TIM HENG
(SIAT) FCAT Undegraduate Research Fellowship Award Recipient
STUDENT PROFILE
Though nearing the end of his a career as an undergraduate student, Tim looks forward to the day that he returns to university soil once again—but as a graduate student. With a goal to attend grad school, Tim is eager to engage in proper research work to guide and support his future ambitions.
His achievements with the Undergraduate Research Fellowship Award, however, do not mark the beginning to his dedicated efforts. Throughout his time as a SIAT undergraduate, Tim has had the opportunity to work on projects involving problem analysis, research, and design—all of which he’s taken very seriously so that he can prepare for grad school.
It is his passion for research that has led him to pursue this Research Fellowship Award as a means to bridge a gap from undergraduate studies to graduate studies. With this opportunity, Tim strives to fortify his skills and enhance his interest in research, critical thinking, and design to impress future employers and mentors.
- Faculty supervisor: Chris Shaw
- Area of study: Visualization/Visual Analytics
Working under Professor Chris Shaw, Tim will take part in research that focuses on developing a visualization system that encapsulates multiple layout algorithms. While current approaches use a single algorithm to lay out interconnection networks, these researchers seek to develop a new method of representing graph-theoretic views of node interconnection networks that will allow users to work with a larger amount of data yet still facilitate the ability to analyze the data with different visualization approaches.
More specifically, Tim will be:
- researching published literature on hierarchical layout systems to better understand different systems;
- designing and developing the graphical system;
- assessing the power of each visualization technique in the new layout system; writing a research paper at the end of his work term or the Visual Analytics conference.
“The project will develop a new graph layout system in which multiple layout algorithms are encapsulated in special-purpose boxes that interconnect in a hierarchical style to enable the establishment of the user’s analytical findings about the graph, and to use the layout hierarchy to impose an order on the nodes. Within each box, the graph layout algorithms mentioned above can be employed to these subgraphs.”
Tim: "I would highly encourage students to apply for this award even if they are not planning to do any grad work because it’s a great chance for students to improve their research skill for undergrad work and learn more about the field that they’re interested in."