so fast that the batter’s brain may not even have the time to make a decision based on what he sees.”

Franklin talks about the physics of the fastball, addressing some of the most controversial questions in baseball: Is there such thing as a rising fastball, and who really threw the fastest pitch? For the latter, Franklin uses physics calculations to compare the speeds of fastballs throughout history.

“Not to spoil the movie, but the fastest pitch on record might not really be the fastest pitch,” said Franklin, a professor of physics. “A fastball is fastest immediately after being thrown, and it loses speed as it approaches the plate. So recordings taken using today’s technology, which measures a pitch’s speed close to the mound, will appear faster than pitches measured using older technologies that recorded speeds closer to the plate.”

Pittsburgh Screenings

Harris Theater
Friday, March 25 through Thursday, March 31
Various times
View schedule

Carnegie Mellon University
8 p.m., Friday, April 15
Kresge Theater, College of Fine Arts

Franklin, Verstynen and Tarr, professor and head of the Department of Psychology, will join Hock and Pittsburgh Pirates Director of Performance Chris Johnson for a panel discussion following the screening. The event is part of CMU’s Carnival weekend, and tickets must be purchased in advance.

Watch the trailer.

Carnegie Mellon University Master of Fine Arts (MFA) students will present new work in “What’s A Steak,” an annual exhibition of new work by rising 2017 and 2018 candidates in the School of Art. Taking over a vacant storefront at 5112 Penn Avenue between April 1-17, the exhibition’s opening reception will be from 6-10 p.m., Friday, April 1, as part of Pittsburgh’s monthly Unblurred Gallery Crawl.

“Each piece in this exhibition typifies currents running throughout the contemporary art world today,” said Adam Welch, local curator, Carnegie Mellon adjunct associate professor of art and adviser of the MFA’s exhibition.

“These works navigate forms and materials as components to larger theoretical, personal or socio-political structures. The artists’ strategies seem to say that established, ‘understood’ ideas exist in a state of flux, prompting the thought that ‘knowing’ is itself a state of questioning. Enjoy your dinner, although it might not be what you have determined it to be," Welch said.

About the Artists:

Shobun Baile explores the role that design, manufacturing and the exchange of goods play in the construction of cultural identity.

Kevin Brophy uses mystical tools of the social as a means to exaggerate mundane forms of communication in satirical and self-implicating ways. So they say: read we whole. Eat us. Mediation is like a knife and no one is safe.

Brittany De Nigris knows that some of these things could last a very long time, others won’t last very long; in this party (some already lasted only a day). Regardless, all of it is here now.

Hannah Epstein’s work responds to the horrific stereotype of the American: one held by those abroad and confirmed by the actions of many Americans themselves.

Alex Lukas examines vernacular markings and their place within the American landscape.

Adam Milner collects physical and digital detritus accrued while reaching out for some connection, and finds that longing permeates every day.

Katie Rose Pipkin makes drawings on paper, in language and collaboratively with machines. Here is a series of symbols that looks like a field of flowers ↾⌠❦ᵳ≀〴❧❀१✾឴〳ノ〳 .

Joy Poulard fuses pop cultural, Afro-Caribbean and Western mythologies and iconography, using multi-ethnic identity to cultivate unity between the familiar and unfamiliar in a rapidly converging world.

Gray Swartzel’s practice, documentation of mother/child exchange, involves collaboration with a woman found by placing an ad on craigslist while searching for someone to claim as their son.

Lee Webster fingers the gap; traces topographies with attention to the points where the personal and public crash.

Moses Williams endeavors to create spaces that consider what lies beyond language and logic through performance and object-making.

Media Contact:
Pam Wigley / 412-268-1047 / pwigley@andrew.cmu.edu

By Jocelyn Duffy / 412-268-9982 / jhduffy@andrew.cmu.edu

Ever see something that isn't really there? Could your mind be playing tricks on you? The "tricks" might be your brain reacting to feedback between neurons in different parts of the visual system, according to a study published in The Journal of Neuroscience by Carnegie Mellon University Assistant Professor of Biological Sciences Sandra J. Kuhlman and colleagues.

Understanding this feedback system could provide new insight into the visual system's neuronal circuitry and could have further implications for understanding how the brain interprets and understands sensory stimuli.

Many optical illusions make you see something that's not there. Take the Kanizsa triangle: when you place three Pac-Man-like wedges in the right spot, you see a triangle, even though the edges of the triangle aren't drawn. 

"We see with both our brain and our eyes. Your brain is making inferences that allow you to see the triangle. It's connecting the dots between the corners of the wedges," said Kuhlman, who is a member of Carnegie Mellon's BrainHub neuroscience initiative and the joint Carnegie Mellon/University of Pittsburgh Center for the Neural Basis of Cognition (CNBC). "Optical illusions illustrate some of the amazing things our visual system can do."

When we look at an object, information about what we see travels through circuits of neurons beginning in the retina, through the thalamus and into the brain's visual cortex. In the visual cortex, the information gets processed in multiple stages and is ultimately sent to the prefrontal cortex — the area of the brain that makes decisions, including how to respond to a given stimulus.

However, not all information stays on this forward moving path. At the secondary stage of processing in the visual cortex some neurons reverse course and send information back to the first stage of processing. Researchers at Carnegie Mellon wondered if this feedback could change how the neurons in the visual cortex respond to a stimulus and alter the messages being sent to the prefrontal cortex.    

While there has been a good deal of research studying how information moves forward through the visual system, less has been done to study the impact of the information that moves backward. To find out if the information traveling from the secondary stage of processing back to the first stage impacted how information is encoded in the visual system, the researchers needed to quantify the magnitude of information that was being sent from the second stage back to the first stage. Using a mouse model, they recorded normal neuronal firing in the first stage of the visual cortex as the mouse looked at moving patterns that represented edges. They then silenced the neurons in the second stage using modified optogenetic technology. This halted the feedback of information from the second stage back to the first stage, and allowed the researchers to determine how much of the neuronal activity in the first stage of visual processing was the result of feedback.  

Twenty percent of the neuronal activity in the visual cortex was the result of feedback, a concept Kuhlman calls reciprocal connectivity. This indicates that some of the information coming from the visual cortex is not a direct response to a visual stimuli, but is a response to how the stimuli was perceived by higher cortical areas.

The feedback, she says, might be what causes our brain to complete the undrawn lines in the Kanizsa triangle. But more importantly, it signifies that studying neuronal feedback is important to our understanding of how the brain works to process stimuli.

"This represents a new way to study visual perception and neural computation. If we want to truly understand the visual pathway, and cortical function in general, we have to understand these reciprocal connection," Kuhlman said.

This study was funded by the Knights Templar Eye Foundation, the Howard Hughes Medical Institute Undergraduate Program, the Fight-For-Sight Foundation and the National Institutes of Health's National Eye Institute (R01-EY024678).

Additional authors on this study are Carnegie Mellon and the CNBC's Diego E. Pafundo, Mark A. Nicholas and Ruilin Zhang.

As the birthplace of artificial intelligence and cognitive psychology, Carnegie Mellon has been a leader in the study of brain and behavior for more than 50 years. The university has created some of the first cognitive tutors, helped to develop the Jeopardy-winning Watson, founded a groundbreaking doctoral program in neural computation, and completed cutting-edge work in understanding the genetics of autism. Building on its strengths in biology, computer science, psychology, statistics and engineering, CMU recently launched BrainHub, a global initiative that focuses on how the structure and activity of the brain give rise to complex behaviors.

Waven Technologies, a team from Carnegie Mellon University placed second in the Allegheny Region CleanTech University Prize competition, held at CMU during its inaugural Energy Week celebration, March 14–18. This competition was one of eight regional contests in the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Cleantech University Prize (CUP).

The CUP aims to inspire the next generation of clean energy entrepreneurs and innovators by providing them with competitive funding for business development, commercialization training and other educational opportunities.

Waven Technologies tied for second place with Manta Biofuels from the University of Maryland.  They were determined to have the greatest potential for moving into prototyping and customer testing of their products. Each team was awarded $15,000 from local companies supporting Pittsburgh’s new Energy Innovation Center.

The top prize was awarded to the team that developed DR-Advisor, a response system that uses building data to optimize demand response curtailment.DR-Advisor is a tool that analyzes the electricity consumption in buildings. Using this analysis,  it can make recommendations or choose a predetermined strategy to control energy use that takes pressure off the electrical grid and can save money in utility costs.

The DR-Advisor team from the University of Pennsylvania received a $50,000 grant from the Department of Energy and a chance to compete at the national level against six other regional winners, June 21-23, in Denver.

Tied for third-place were WindiGo Turbines of Drexel University and Saloleum Inc. of Chatham University. They were each awarded $5,000 from a prize pool donated by Scott Electric. WindiGo received an additional $5,000 as a “fan favorite.”

In 2015, the winning team at the national level was the CMU team Hyliion for its SMART suspension system for trucks.

This is the first time that Carnegie Mellon has hosted a regional competition in energy. The remaining funds from a DOE grant to CMU will support CleanTech prize money for future competitions in 2017 and 2018. More information is at http://www.cleantechprize.org.

The U.S. Department of Defense has tapped Carnegie Mellon University as a partner in a $75 million national research institute that will support American textile manufacturers in bringing sophisticated new materials and textiles to the marketplace.

The institute, called Advanced Functional Fabrics of America (AFFOA), will be a national manufacturing resource center for industry and government to draw on the expertise of academic researchers working with new fibers, fabrics and materials, and developing the technology that can integrate them into products from active wear to protective armor.

Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter formally recognized AFFOA as one of the White House’s National Network for Manufacturing Innovation (NNMI) institutes in a ceremony at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology today. The NNMI initiative is a $317 million public-private effort to boost the value of American-made products on the international market, by using new materials and manufacturing methods.

“The AFFOA initiative will provide unique opportunities for Carnegie Mellon to enable new materials, devices, systems and applications. The integration of sensors and actuators in electronic textiles and smart fabrics can help widen the use of existing applications and open new applications in health, education, transportation or Internet of things,” said Diana Marculescu, professor of electrical and computer engineering at Carnegie Mellon.

“I strongly believe that AFFOA offers an unparalleled opportunity for developing our workforce. Indeed, new generations of scientists and engineers will be trained in integrating sensors, actuators and photonics into wearable clothing fabrics. We are looking forward to being part of AFFOA and connecting with other academic and industrial members” said Marculescu, who is leading a group of faculty that will focus on development of electronic textiles with novel properties enabled by the embedding of processing, sensing and actuation.

The AFFOA group includes 31 academic institutions, including Carnegie Mellon, Cornell University, The Ohio State University, the University of Michigan and the University of California, Davis. It counts 16 companies as industry partners with NIKE, Microsoft, Goodyear, The North Face, Bose and Medtronic among them. In addition, 26 start-up incubators and venture capital groups, including Angel Capital Associations, Westbury Partners and North Bridge Venture Partners have pledged support to AFFOA.

Carnegie Mellon is part of a mid-Atlantic research hub led by Drexel University that links research institutions including Penn State, Temple University, Thomas Jefferson University, Philadelphia University and the University of Delaware to manufacturing and investment partners DuPont, Ben Franklin Technology Partners of Southeast Pennsylvania, the City of Philadelphia Office of Manufacturing and Industry, and the Pennsylvania Department of Community and Economic Development.

The mid-Atlantic cohort will lead investigations into modeling, designing and predicting the utility of new fibers, yarns and materials, as well as using those new materials to build prototypes of functional fabrics for apparel, health care, transportation, consumer electronics, architecture and the defense industry.

By Sherry Stokes / 412-268-5976 / stokes@cmu.edu

Meagan Mauter, an assistant professor of Civil & Environmental Engineering and Engineering & Public Policy, has been awarded a Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) award from the National Science Foundation.

The CAREER award supports junior faculty who exemplify the role of teacher-scholars through outstanding research and education. Mauter, who holds courtesy appointments in Chemical Engineering and Materials Science & Engineering, will use her five-year CAREER award to reduce air and water pollutant emissions from power plants.

"Much of our electricity generation infrastructure was built in an earlier era when air, water and CO2 emissions were not tightly regulated," Mauter said. "In the past decade, we have developed a much greater understanding of the human health and environmental costs of these emissions, and regulatory agencies have responded with strict new limits on emissions from coal fired power plants."

Mauter's CAREER research will build upon and unify her past research topics, which include studying waste heat driven water treatment processes, investigating the limitations of these processes and looking at tradeoffs between air and water emissions at these power plants.

The project, titled "Integrated water, energy, and emissions decision making for a low-carbon future with coal-fired power plants," will develop decision support tools to help redesign coal fired power plants to cost effectively reduce emissions.

"Helping power plants to more efficiently treat water emissions will reduce the auxiliary power consumption and associated air emissions from running water treatment processes," Mauter said. "Avoiding these tradeoffs in air and water emissions will reduce the human health and environmental consequences of electricity production from coal fired power plants as we transition to a low-carbon electricity generation mix."

The award also will fund the development and characterization of new materials used in waste heat driven processes, as well as allow Mauter to include high school students in the collection and interpretation of data on the environmental impacts of water emissions from power plants.

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Event: Carnegie Mellon University’s annual Spring Carnival is set for April 14 – 17. Many events are free and open to the public, and a full schedule is available at http://springcarnival.org. Follow the weekend on social media with #CMUcarnival. Highlights include:

Spring Carnival Booths
3 to 11 p.m. on Thursday, April 14
11 a.m. to 10 p.m. on Friday, April 15, and Saturday, April 16
Note new location for this year: College of Fine Arts parking lot and lawn

The opening ceremony at 3 p.m., Thursday April 14, on the Midway will include remarks by Spring Carnival Committee Chair Patrick Koenig, Associate Vice President and Dean of Student Affairs Gina Casalegno, and performances by the CMU Pipe and Kiltie bands. More than 20 student organizations are building booths with a “Game Night” theme, including “Battleship,” “Pac-Man,” “Candy Land,” “Oregon Trail” and “Dungeons and Dragons.”

Sweepstakes Buggy Races
8 a.m. to noon on Friday, April 15, and Saturday, April 16
Held on Tech and Frew streets, and Schenley Drive

Buggies are aerodynamic pushcarts designed and built by student organizations. Each team includes five students who push the buggy in a relay-style race while a driver steers around the 4,400-foot course. Just an inch off the ground, buggies also roll freely reaching speeds of nearly 35 miles per hour. Student organizations cmuTV and WRCT 88.3-FM will broadcast the event on their websites.

Mobot Races
Noon, Friday, April 15
Outdoors, next to Wean Hall

The School of Computer Science challenges members of the CMU community to create and race small, autonomous vehicles (“MObile roBOTs”) along a slalom-style course.

“Fastball” Documentary Screening
8 p.m., Friday, April 15
Kresge Theatre, College of Fine Arts
$5 for adults, free for CMU students and children under 12. Advance online registration is required.

CMU physicist Gregg Franklin and psychologists Michael Tarr and Tim Verstynen are featured experts in this baseball documentary exploring the science of throwing and hitting the fastball. Narrated by Kevin Costner, the film features current baseball stars and 20 Hall of Famers. Nine-time Emmy Award-winning director Jonathan Hock and Pittsburgh Pirates Director of Performance Chris Johnson will join CMU faculty members for a talkback after the screening.

Traffic Alert: The City of Pittsburgh has granted permits to close several Oakland-area roads during CMU’s Spring Carnival and Sweepstakes buggy races. Forbes and Morewood avenues will be closed near the campus intermittently from 6 to 11 p.m. Friday, April 8, to allow students to transport their booths to the Spring Carnival Midway.

Margaret Morrison Street, Tech Street, Frew Street, Circuit Road and Schenley Drive (Panther Hollow and Schenley bridges included) will be closed from 5 a.m. to 1 p.m., Friday, April 15, and Saturday, April 16. Both City of Pittsburgh Police and Carnegie Mellon Police will be present during the races to help monitor traffic. Roads will reopen by 1 p.m. If inclement weather causes the cancellation of the Friday and Saturday competitions, races will be held Sunday, April 17, during the same time frame.

Phipps Conservatory will remain open during normal hours. Due to road closures, visitors will need to park on the streets by Carnegie Library and the surrounding area. City of Pittsburgh Police stationed at barricades will give bus drivers instructions for passenger unloading.

Parking: On-campus parking will be limited for non-permit holders and campus visitors, April 11 – 15. Additional parking will be available for $5 (cash only) from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. Friday, April 15 at the Bob O’Connor Golf Course at Schenley Park, 5370 Schenley Drive, and a shuttle service will be provided to and from campus.

Free parking will be available in the East Campus Garage on a first-come, first-served basis on Saturday, April 16. More parking information is available on CMU’s Alumni Association website.