{"50974":{"#nid":"50974","#data":{"type":"news","title":"Brubaker Nominated For ACM Ph.D. Award","body":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003E\n\n\n\nCharlie Brubaker, an August 2009 Ph.D. graduate in Computer Science, has won the College of Computing Doctoral Dissertation Award for his thesis, \u201cExtensions of Principal Component Analysis,\u201d and the College has voted to recommend the work for the ACM Doctoral Dissertation Award, which each year recognizes the best CS dissertation in the country.\u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003EBrubaker was advised by Distinguished Professor Santosh Vempala (CS), and his thesis committee includes professors Haesun Park (CSE), Vladimir Koltchinskii (Math), Adam Kalai, senior researcher at Microsoft Research New England, and Ravi Kannan, principal researcher for Microsoft Research India.\u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003E\u201cMy journey through the Ph.D. program has been a long one, taking me from robotics, to computer vision, to machine learning, and finally to theory,\u201d Brubaker said. \u201cMaking so many transitions slowed my graduation, no doubt, but it also allowed me to work with leaders across several research fields and has given me a better perspective on the research world. Ultimately, I am the better for it, and I am grateful to everyone I have had the opportunity to work with.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003EPrincipal Component Analysis (PCA) is one of the most widely used data-analysis techniques in science and engineering. In a letter explaining the significance of Brubaker\u2019s research, Vempala said the thesis (available \u003Ca href=\u0022http:\/\/www.cc.gatech.edu\/~brubaker\/thesis.pdf\u0022\u003Ehere\u003C\/a\u003E) made three distinct contributions to the field: it gives a new notion of principal components called \u201cIsotropic PCA\u201d that is scale-invariant; it suggests a new method called \u201cRobust PCA\u201d for dealing with outliers and noisy data; and it extends the notion of principal components from matrices to tensors (multi-dimensional arrays). PCA is notorious for its vulnerability to noise and for its lack of scale-invariance. The thesis addresses these outstanding issues and will make PCA more practical and reliable.\u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003E\u201cBesides the sheer technical strength of his results, Charlie has put in a great deal of effort into clear exposition, and has included multiple chapters with introductory and background material,\u201d Vempala wrote. \u201cHis thesis is consistently insightful and a pleasure to read. It is hard for me to recall a more impressive thesis in algorithms in recent years.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003E\u201cWhat strikes me as most impressive about Charlie\u2019s work is that it so beautifully has a foot in absolutely first-rate theory, as well as practical, broad and important application areas,\u201d CS Chair and Professor Ellen Zegura wrote in her letter supporting Brubaker\u2019s nomination for the ACM award. \u201cIn the next several years, I think we will see numerous uses of and citations to Charlie\u2019s work in many domains.\u201d \u003C\/p\u003E\n\u003Cp\u003EBrubaker and his wife, Stephanie, have two children, Charles and Sophie.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E","summary":null,"format":"limited_html"}],"field_subtitle":"","field_summary":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003ECharlie Brubaker, an August 2009 Ph.D. graduate in Computer Science,\nhas won the College of Computing Doctoral Dissertation Award for his\nthesis, \u201cExtensions of Principal Component Analysis,\u201d and the College\nhas voted to recommend the work for the ACM Doctoral Dissertation\nAward, which each year recognizes the best CS dissertation in the\ncountry. \u003Cem\u003ESource: Office of Communications\u003C\/em\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"field_summary_sentence":"","uid":"27154","created_gmt":"2010-02-09 21:39:23","changed_gmt":"2016-10-08 03:04:20","author":"Louise Russo","boilerplate_text":"","field_publication":"","field_article_url":"","dateline":{"date":"2009-11-03T00:00:00-05:00","iso_date":"2009-11-03T00:00:00-05:00","tz":"America\/New_York"},"extras":[],"groups":[{"id":"47223","name":"College of Computing"}],"categories":[],"keywords":[],"core_research_areas":[],"news_room_topics":[],"event_categories":[],"invited_audience":[],"affiliations":[],"classification":[],"areas_of_expertise":[],"news_and_recent_appearances":[],"phone":[],"contact":[],"email":[],"slides":[],"orientation":[],"userdata":""}}}