Consulting Projects and Activities – Spring 2007

Projects

    • Project: Statistical Input for an Economic Panel Dataset
    • Client: Dr. Nandita Dasgupta, Professor of Economics, UMBC
    • Consultants: Dr. Neerchal and Elizabeth Stanwyck
    • Description: Provided consultation and assistance with analyzing a panel dataset in order to explore the influence of Heritage Foundation Economic Freedom indices on the inflow of foreign direct investment in developing countries.
    • Project: Retention Rate and Academic Performance of UMBC Students
    • Client: Learning Resources Center (LRC), UMBC
    • Consultants: Dr. Neerchal and Ines Urrestarazu
    • Description: Analyzed the effectiveness of a program offered by LRC on helping UMBC students in academic jeopardy to remain at school and improve their academic performance.
    • Project: AXA-Equitable Life Insurance
    • Client: AXA-Equitable Life Insurance Company, New York
    • Consultants: Dr. Park and Aarti Gupta
    • Description: Found the relationship between Breakage Count/Total Loss and equity market movements such as return or volatility using a variety of regression analysis and Bayesian approaches.
    • Project: Modeling the Spread of Epidemic Cholera
    • Client: David Hartley and Holly Gaff, UMB
    • Consultants: Dr. Gobbert and Alen Agheksanterian
    • Description: Development and implementation of a numerical method for partial differential equations that was used inside an optimal control code. Extended the code to a new model and visualization.
    • Project: Extrapolation of Maryland Child Support Table
    • Client: Stuart Rehr, GVA Architecture Interior Design
    • Consultants: Dr. Gobbert and Alen Agheksanterian
    • Description: Extended Maryland’s basic child-support table by extrapolating past the end of the original table.
    • Project: Development of a Database Application
    • Client: Dr. Kenneth Maton, Department of Psychology, UMBC
    • Consultants: Dr. Neerchal, Justin Newcomer, Willy Weng, and Yukun Wu
    • Description: Developed a database application in Microsoft Access to manage data for a high school study.
    • Project: Validation of Drug Testing Software
    • Client: John Shatley, Constellation Energy
    • Consultants: Dr. Gobbert, Dr. Neerchal, Alen Agheksanterian, and Willy Weng
    • Description: Validated the statistical properties of software used in the selection of subjects for drug testing.

Also Consulted With

  • Weihong Lin, Assistant Professor in Biological Sciences (Dr. Neerchal and Alen Agheksanterian)
  • Stephen J. Freeland, Assistant Professor in Biological Sciences, regarding various questions including advice on choice of statistical distribution (Dr. Gobbert, Dr. Neerchal, and Justin Newcomer), mathematical notation (Dr. Gobbert), and model for amino acids (Willy Weng, Justin Newcomer, and Alen Agheksanterian)
  • Vishwanath Mulukutla, Mechanical Engineering Ph.D. student (Dr. Gobbert and Alen Agheksanterian)

Publications and Presentations

  • Probability and Statistics Day Poster PresentationsJustin Newcomer and Will Gretes
    A Novel Analysis of Feeding Behavior to Address an Old Debate: Behavioral Plasticity of Larval Manduca Sexta, Induction of Preference or Induction of Specificity?
    First Prize, Student Poster Competition

    Willy Weng
    Analysis of Cyberknife Radiosurgery for Pancreatic Cancer Patient

Other Activities

  • Software workshops extended to weekly schedule in cooperation with the Office of Information Technology (OIT)
  • Delivered workshop on Matlab at Villa Julie College (Alen Agheksanterian)
  • Presentations at the Advisory Board Meeting of the College of Natural and Mathematical Sciences (CNMS) by CIRC RAs (Alen Agheksanterian and Justin Newcomer)
  • Helped with statistical/computational component for a R01 grant research proposal (Dr. Neerchal and Alen Agheksanterian)
  • Developed and presented a new tutorial on the Message Passing Interface (MPI) (Robert C. Newton)
  • Hosted seminar by COMSOL on the partial differential equation software package COMSOL Multiphysics
  • Webhosting and volunteer help for Probability and Statistics Day 2007
  • Taught special version of Matlab workshops with emphasis on Numerical ODEs to summer REU students (Alen Agheksanterian)

Infrastructure

  • CIRC webpage overhauled to create an Internet presence consistent in appearance with the Department of Mathematics and Statistics webpage
  • CIRC assumes the responsibility for the continued development and staffing of MATH 426 and STAT 432 for the department; redesign of MATH 426 initiated with design of several new tutorials (Alen Agheksanterian)
  • Developed expertise within CIRC on the use of parallel computing in application areas
  • Developed capability and expertise to host an interactive web interface to Matlab on the CIRC webpage
  • Took responsibility for hosting the pre-application form for students considering application to the department’s graduate programs
  • Developed expertise on the use of the Matlab Compiler on UMBC’s Linux systems (Dr. Gobbert and Alen Agheksanterian)