http://www.phdcomics.com

This one is more funny. After graduate, some guys get their faculty job, some guys goto industry, however, the rest of the Phd students become PostDocs .....

Finding a job is really a problem for every Phd student. It is better to prepare from the begining .....

Firstly, I think we need to find out why we are doing this. Why we came to Phd student? I think I have enough reasons to do this. Secondly, I need to and have already found that academia is a business. I should treat it like a job, otherwise I can not succeed. Next, the most important criteira to evaluate a graduate student is research achievement. And there are some personalities a graduate student should have to be successful in a graduate school, e.g. initiative, tenacity, and flexibility. Besides these, a graudate student should possess of certain skills, like interpersonal skills, organizational skills, communications skills and etc. In addition, choosing advisor and committee members is important as well. After we graduate, how to find a job is also a considerable issue.

Dr. Engels is the former Research Director of the Auto-ID Labs of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dr. Engels spearheaded the Auto-ID Labs' transition from the Auto-ID Center to the Auto-ID Labs and EPCglobal, Inc., a non-profit organization. He is one of the principle architects of the EPC System, a system designed to connect physical objects to the Internet, and the principle product from the Auto-ID Center. The EPC System was licensed to EPCglobal Inc. in 2003. The EPC System is currently being adopted and deployed by the retail industry and the U.S. Department of Defense.

Dr. Engels was the first Chairman of the Hardware Action Group under EPCglobal, Inc. and was a member of EPCglobal's Technical Steering Committee (TSC) from its inception in 2003 until May 2005. The Hardware Action Group is the technical action group charged with developing the hardware standards, including radio frequency identification protocols, used within the EPC System. The TSC guides the work of all the technical action groups that develop EPCglobal's standards and recommends avenues of EPC System related research to the Auto-ID Labs.

Prior to his appointment as Research Director of the MIT Auto-ID Labs, Dr. Engels was the Director of Protocols for its predecessor, the Auto-ID Center. The Auto-ID Center, founded at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in October 1999, developed the EPC System and its related standards. As Director of Protocols, Dr. Engels led the development of two radio frequency identification (RFID) protocols, and he led the daily operational and research activities at the MIT Auto-ID Center. Dr. Engels is one of the original members of the team that formed in 1998 to develop what became known as the EPC System.

Dr. Engels has authored more than 30 articles published in peer reviewed conferences and journals.  His work includes seminal publications on the Reader Collision Problem, as well as articles on antenna design, the EPC System, VLSI computer aided design, theoretical complexity of scheduling problems, and programming languages.

Dr. Engels' broad research interests span the areas of radio frequency communications, sensor technologies, information systems, scheduling theory and applications, optimization algorithms, complexity theory, and the social and policy implications of technologies.  He is applying concepts from these areas to solve problems in embedded systems, mobile computing, electronic commerce, and applications of advanced and emerging technologies for security and in healthcare.

Dr. Engels received his Doctor of Philosophy degree in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, his Master's of Science degree in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from the University of California, Berkeley, and his Bachelor's of Science degree in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Summa Cum Laude, from the University at Buffalo.

Information Systems Research is a journal of INFORMS, the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences. Information Systems Research is a leading international journal of theory, research, and intellectual development, focused on information systems in organizations, institutions, the economy, and society. ISR has been constantly improving the Social Science Citation Index (SSCI) impact factor score and is considered on e of the best journal in IS community.

The European Journal of Information Systems provides a distinctive European perspective on the theory and practice of information systems for a global audience. This journal encourages first rate research articles by academics, but also case studies and reflective articles by practitioners. It provides a critical view on technology, development, implementation, strategy, management and policy. The impact factor for EJIS is pretty high, although not as decent as ISR. Recently, EJIS has a special issue for RFID - Managing RFID Projects in Organizations. The theme of the special issue will be to discover the challenges faced by organizations in execution of RFID projects. It will address every aspect of RFID project management starting from requirements analysis, to implementation, and maintenance. This is quite relevant to the research in our RFID lab.

Information Systems Frontiers examines new research and development at the interface of information systems (IS) and information technology (IT) from analytical, behavioral, and technological perspectives. It provides a common forum for both frontline industrial developments as well as pioneering academic research. The journal's multidisciplinary approach draws from such fields as computer science, telecommunications, operations research, economics, and cognitive sciences. Among the emerging areas covered are enterprise modeling and integration, object/web technologies, information economics, IT integrated manufacturing, medical informatics, digital libraries, mobile computing, and electronic commerce. Both the Editorial Advisory Group and the Editorial Board feature outstanding individuals from academia and industry, ensuring that all the multiple frontiers in the IS/IT field are covered.

Operations Research (OR) is the flagship journal for operations research community. I try to publish papers on the two fields: i) methods and principles on data based operational systems; ii) observations and modeling of operating systems. The operational systems in my end include tracking systems, SCM (supply chain managment) systems.

As I mentioned in the previous blog, IEEE RFID 2009 addresses key topics and issues related to RFID technologies, their supporting distributed information systems and their applications. I got a paper accepted in IEEE RFID 2008. IEEE RFID 2009 is the third annual one. For the areas it features, I am interested in the followings: i) RFID Communication Protocols, including Coding, modulation and medium access schemes; ii) RFID Location Sensing, including novel system approaches, technologies and algorithms; iii) RFID security and privacy, including cryptographic protocols and privacy-enhancing techniques. The deadline of RFID 2009 is December 5, 2008, and the conference will be held in Orlando this year.

ACM SIGKDD: SIGKDD is the famous conference in knowledge discovery and data mining. I hope I can come out some papers on the two aspects on data mining: i) RFID data processing; ii) Optimizing supply chain using data mining technologies.

During her Phd study, she has published some papers.

Mary Beth Rosson, Hansa Sinha, Mithu Bhattacharya, Dejin Zhao: Design Planning in End-User Web Development. VL/HCC 2007: 189-196.

Mithu Bhattacharya, Chao-Hsien Chu, Tracy Mullen. RFID Implementation in Retail Industry: Current Status, Issues, and Challenges, Decision Science Institute (DSI) Conference, Phoenix AZ, 2007.

Mithu Bhattacharya, Chao-Hsien Chu, Tracy Mullen. A Comparative Analysis of RFID Adoption in Retail and Manufacturing Sectors. 2008 IEEE International Conference on RFID, Volume 16, Issue 17, April 2008 Page(s):241 - 249.

Thus, she has already attended some conference, which are Decision Science Institute (DSI) Conference and IEEE International Conference on RFID.

Compare with her, the senior Phd student who has decided the research direction, I am a new graduate student who just join IST and RFID lab. So, I am still seeking my research direction. At present, I am interested in supply chain and RFID integration issues. But we still need to see  ..... Hopefully I will settle my research areas soon.

He had a lot of working experience, both in academe and industry. He was on the business faculties at Iowa State University, Baruch College and the Tatung University, and was in 1991/1992 a Visiting Associate Professor of Management Sciences at the University of Tsukuba (Japan). He is Adjunct Professor of Management and Engineering at the Hebei University of Technology (China), where he is serving as the Chief Academic Advisor to the School of Management. His industrial experience includes serving as a project leader, section chief, and consultant at Tatung Company - a multinational company with headquarters in Taipei and also in providing consulting services to a number of companies in China, Taiwan, and North America.

According to the public record, my advisor attend many different journls and conferences. For example, International Journal of Mobile Network Design and Innovation, Journal of New Mathematics and Natural Computation, European Journal of Operational Research, International Journal of Security and Networks, International Journal of Production Research, Ad Hoc Networks Journal, Electronic Commerce Research Journal, Journal of Management and Information, etc. And for conferences, International Conference on Telecommunication Systems - Modeling and Analysis, Pacific Asian Conference of Information Systems, International Conference on Information Warfare and Security, and the most often conferences he attend should be IEEE related conferences.

In past few years, Prof. Chu taught some courses, which include SRA 111 - Introduction to Security and Risk Analysis, SRA 221 - Overview of Information Security, IST 220 - Networking and Telecommunications, IST 302 - IT Project Management, IST 321 - Information Technology and Systems Integration, IST 420 - Fundamentals of Systems and Enterprise Integration, IST 402 - Wireless Network Design and Security, IST 421 - Information Technology and Systems Integration II, IST 450 - Information Systems Security, IST 451 - Network Security, IST 454 - Computer and Cyber Forensics, IST 456 - Security and Risk Management, IST 497 - Mobile Information Services: Design and Implementation, and IST 501 - Integrative Theories and Methods of the Information Sciences and Technology.

He was originally from Taiwan. Before he came to the US, he was awarded an MBA from Tatung University (Taiwan), and a B.E. in Industrial Engineering from Chung Yuan University (Taiwan). In 1980, he came here for his Ph.d study. After 4 years , he received his Ph.D. in Business Administration (major in Operations Management and Information Systems) from The Pennsylvania State University.

He had a lot of working experience, both in academe and industry. He was on the business faculties at Iowa State University, Baruch College and the Tatung University, and was in 1991/1992 a Visiting Associate Professor of Management Sciences at the University of Tsukuba (Japan). He is Adjunct Professor of Management and Engineering at the Hebei University of Technology (China), where he is serving as the Chief Academic Advisor to the School of Management. His industrial experience includes serving as a project leader, section chief, and consultant at Tatung Company - a multinational company with headquarters in Taipei and also in providing consulting services to a number of companies in China, Taiwan, and North America.

Now, he and his families are living in State College. He and his wife have 2 children, one is girl who is studying computer science at MIT, the other is a boy who is studying piano at Johns Hopkins.

Although my advisor said he does not have any hobbies, I think he enjoys walking and reading. Besides, he is interested in traveling.

Frankly, I am surprised by my professor's rich experience. He worked at many different places and researched in many different areas. I believe I will learn a lot from him.  

I think the flavor of our college is collaberation and interdisciplinary. IST offers many different interdisciplines programs to both graduate students and undergrduate students. There are two unique bachelor's degree programs: Information Sciences and Technology, and Security and Risk Analysis. For graduate students, there are more opportunities, they can choose their own advisor and program based their research interests. The research areas in IST nearly includs every aspect of people's lives, from education, work, entertainment, health, safety, to national security.

Although there are no departments within IST, it is structured mainly by different research Labs and research centers. We have five big research centers in IST, they are Certer for Infomation Assurance, Center for the Information society, Enterprise informatics and integration center, Network-centric congnition and information fusion, Penn state center for human-computer interaction. Beside these, there is one a affiliated research center, Institute for information policy. Under these research centers, IST has more than ten different Labs. Although they independent research centers and Labs, most of them collaborate with one or more other centers or Labs, as well as collaborate with outside colleges, departments, research institutes or companies. I think this is the most attractive feature of IST.

Now I am working at RFID Lab which is under the Center for Infomation Assurance. It also associates with college of communication, college of engineering and smeal college of business. The missions of the center are: conduct a broad-based research on various aspects (theoretical and applied; technical and managerial; wired and wireless, etc.) of information and cyber security; educate and train information security professionals through degree and continuing education programs, and to insure that information security awareness is instilled in all Penn. State Students; provide assistance and technical supports to industry, non-profit organizations, government, and individuals in the information and cyber security area.

Our Labs' goal and my work is research the broad security issues relate to RFID, especially in the healthcare and supply chain management areas.   

Be honesely, I never thougth about the essential differences between information science and computer science before I applied for my Ph.d study.

When I was applying for Ph.d study, I did some research. At the begining, I always looked for computer science department or computer engineering department. However, I found most of them are focusing on very technical and theoretical computer related areas that are not attracted me so much.  And in the meanwhile, I noticed there is another kind of college call information school. From that time, I gradually paied attentions to I-Schools.

I found the main difference is, I-School concentrates on interdiscipline research. The research of traditional departments or colleges generally restrict within their own areas, for example mathmatic, physics. computer science, most of them just collaborate with their own peers. But in I-Shool, I found there are many people have many different backgrounds, and I nearly can find any primary subjects here. They are willing to work with each other.

It is true, nowadays, the society has become more complex. Many issues can not be solved by only one discipline. People from different fields need to collaborate. So, I-Shool is a great place to integrate these expertise. But the research interests of I-Schools in different universities are not the same. E.g. I-School in University of Texas, they said "Our focus is on information in its social context, from a single user searching for a document, to a government determining the access of its citizenry to public records." And I-School in University of Washington said that, "We are interested in the relationship between information, technology, and people. Expertise in all areas of information is required for the advancement of science, business, education, and culture." And I-School in UC Berkely said "Our work takes us wherever information touches lives, often bringing us into participant with diverse disciplines, from law, sociology, and business to publishing, linguistics, and computer science."

The main reason that I choose join I-School eventually is because my advisor Prof. Chu, and his program. I contacted with Prof. Chu, he introduced his RFID program to me in detail. And explain the benefits and challenges to me that inspired my interests. Thus, I decided to join his very promising program, and I really believed that this is the best choice for me.

My master study inspired my interests toward information security areas. So I followed this track, and wanted to further my study. I did some research, and finally I met my advisor Prof. Chu. He gave me many precious advices that helped me a lot. In the meawhile, he is leading a very promising program which matched my interests perfectlly. Thus, I choose to come here and commit my Ph.d study here.

Moreover, I really believe the RFID is very important for the future, and I can success in this area.

Currently, my research interest is focusd information security area. Especially RFID security and supply chain risk management, my advisor is Prof. Chu.

Both RFID and supply chain management are the new waves for the future, and their security issues have not been paid enough attention. And the integration of RFID and supply chain management may cause more serious security problems. But I will not restrict myself within the above research fields.

RFID technology is used in many different areas in Beijing, e.g. food security system, hotels, supply chain and hospitals, and so on. Among these, people are more interested in the hi-tech tickets of the game which combined RFID into it. And this related to all the audiences, it makes people can actually touch this new techonology.

Normally, there were more than fifty thousand people were entering the buliding like football field, or basket court, or gymnasium at the same time, so it was really hard to figure out this problem. Whereas, people found RFID tickets were actually very helpful. It soared the efficiency of this process. The RFID reader can identify the tickets as well as the tickets' holders within 0.1 second. Besides that, RFID ticket also enhanced the security of the game, people were asked to show their ID when they purchased the ticket, also in the meanwhile their personal information will be stored on a server. Later, when they entered the building, their ID and personal information will be checked. So this prevented the terrorist attacks effectively. 

Here is a picture of the RFID ticket.

I have many hobbies. Especially, I love traveling very much. I have been to a lot of places in China, and most counties in Europe. I really  had a lot of fun and enjoy the trip. I met a lot of great people that from defferent places, and I saw a lot of fantastic views. For some of the places I sware I will go again.

In addtion, I like to do sports, basketball, badminton, swim, and etc. I like to watch soccer, but not actually play it. My favorite game is English Prime League.