Joseph A. Goguen - US grants

9417435 Jain ABSTRACT UCSD MS Program in World Class Manufacturing Engineering The University of California, San Diego proposes to create a 2-year MS Program World Class Manufacturing Engineering with a strong international and information systems focus. In partnerships with ALCOA Electronic Packaging, Hewlett-Packard, Hughes Aircraft, and TITAN Linkabit, it is targeted toward displaced defense engineers, particularly women and minorities. Aiming to take advantage of manufacturing and management strengths overseas, the program has a unique emphasis on foreign language and culture learning (approximately 50% of the students) and includes a 9-month internship in a manufacturing firm in the U.S. or abroad. With good support from institutions with strong international studies program, it expects a steady state of 30 students per year with expansion in later years to feed in undergraduates. ***

9901002 Goguen, Joseph A University of California
Hidden Algebra and Modular Distributed Concurrent Software

Tools, theory, case studies, and methods are being developed for hidden algebra, a new approach to specifying, prototyping, verifying, documenting and generating distributed concurrent software. Tools build on the Kumo proof assistant and website generator, by providing a new specification language, taking advantage of new web technology (XML, dynamic HTML, JavaCC, etc.), and using multiple inference engines, including the new CafeOBJ system. Hidden algebra extends the algebraic approach to abstract data types (ADTs) initiated by the PI, by encompassing state, behavioral abstraction, nondeterminism, concurrency, and first order sentences; like the algebraic theory of ADTs, it works well with modularization. More powerful proof principles are being developed, as well as better methods for documenting proofs. Long term goals are to develop tools, methods and theory for high quality software systems, and to advance our understanding of modular distributed concurrent systems. Semantics is important as a model for designing software tools, and providing correctness criteria for important relations like refinement, while experimentation is essential for ensuring that the approach can handle realistic problems and meet real needs.

Understanding and sustaining the natural world in the 21st century depends on improving our capacity to access ecological, earth science, and human-dimension data; mining these data for new knowledge; and conveying new insights to decision-makers and the general public. Computer science and information technology research can effectively address many of these issues and advance our ability to conduct ecological science. This multidisciplinary research investigation will create a "Science Environment for Ecological Knowledge" (SEEK)-an information technology framework and infrastructure that will be used to derive and extend ecological knowledge by facilitating the discovery, access, integration, interpretation, and analyses of distributed ecological information. SEEK will provide for the integration of local desktop data with a larger network of data and analytical tools, enabling ecologists and other researchers to tackle complex research problems that were hitherto intractable.
The SEEK initiative stands on the foundation of substantial and productive NSF investment in ecological and biodiversity informatics and it brings together four highly collaborative, forward-looking institutions in a partnership committed to inventing and supporting a global computing infrastructure for environmental biology. The project involves a multidisciplinary team of computer scientists, ecologists and technologists from the Partnership for Biodiversity Informatics (PBI), a consortium comprising the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis (NCEAS); the San Diego Supercomputer Center (SDSC); the University of Kansas (KU), and the University of New Mexico (UNM)) and partnering institutions (Arizona State University, University of North Carolina, University of Vermont, and Napier University in Scotland).
This five-year initiative will lead to fundamental improvements in how researchers can 1) gain global access to data and information, 2) rapidly locate and utilize distributed computational services, and 3) exercise powerful new methods for capturing, reproducing, and extending the analysis process itself. SEEK will also specifically provide ecologists and other researchers access to a large-scale network of information resources and computational services, via powerful data discovery and analysis tools that operate from desktop computers. These capabilities will significantly build research capacity to more effectively address global research, management and policy issues in environmental biology that increasingly require much more efficient, automated access to distributed and heterogeneous data.
A multi-faceted approach will be employed to insure that the research products, software, and information technology infrastructure resulting from SEEK optimally benefit science, education, and the public. Outreach includes community involvement, a WWW portal, informatics training, and an innovative annual symposium and training program that focuses on information technology transfer to young investigators and students, particularly those from underrepresented groups.
In the information economy, access to information for knowledge creation and decision-making is as valuable as the information itself. This project will enable bringing the intellectual content of biodiversity and ecological information into currency for science and society. Examples of significant project outcomes include: (i) revolutionizing discovery, access to and integration of ecological, earth, and human dimension data and information through the SEEK infrastructure; (ii) developing intelligent analytical tools and infrastructure to support the needs of scientists, decision-makers, and the general public; (iii) education and training of the next generation of ecologists in information technology skills; and (iv) improving the opportunities for scientists, resource managers, policy makers, and the public to make scientifically-informed decisions about the environment by expanding access to ecological data, information, and knowledge.